Peanut Sniffing Dogs.

Syncro

A Jimmy Carter strap on.

Like a lot of folk I'm more than a little sceptical of this peanut alergy thingy seems a bit.......
I could be wrong....
My dad didn't believe headaches existed....so what do I know????
Perhaps this is from witnessing certain individuals of my aquaintance manifesting the current allergies-----which went into remission when the next allegy arrived on the scene. Such folk always enjow ill health.
Like a concensus of the population, I'm allergic to bullets and explosions.....but....it seems our concerns are not addressed in a sensible manner.
Check out a can or pack of peanuts----by law it has a warning lable.....:
CAUTION:
THIS MAY CONTAIN NUT PRODUCTS

..........WHO-DA-THUNK-IT....

Sasquatch, a bag of peanuts is not a bag of nuts, but may have been contaminated by nuts. Think.

The nuts can fly on nut free flights.
Knowing people with severe nut allergies, they call these people nuts. Enough of this crap!

I thought that law was to protect us from nuts like that Lizzy May from the Greens and Suzuki.

Snicker(s)

hey SDA, I got a great idea. why don't I scour the net for reports of kids going into anaphylactic shock from ingesting nut products and you can all have a good belly laugh about it?

why are you all so anxious to step up and toe the party line on this posting?

may your grandkids die from bee sting allergies. no one is immune.

curious_george at January 9, 2010 4:17 AM

"why don't I scour the net for reports of kids going into anaphylactic shock from ingesting nut products and you can all have a good belly laugh about it?"

Yes, please do, especially for one that occurred on board a Canadian registered aircraft.

Regarding the bee sting allergies, is that on board the same aircraft or WTF?

Don't concern yourself with personal responsibility, it's something beyond your comprehension.

Thanks, George.

I don't want kids to die of anaphylactic shock; I just want the powers-that-be to stop banning everything in the world on the grounds that someone might possibly be inconvenienced by my exercising a mundane freedom.

I wear perfume. I am a monster.

If someone is deathly alergic to peanuts, they need to not eat things that have or might have peanuts in them. And keep an epipen handy, just in case. I'm allergic to nothing and I don't eat peanuts on bloody planes. It's very easy.

(Bernie @2:04 - A Jimmy Carter peanut strap-on. Tee hee, ew.)

Two scenarios - overhead page on Air Canada:

#1 - "We have someone with a severe anaphalactic reaction to peanuts on board, please do not bring out any peanut products"

Reaction by me: Oh, OK

#2 - Transport Canada has mandated, in addition because in the event we are flying over water (many words) - and also, because in the event someone may be allergic to peanuts . . .

Reaction by me: A*******s

A better idea than "nut free zones" for Transport Canada to think about...

How about anyone with an identified nut allergy gets dressed in a full environmental suit for the duration of their time in the airplane. That way they are reasonably accommodating the other 200 passengers who don't have a nut allergy on board the airplane, and actually want their peanut snacks.

Simple.

Ahh....peanuts are not nuts, they're legumes....

Exactly RFC.Never saw a peanut tree in my life and never will.
The n'guba plant was brought to America by African slaves. N'guba has since been corrupted to
Goober and hence Goober Peas.

Know how many Americans died from eating peanuts in 2005 (last year data is available)?

11. (Center for Disease Control).

So what? More people died from lawnmower accidents. Let's ban lawnmowers. They make little plastic lawnmowers for kids too, you know. Damn Big Lawnmower, tryin' to get 'em young...

We all have to die of something, some day. I know that's a shock to even some so-called "conservatives" but that's just the way it is.

We have too many injury lawyers with too much (unbillable) time on their hands plus too many egocentric types willing to fill in that time with the best justice your money can buy.

Kate and Kathy playing blog tag. Cute.

On the subject of blowing up planes, etc. How about this one:

British police arrested three passengers aboard a Dubai-bound Emirates airliner at London's Heathrow airport on Friday on suspicion of making a bomb threat, police said. ... initial searches had found no actual threat to the flight, indicating that the incident may have been an ill-judged prank. The men, aged 58, 48 and 36, were taken into custody for making verbal threats against the crew before take off ...

How many people here think that this was "an ill-judged prank"?

This is nuts.

I sure hope those scanners pick up any illegal nuts (and you can read that anywhere you want!)

I was laughing so hard I meant to say anyway you want (not anywhere). Duh.

I am surprised that this is throughout court system. It sounds more like something that the Human Rights Commission would do. After all, didn’t the HRC rule that one restaurant must keep an employee on even though he/she didn’t wash his/her hands before working with food (after washroom break)?

I have been in countless events and have yet to see a reaction to nuts, because those with an identified nut allergy avoid them.

How have those with an identified nut allergy fly now, or go grocery shopping for that matter? Perhaps they should be issued a neon yellow sign around their neck, stating that they have an identified nut allergy, so those around them can choose to sit in another area. Besides, all we get for out ticket is a free drink and snack as a thank-you.

Perhaps the security before boarding will take nuts away from passengers as they would a bottle of water.

curious george and gellen and other 'leguemophobes',
what was your september 11 moment in the life of peanut fear? Was it that day that a honeybee wandered into the elementary school and some uncaring Christian crusader spilled a can of nuts? Maybe we need to establish a department of home-peanut security? BTW, I know it's 'your type' that is really behind the demise of the honey bee...you, you, 'insectophobe' !!!

I have a severe reaction to liberals/greens and the like. Can I now demand to be seated next to a conservative only?

I am allergic to wasp stings. Does that mean I call the golf course first to make sure they have removed all hives?

As Erik Larsen said at 5:08am - #1 - no one would object to a simple announcement when there is a passenger with an allergy on a flight, and put their peanuts away.

And the only sure way to accomodate those with nut allergies would be to ban nuts outright, everywhere. What difference is there between taking public transit or a train without a nut free zone and taking a plane without a nut free zone? This is ridiculous.

You've got a nut allergy and you have to fly?

Wear a mask. Wear gloves. I know it wouldn't be comfortable for you -- but why should the 249 other passengers be inconvenienced because YOU have a problem?

All of this legislating and making policies for every individual allergy, "challenge" (aka handicap), sensibility, is reaching the point of absolute ridiculousness.

And, of course, the timing totally coincides with the me-myself-and-I generation -- or, maybe, the past two or three generations. I'M SPECIAL. I'M THE CENTRE OF THE UNIVERSE. THE WORLD REVOLVES AROUND ME.

Well, actually, it doesn't. Get over it.

kathy shaidle - using your line of reasoning, shouldn't we ban research and treatment for cancer...'for we all have to die of something some day'. And ban attempts to stop terrorist bombs. And ban..etc.

The agenda is to reduce the ratio of illness or death from such causes.

As for peanuts/nuts and other allergies - they are realities. I don't know what has caused this increase in sensitivities to various products; possibly the other ingredients required for preservation in mass food production. I've no idea.

But I agree that Air Canada has gone too far in authoritarian governance over its passengers. Who knows which twit on its Board thought up this rule?

I was on an Air Panama flight in the spring and to my delight they still give out those little bags of peanuts.

I certainly would never question the reality of severe allergies. However, I recall listening to an allergy expert once who addressed the question of whether an allergic response could be provoked by being in the vicinity of nuts, as opposed to actually ingesting nuts, i.e could the exhalations of fellow passengers on a plane, who have ingested peanuts, provoke an allergic response in a person with a severe peanut allergy. He said no. That leads to the question, how could the presence of nuts on a plane (the peanut sort, not the human kind) lead to an allergic reaction. Since they are distributed in little bags, nobody has to come into contact with them if they are allergic. I am not seeing the problem. Surely people who have a life-threatening allergy have to take the responsibility themselves for ensuring their safety? The whole world cannot be changed for their sensitivity, and if they expect that it will be, then I predict they will have a reasonably short life-span. That is not cruelty, just reality.

"As for peanuts/nuts and other allergies - they are realities. I don't know what has caused this increase in sensitivities to various products; possibly the other ingredients required for preservation in mass food production. I've no idea." - ET

I think that it comes from evolution: a lot of these individuals would have died in the past before having offspring. The same reason that there are many more C section babies now: many of the mothers and children that were born C section would have died in the past, and not carried forward their genetics that predispose them to difficult childbirth.

I'm not saying that life saving surgery and medical treatment are bad, but it will alter the outcome of natural selection, and result in more of the original medical problem.

Weaselfarmer

ET

"""kathy shaidle - using your line of reasoning"""

oxymoron:-)))

Posted by: Kathy Shaidle at January 9, 2010 7:45 AM

... and how many kids drown in bathtubs each year? We should ban those, as well, or - at the very least - set up a Bathtub Registry to make sure they are only made available to certain people and used carefully.

Although this might seem a bit paranoid and over-the-top, it's worth it (everyone, now) "if it saves just ONE life".

mhb23re
at gmail d0t calm

weaselfarmer - but your suggestion of the cause of some of these new allergies, that they are due to individuals who might have died in the past without medical treatments - has to be empirically proven.

That is, you are saying that the cause is genetic and due to 'old genes'; that these 'old genes' are now around because medical intervention enabled them or their parents to live. Is peanut allergy an ancient allergy that has resurfaced due to carriers being enabled to live? I think that needs to be proven!

And frankly, I think it's a weak argument for it ignores that biological dispositions can and do change; are even heritable, and have nothing to do with an 'old gene'.

Same with C-sections; it's not a genetic disposition.

Natural selection is not the only or even major means of adaptive changes in a population.

Coming to a theatre near you, Samuel L. Jackson in Nuts On A Plane!!!
Get that mutha f***ing nut out of my face!

Peanuts were banned from our lunchroom years ago. An employee claimed a reaction took place while walking on the other side of the door. That person had their own lunch room with fridge and microwave. I asked when protein learned to fly?

Banana Airlines - Yes we have no bananas

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WniTTvVBZO4&feature=related

Another nordic country rips Air Canada, polish up your Norwegian! Great fun...

Cheers

Hans-Christian Georg Rupprecht, Commander in Chief

1st Saint Nicolaas Army
Army Group “True North"

ET It's not Air Canada wanting it. It's Transport Canada that want's the nut free zone.

I hate sushi.

Does that make me a sushist?

annoying-monkey said: "why don't I scour the net for reports of kids going into anaphylactic shock from ingesting nut products"

Yes, why don't you do that? If you find -any- that happened on an aircraft it will be extremely surprising.

It is reasonable to ban nuts and peanuts from school lunches because CHILDREN by definition are unable to look after themselves, and are therefore at risk of accidentally eating things that are bad for them. Same reason you don't put the bleach under the sink when toddlers live in the house. This is a no-brainer.

But ADULTS are by definition able to decide for themselves what risks to assume, and children do not go on airplanes unattended. It is therefore utter madness to demand airlines create "nut free zones" on demand. If you're that allergic, or your kid is, wear a respirator or make some other arrangements. Like maybe pony up the cash to charter a specially cleaned airplane. And rent a specially cleaned car when you get there, to drive to your specially cleaned hotel room, yada yada yada.

And I say this as a medical professional (PT) who has a family member with multiple food allergies. The world is not required to change for your convenience, plus it would be rank insanity to trust an airline's "nut free zone" to be 100% in the first place. You take your own food, you take your epi pens and etc, you watch your kids like you're supposed to, and like that.

AKA, you suck it up.

Chew on that georgie-boy.

Now I get why ET gets all touchy whenever I mention national IQs :-)

I thought my point was pretty obvious. Thanks for weighing in with that pointless addition.

Most of these "allergies", along with "asthma" etc are just bourgeois affectations, like the vapors of old. Neurotics inflict (low to moderate) suffering on themselves when they sense their soft, modern lives have become too easy.

People used to pretend to have TB because it make them look more "artistic". Now they pretend to be allergic to things to be special. Everybody has to be "special," everybody has to be "on the honor roll", blah blah blah

Frankly yes I think too much money is spent trying to cure cancer. More should be spent on allieviating the pain etc of chronic, crippling illnesses -- the diseases that won't kill you, but keep you suffering for decades, like MS or MD. Not to mention psychiatric illnesses.

People want to live too long, in perfect shape, and for free. The day we cure cancer, Nature will rise up and invent spancer or prancer or trancer.

We all have to die of something.

It seems that it’s the Canada Transportation Agency (CTA), which is not part of Transport Canada, who rendered the decision about the “buffer zone”. The CTA is an “independent administrative tribunal”; a term that, these days, gives me shivers down my spine. Nonetheless the decision by the CTA in this matter seems to be based on solid science and reasonable balancing of the needs of all parties. Although the allergy sufferers made some fairly aggressive demands, the tribunal was much more objective in their deliberation than those other atrocities, the HRCs.

The airlines are the big winners here. Nuts are expensive snacks. Now they have an excuse for offering passengers crackers, and nothing else.

I agree with those who believe in personal responsibility. I've seen our culture being pulled down to the lowest common denominator for 40 years. My kids had to function at the level of the slowest kid in class, all the way through public school.

I'll never forget their 2nd grade Christmas concert, which they practiced for weeks. During their performance, an autistic kid was howling like a dog, and licking the floor. This kid had been mainstreamed, and the class had to work around him. During class, he was allowed to scream, and throw things, while the other kids were supposed to be working.

The kids were all given sensitivity training, and taught how to deal with his outbursts. It isn't a bad thing, learning to deal with handicapped people, but it really had a negative effect on their regular schooling. I don't know what happened to that kid, but I doubt he ever made it into the regular workforce. There was no advantage to forcing him into the mainstream, since he had little chance of staying there, after public school.

I know, that was a tangent, but I believe it's another symptom of the same disease.

Now they pretend to be allergic to things to be special.

So there I was, just Munchausen on a peanut...

ET- Natural selection is not the only means of adaptive change, but the point of the piece is, it's the more desirable means.

Allowing the weak to survive is good for society, but bad for the species. We seem to have reached a tipping point in our balancing act. Man has achieved all this by forming a strong bond with fragile offspring. We've taken that to extremes, and there may be consequences.

I can hold these opinions, because I have healthy children, but I have empathy for anyone who isn't so lucky. We do what we can for our own situations. A little less intrusion might lead to a little more personal responsibility.

I know a family that went through voluntary sterilization, because their dad was a monster. I don't believe it was all genetic, but they didn't want to take that chance. They seemed like good kids, but it was their choice, and I respect them for it.

kathy - the reason I get all touchy when you mention national IQs is that it is such a moronic idea that it stuns me that anyone can advance it.
An IQ is an INDIVIDUAL physiological capacity of an organism; a NATION is a political and societal construction. Do you seriously equate a material entity with a conceptual entity????? That's unreal!

I think you ought to provide some empirical evidence that, eg, asthma is a 'bourgeois affectation' - i.e., a psychologically induced mode of behaviour and not a physiological reaction. Just because you say it is - I'm afraid that doesn't convince me.

It is equally both illogical and non-empirical for you to state that TB was an 'artistic pretense'. Surely you aren't really stating that TB, as an infectious bacteria-caused disease didn't and doesn't exist.

IF you are talking about neurotics who pretend to have TB (?? example?) and other afflictions - then this is an irrelevant and specious comment. Why? Because that means that you are attempting to define ALL allergic reactions, ALL asthmatic reactions, ALL cases of TB as merely neurotic psychological affectations. Do you really believe that?

Your comment that IF the disease will kill you, THEN, it's a waste of money to research a cure is, if I may say - arrogant nonsense. After all, who are you to judge whether a cure for cancer is a 'waste of money'to the person with that disease?

Who are you to judge whether a disease that lasts for a short time; that affects millions; and that CAN be cured.. is irrelevant while one that lasts for a long time; that affects fewer and that, as of now, has NO cure, merits a lot more research funds and work? Do you know the ratio of funding and research between the two - or are you just speculating?

No, nature is not a speculating Evil Doorman and won't invent a replacement for cancer. Most certainly, we, as matter, are finite; and most certainly, when we fight back against bacteria, that bacteria fights back against us. It too, wants to live.

But we've greatly conquered old diseases such as leprosy, the plague, TB, polio. There aren't any more 'iron lungs' around. People live longer and with a better quality of life than in the medieval or in current third world countries. You, of course, may consider such advances irrelevant. But I consider them examples of both our capacity for reason, and our capacity for care and love of what it is to live.

The same junk rhetoric was used to ban smoking tobacco, first they came for the Jews....intolerance via nanny state is a Communist template.

Kathy doesn't really believe that these are bourgeois affectations. That's her patented and highly entertaining rant-mode affectation (the post 9/11 conservative who's in a hurry to make up for past lefty lunacy).

HOWEVER, Kathy is absolutely right that this story is emblematic of a very serious problem in modern western society: Softness. Weepiness (think of those sick road side accident shrines). Sentimentality. Weakness. Excessive earnestness. Suicidal risk aversion of imagined threats. Obsessive imagined specialness. Moral posturing. Hysteria (think of all those hoax child care abuse stories and their therapetic enablers).

The root of this ridiculous story is how absolutely dependent we've become on the state for the solution to all problems, real and imagined.

In a more robust age, the afflicted person might say a quick word to the flight attendant and perhaps the person sitting in the next seat. She would perhaps take her own lunch, or as my daughter puts it: self cater! She would certainly eschew all proferred airline snacks.
And if the afflicted is really so neurotic to think that she can be harmed by essence of nut wafting through the air, as batb suggests, wear a mask.

I share Kathy's frustration 101%. I'm sick to death of this infantalized, sissified society. And I'm sick of seeing my dead father shaking his head.

Moreover, think of the wasted bureaucratic energy here. Air Canada has been issued a order to respond. They've got to now put together some kind of bullshit policy and respond. This bureaucratic energey could be better spent on a whole host of issues to better serve the travelling public.

I know: how 'bout a fear of heights free zone?

me no dhimmi - are you sure Kathy doesn't believe that various physiological ailments are 'bouregois affectations'??

The issue where I'd agree with you is the abdication of personal responsibility in our modern society. We insist that govt, as our nanny, look after us completely. We take no responsibility.

As you point out, a responsible person would bring their own food, avoid known allergens and, basically, look after themselves.

I suspect that the whole issue is really a cost-cutting measure, but the BoardRoom of Air Canada doesn't want THIS reason to be known and instead, cloaked it in the absurdity of Care and Concern for its passengers. Rather than its bankbook.

The latest scientific news regarding peanut allegies is that exposure to said nuts can cure the allegy. Many of those diagnosed with nut allergies are not actually allergic but Mom is one of those Moms that raises her kids to be afraid of everything including food.

That sounds like a tough sell, Rose, but you might have something there. I've had some experience with another questionable affliction, 'sport induced asthma'. I don't know if it's real or imagined, but for kids who have it, it seems real enough.

When kids used to choke up, and lose matches, we'd tell them they need to train harder. Now we tell them to use a puffer, before competition. It works, more often than not. It could be a placebo effect, I suppose. With all the substances that have been banned from sport, it's odd that asthma puffers have been allowed in recent times.

Are peanut allergies so serious that a sufferer can't inhale microscopic quantities of peanut-dust from someone munching three aisles over? Because look, in that case these poor people need to go live in a bubble. Seriously. Like the "Bubble Boy" on Seinfeld who cheats at Trivial Pursuit.

If you can't survive on the sidewalk, you can't survive on an airplane.

A great many "illnesses" are "bouregois affectations". Like this stupid perfume allergy thing (a big deal in the cultural hub that is Halifax - we're leading the world, don't you know). My line on that one has always been: Find me an black guy in his twenties who works out and has a perfume allergy.

The slippery slope argument applies, as it usually does. Someone is or will pretend to be or will decide they are (she is) allergic to anything. Than anything and everything can be banned, and bye-bye freedom.

Al the fish @12:09 - I think that might be "I have had it with these muthaf*(&in' legumes on this muthaf@*$in' plane!!!"

Touché, Black Mamba: If you can't survive on the sidewalk, you can't survive on an airplane.

LOL!

Black Mamba: Out on errands this afternoon and BEFORE reading your post, I thought of Seinfeld's Bubble Boy. Was amusing myself with the notion that perhaps, to liberate the Bubble Boy and to express our solidarity, we unafflicted could all be encased in bubbles.

Sorta related (modern hypersensitivity): at the Whole Foods shop I go to (mostly for the salad bar) in Vancouver, at the deli there's a sign warning us that their slicer slices non-organic as well as organic foods. Reflect on that for a moment: the notion that ordinary food processed by modern high-tech standards might CONTAMINATE the organic food grown and tended by ancient methods and costing twice as much!

At the salad bar itself, we are advised that the green tongs are for organic items ONLY and are kindly asked to make sure that the green tongs stay with the organic items.
Which leads me to wonder whether or not there should be a non-organic food free zone on the aircraft.

Me No Dhimmi @4:16 - "Kathy doesn't really believe these are bourgeois affectations. That's her patented and highly entertaining rant-mode affectations..."

Dude, you know I'm fond of you, right?

How do I put this? Kathy has a problem - and quite rightly, says me - with this whole "Glenn Beck doesn't mean a word he says" and "Rush Limbaugh is a charlatan who'se making it up for money and a laugh" thing that some lefties float.

Ans as I remember, she also recently pointed out that nobody's ever really kidding.

Which gave me pause, when I read it.

Disagree with her if you want, but she's not faking.

who's.

And.

When my kids were young, we were instructed not to send anything containing nuts in their lunches.

We ignored it and sent peanut butter if they wanted. Told them not to share with the alergic kids.

Bottom line we are not our brother's keepers - alergic or not.

My wife's alergic - I just tell her to stay away from my nuts.....

Dave.

You must eat peanuts to have a re-action. Touching or smelling them does no harm. There is lots of real studies out there that proves this. Go to junk food science blog, lots of big time reading on this.

Black Mamba:

Yeah, I'm fond -- very fond -- of you too! Enjoy your stuff immensely.

I'm in a bit of a panic here 'cos I certainly didn't mean to suggest that Kathy is faking in any way shape or form (ala, the left's phony dismissal of Beck and Rush as mere opportunists who'd reverse positions for a bit more dough). Oh, no, not at all.

I admire the woman and believe she's totally sincere. All I was trying to say is that she has a deliberately provocative over-the-top style and often engages in hyperbole to land her points. One simple example: were she commander in chief, I don't think she'd actually just drop nukes in troublesome places. This "nuke 'em" meme is not meant to be taken quite as literally as some of our delicate brothers and sisters of the left would like to take it.

Kathy's "Come and get me fairies" gives me paroxysms of laughter but you will have to admit that there are constituencies (including venerable regulars Vitruvius and ET) who reject messages delivered in this format, just as, for example, the very brilliant Coulter is dismissed because of her style.

I think Kathy's "nuke em" meme is meant to be taken literally. It's the main reason I actually respect her. People should be taken at their word.

Anyone who really thinks about it will realize we will eventually come to blows with different cultures. Nukes save lives. The lives of those who launch them without hesitation.

Me No Dhimmi - maybe I'm naive. I'm inclined to take Kathy at her word. Nobody's ever really kidding

I agree with Kathy, ban lawnmowers from airplanes!

Oh, and, uh: Hyperbole, schmyperbole.

Black Mamba and Me No Dhimmi, as Kathy herself puts it: Five Feet of Fury, and outta my way!

'Not to be messed with.

As I noted with my earlier post, I am morte than a bit suspicious about a lot of this. Kathy just expressed it better....not difficult....
I recall when smoking was allowed on airliners....in the back.....then.....a total smoking ban.
The energy crunch following the failed Yom Kippur War was the real cause.
Airliners pressurize via openings in the front and rear.....controlling the flow at the various ports renders pressurization...in the same manner air-conditioned tractor cabs exclude dust.
The incoming frigid air must be heated.....banning smoking reduces the air needed to be heated and save fuel....and creats the stuffy, unhealthy interior atmosphere.
But the propaganda made it seem to be about protecting the passengers from the dreaded "secondhand smoke". A situation the "smoke nazis" exploited shamelessly.
My former GP is the local anti-smoking activist----who prescibes meds over the telephone to nursing homes----or tries to----the staff makes him come and actually examine the resident---kudos to the staff.

Isn't that not to be meshed with?

Syncro

The problem with the whole I'm Angry and I'm Proud of It
shtick was perhaps best elucidated by Albert Einstein, who
noted that: "Anger dwells only in the bosom of fools".

And the Good Book says, "Be angry but don't sin" (Ephesians 4:26).

Say what you mean, mean what you say, and don't kick the dog.

What's wrong with that?

That book is wrong.

And, Vit, I guess you're never angry? ;-)

Anger denied is certainly unhealthy (remember those 70s "new age cults" like est, and stuff, in which folks walked around with pasted on smiles).

Anger expressed openly and honestly is healthy.
Anger is a normal human emotion, and as such one cannot be a fool to experience it. To hold it in, though, for a long period of time, can be corrosive to ones personality.

What Einstein thought of anger is of no special consequence. His genius in the field of mathematics/physics doesn't necessarily translate to other fields of inquiry. I gather, for example, that he was a fan of socialism, and didn't understand free markets.

And I spose a spike in adrenaline is foolish too eh?

It is not the case that I have never been angry, BATB, however, I have been working on the problem diligently, and I can say (with some degree of satisfaction) that I have been continuing to advance my skills thereto: day by day I care less and less about more and more. And, indeed, the blog-o-sphere has helped me out immensely here: before I had such good data on how normal people (present company excluded, of course) actually think, that is to say, when I thought much more highly of our species, I cared to a degree that I now realize was far too high.

Thus have I chucked out any transient sense of studied pessimism that I might have been temporarily entertaining, and returned to the sense of mindless optimism that characterized my behaviour before that, for as Heinlein said: "Don't ever become a pessimist... a pessimist is correct oftener than an optimist, but an optimist has more fun, and neither can stop the march of events".

Yeah, Me No Dhimmi. Check!

Vitruvius, I'm a cheerleader for optimism if that works for you.

However, I do detect an animus to religion which is of concern to me.

I've just come across this link which made me think of you:

http://bigjournalism.com/bhallowell/2010/01/10/o-ye-of-little-faith-the-secular-american-media-and-religion/#more-1694

You know, it's not just the secular american media that thinks that religious faith is a bad word -- well, two bad words.

Your detector is faulty. I'm not opposed to religion, some of the best people I know are religious. And some are not religious. So I have no animosity thereto either way, rather, as I explained above: I don't care. Proselytizing, on the other hand, is a different matter. Proselytizers should be shot (but I don't mean that in an angry way).

Vit, could you give me your definition of a proselytizer? (And I appreciate your not telling me in an angry way ... if you're really not angry ;-)

My understanding, BATB, is that proselytize means "to induce a person to convert from one belief, doctrine, cause, or faith to another". It's the word induce that's the problem for me, if it was simply invite then it would just be another case of my not caring. And I truly don't mean shot in an angry way, as I explained above: I mean shot in an optimistic way.

Well, I'm relieved that when you say they should be shot you mean it in an optimistic way. I'm sure it makes all the difference. (Do you just hit them in the leg?)

When you've been blessed by the gift of faith -- and all that that means: forgiveness, healing, joy, hope -- you want to share what you've experienced about G*d in your life and you are called to share it. It's the most generous thing you can do. But, I like the distinction you make between inviting others to openness to your faith and inducing them, forcing them, threatening them to embrace your faith.

The latter approach never works in my experience. You might be able to produce a head count for head office, but hearts and minds aren't fundamentally changed -- and may be damaged.

Damaged, or shot! And now, BATB, I think we should activate
the extended debate avoidance rule noted below, and let it go at
that. I must say though, that, as always, it's been a slice ;-)

;-)