How did the great rivers and seas gain dominion over the hundred lesser streams?
By being lower than they.
- Lao Tzu [A simple question for thought on the death bed]
Look, blog: we (royal noun) don’t want to sound like big headed ocean here, but the past 12 months has pretty much been the best internet year of our lives. Judging by Blogstreet, top 100 political blogs or flyaway simulation top 3200 Reads, we consider 2004 to be a year of pretty big waves in the sea of digital blogging as well as digging of useful links. We know most of you like MEdia Dragon best when we are broken and crippled with self doubt or facing disasters so as a result 2005 is unlikely to reverse our misfortunes (smile).
Among other things, we believe that fogged memory and slowed wit are not the inevitable consequences of, say, becoming a parent and/or acquiring more and more salty hair. So help MEdia Dragon each day to find that extra thoughtful story, play River Crossing, solve the Sydney Morning Herald crossword puzzle, learn how to make the perfect coffee...
And help us to write that second volume of stories covering 1980-2002 period in Sydney, the city of exiles, of course. Sydney does not get celebrated enough in the written word yet it is the city peppered with wild men and women ....
Tracking Trends Great & Small: 'People flung into the air like confetti': 'Tsunami' born out of disaster
All of us live at the mercy of pitiless political and natural forces beyond our control. Not unlike tsunami, specter of political powerlessness is haunting us everywhere. Internet instills a major shift in mindsets so that egalitarianism is no more merely conceptual. Winner takes its all mentality has successfully spread its tentacles deep into our societal fabric and has infiltrated our institutions. Bloggers stand out as the particularly liberated group of the egalitarian "success" story. [To a certain extend, anyone, anywhere, anytime can be a blogger.] It looks like the entire world is keen to make a creative leap into a new desirable action. Any idea that one and all unites in mercy tends to be saturated in hope.
Why weren't these problems obvious to the Maya kings, who could surely see their forests vanishing and their hills becoming eroded? Part of the reason was that the kings were able to insulate themselves from problems afflicting the rest of society. By extracting wealth from commoners, they could remain well fed while everyone else was slowly starving. What's more, the kings were preoccupied with their own power struggles. They had to concentrate on fighting one another and keeping up their images through ostentatious displays of wealth. By insulating themselves in the short run from the problems of society, the elite merely bought themselves the privilege of being among the last to starve. Ach, sound like feudalism and communism and out of control capitalism lessons in the nutshell! The Ends of the World as We Know Them
It is clear that a true democratization of our society starts by chipping away at the deeply encrusted institutional practices, which reproduce systemic inequalities of power on the basis of race, gender, caste or communal creed. Dissidents, like a number of soulful bloggers, know that alternatives exist, but their inclusion requires a context of diversity. Shifting to diversity as a mode of thought, a context of action, allows multiple choices to emerge. We need dissent and diversity in the public service, the media, the legislatures as well as at schools and universities.
Vaclav Havel heralded a new era in 1970s when he sang about a wake up call:
The dissident does not operate in the realm of genuine power at all. He is not seeking power. He has no desire for office and does not gather votes. He does not attempt to charm the public, he offers nothing and promises nothing. He can offer, if anything, only his own skin -- and he offers it solely because he has no other way of affirming the truth he stands for. His actions simply articulate his dignity as a citizen, regardless of the cost.
Apparently, it is now an act of treason to laugh at politicians who have three cars yet cannot drive one of them. It is also a treason to offer an opinion on the self interest prevail metality among the union structure that goes against the conventional egalitarian wisdom.
There are a few bloggers that defy classification more than the Samizdat Underground. While blogging is global language, traditional storytelling and colourful vocals mixed with photography are often difficult to place in a frame of reference. Part politics, part celebration of life, part risk taking so click on the links on your left for an uncompromising blogging experience which we can all take something from. I like to enter the world of David, Giana , Tim, John and the list goes on and on. The bloggers I enjoy do not suggest in any way that have a monopoly on truth and trust. They are survivors with human face and action not just rhetorical words to back it up ... I hope they will touch you in a special way, a different way, a risk taking way ...
"Tsunami" has touched the hearts of hundreds of people who survived last Sunday's earthquake and towering wave
• A woman who gave birth prematurely in the forests of a remote Indian island sheltering from killer tidal waves named the girl Tsunam [10 miracles of survival in the wake of catastrophe; Google compiles Tsunami sites ]
• · Australia's eastern seaboard bears the scars of tsunami
• · · Donations at ‘unprecedented’ levels Relief Groups Hail Level of Donations by Individuals
• · · · Angel at 10 There was about 10 minutes from the moment the ocean draws out before the tsunami strikes
• · · · · Standing on the shoulders of giants Don't forget, the people of the United States are the most generous people in the world. We don't expect our Government to spend our money for us. We take care of that ourselves
• · · · · · Philippe Van Parijs A Basic Income for All