Sect Schools

Any of you who think that so called 'faith schools' are only encouraging and promoting divisiveness and conflict might be interested in this online petition, which:

• proposes the term "sect school" in place of the term "faith school"
  


• calls for amendments to the Education Bill (published 28th February 2006) to prevent the further proliferation of sect schools in the UK
  


• calls for an end to state-funded education which is controlled by any religious group or affiliated with any religious beliefs
  

More at The Brights.

Edit: You can also petition the UK government direct at http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/nofaithinschools/, although this may just be a ploy to gather names and addresses so that they can send the black vans round. Paranoid, me?

Bad Code

The "Bad Code" posting on Wired's 27B Stroke 6 blog is both funny and sad. I can't add much to it, just go and read. If you aren't a coder, a little bit of background research might be needed, but it isn't too hard.

big and bad

I was cycling around Warwickshire in an eco-friendly sort of way at the weekend, and in between the excessively frequent stops to repair the damage caused by the visits of the puncture fairy I was thinking about SUVs. Probably prompted by the amount of time one has to spend as a cyclist trying to avoid being killed by them, I was trying to figure out why a) they existed at all and b) why they sold in such numbers. Engineers are generally rational people, so why would they create something quite as preposterous as a Porsche Cayenne Turbo? Obviously, they did it because they wanted to keep their jobs and feed their children, but apart from relishing the challenge of building a 2 tonne off-roader that will go from 0-60 in under 5 seconds, can they really have felt happy about what they were doing? Engineering is about solving problems, but the modern SUV solves very few problems while creating rather a lot of them. In the beginning, SUVs existed as workhorses, to be used by farmers, foresters, explorers and construction workers to get places ordinary cars couldn't go. If you've ever been in a Willys Jeep or a Series 1 Landrover, you will appreciate just how utilitarian these utility vehicles were. Then for many years, the Range Rover was the only 'luxury' 4x4, sold to the landowners rather than their staff, and just as acceptable in Mayfair as in the country. The wider popularity of alleged off-roaders was driven by the American market (the Cayenne and the BMW X5 were created for that market), and according to the American Automobile industry, SUV purchasers

"tend to be people who are insecure and vain. They are frequently nervous about their marriages and uncomfortable about parenthood. They often lack confidence in their driving skills. Above all, they are apt to be self-centered and self-absorbed, with little interest in their neighbors or communities."

(Keith Bradsher, "High and Mighty: The Dangerous Rise of the SUV")

So the problem SUVs solve is how to sell more vehicles to vain, selfish, nervous people, and for that the rest of us must accept unnecessary levels of pollution, increased accident risks and many other reductions in our quality of life. Would it not have been a btter engineering solution to invest in some education and therapy?

Fruitstock

Just got back from a day at fruitstock with my children. What inspired marketing! For less than the cost of a TV advert, Innocent make a lot of friends,, enhance their cool image, and give a lot of people a good time. As you can see from the picture, it was pretty popular.

Welcoming Homer the tree-hugger

In his post in the BBC's Green Room series, George Meyer welcomes hypocrites to the green cause. Because even hypocrites are better than evironmental rapists who neither know nor care what damage they do. He says:

We will now accept:

* Ignoramuses
* Poseurs
* Backstabbers
* Know-it-alls
* Opportunists
* Busybodies
* Hypocrites (like me)
* People Who Talk a Good Game
* Total Nutjobs

It's wide open. If Michael Crichton ever comes to his senses, we'll even take him. He's a big fellow, maybe he can lug around pamphlets or something.

It's a fair point - the recent evidence of the speed with which the glaciers and ice-caps are shrinking makes it clear that the change is real and accelerating. It is no time to be snobbish about who's on board the bus.

Don't go quietly

In 1988 the following text was published in full page advertisements in the quality papers:

We have had less freedom than we believed. That which we have enjoyed has been too dependent on the benevolence of our rulers. Our freedoms have remained their possession, rationed out to us as subjects rather than being our own inalienable possession as citizens. To make real the freedoms we once took for granted means for the first time to take them for ourselves.

The time has come to demand political, civil and human rights in the United Kingdom. We call, therefore, for a new constitutional settlement which will:-

• Enshrine, by means of a Bill of Rights, such civil liberties as the right to peaceful assembly, to freedom of association, to freedom from discrimination, to freedom from detention without trial, to trial by jury, to privacy and to freedom of expression.
  Subject Executive powers and prerogatives, by whomsoever exercised, to the rule of law.


• Establish freedom of information and open government.


• Create a fair electoral system of proportional representation.


• Reform the Upper House to establish a democratic, non-hereditary Second Chamber.


• Place the Executive under the power of a democratically renewed Parliament and all agencies of the state under the rule of law.


• Ensure the independence of a reformed judiciary.
  Provide legal remedies for all abuses of power by the state and by officials of central and local government.


• Guarantee an equitable distribution of power between the nations of the United Kingdom and between local, regional and central government.


• Draw up a written constitution anchored in the ideal of universal citizenship, that incorporates these reforms.

The inscription of laws does not guarantee their realisation. Only people themselves can ensure freedom, democracy and equality before the law. Nonetheless, such ends are far better demanded, and more effectively obtained and guarded, once they belong to everyone by inalienable right.Add your name to ours. sign the charter now!

That was Charter 88; signatories were led by Lord Scarman and many other high profile figures from the law, civil service, politics, media and business. How much progress have we made in nearly 20 years? You can still follow that link and add your name, and you can still apply pressure for our democracy to be made as good as we like to think it is.

Please send money now

For years, I have deliberately avoided skiing, as the last thing I need is another expensive hobby, especially one that also demands large chunks of my annual leave. Then, last autumn, my wife suggested that we share a chalet with some friends. We quickly realised that we'd left booking a bit late but eventually, having got nowhere with internet searches and so-called specialist ski agents, our local travel agency found us a place in Les Deux Alpes for the February half-term week. The most expensive week in the calendar :-(

So that I wouldn't look a complete muppet when I got there, I booked a 'Learn to Ski in a Day' session at the Snowdome in Tamworth. That was well worth the money, and the instructor was excellent. More than can be said for me. My excuse is that my unicyclist insticts are just all wrong for skiing.

Once in Les Deux Alpes, for the first couple of days, I was just crap. I heard what the instructors said, but I just could not make it happen. I lay in bed at the end of day 2 thinking that I had just wasted thousands of pounds (family of 5 in peak week) - I was really quite fed up. By day three, I was just getting the ocasional feeling that I'd got it right and I was feeling better about it. On day 4 I forgot my lift pass and had to miss the lesson, so I got to spend the morning just practising the things that I felt I needed to. That really helped, and by day 6 I'd got it and was hooked. Now my problem is how to find the money to do it at least once every year.

Never apologise never explain

Right