Category Archives: Cultural

The flu has flown

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From Flu-zero: More than a year since Australia’s last flu death.

A graph of annual influenza deaths in Australia.

Influenza experts never thought they would see the scenario currently unfolding in Australia.

In a month when flu cases are normally rising to a peak, no deaths have been reported anywhere in the country for the year to date. And according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, the last Australian death officially attributed to influenza was recorded in July 2020.

Professor Ian Barr is the Deputy Director of the World Health Organisation Collaborating Centre for Reference and Research on Influenza at the Doherty Institute. He is frank when asked if he ever imagined the current situation; just 435 cases notified to the Australian Influenza Surveillance Report so far this year and no hospital admissions.

‘No. It’s amazing. Never,’ he told newsGP.

And this is the only comment on the site, by one assumes a medical doctor, Dr Edgard Arslan. He wrote:

It is interesting how the Influenza has gone by more 95% world wide , since COVID emerged in 2020. Maybe the restrictions , social distancing and wearing masks has played a big role in the disappearance of influenza ,but it didn’t work for COVID ???.what kind of flu vaccine are we going to give next year (2022) ?. what strain is it going to be covered ??.are we covered with the same vaccine from 2021? is influenza going to disappear for good ??all those questions with out answers so far . we just have to wait and see.

Covid variants are just words to cover up on death by vaxxine

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The video has been sent to me with these words:

Among the million videos on the web this one has been on my mind for 24 hours. Not sure if this funeral director is correct but worth the listen because experience and common-sense usually trumps pseudo science.

Go to 19mi 45 second, but worth listening to the whole vid.

Basically, he claims the “delta-variant” is code for ‘added deaths, resulting from adverse vax reactions’.

That’s exactly what he says. Here is the link to the source of the vid. There are a million such stories out there but it is hard, for everyone, to believe those who are in charge are actually as callous and cruel as these stories would imply.

Might pair the above with this which is also about the UK: Official data shows people who received a Covid-19 vaccine account for 70% of all-cause deaths during the first 6 months of 2021, with 20% occurring within 21 days of vaccination.

“We are flying blind”

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From Peter Smith at QoL: COVID, Pregnancy and Official Misconceptions. He begins:

It may interest readers to know that Benjamin Netanyahu got the first jab in Israel on December 19, 2020. That’s exactly nine months ago – the gestational period for a human baby. Pregnant women were not included in vaccine trials (see below). Thus, there is no information from clinical trials on reproductive risks and, by definition, we have no extensive and reliable information on the effect of vaccines on new-born babies and infants. We are flying blind; or at least with blurred vision.

For myself, we are now gathering a list of people who will no longer welcome us in their homes until we get the vax. They have already had the vax themselves, so I classify this as a form of misery loves company. If you have had the vax, what are you worried about? 

Of course, there’s a lot to be worried about, specially if you have had the vax. From the comments at Peter’s post:

Vaccines advocated and promoted by the Federal Government , according to current scientific knowledge and previous public statements:

1. do not provide immunity to the SARS Cov-2 virus

2. do not prevent the development of Covid-19

3. May lead to shedding – causing variants and further cases

4. are causing death and serious injury globally

5. long term effects on the health of those jabbed are unknown

6. have not undergone testing for safety

7. may be characterised as a form of genetic modification and while called genetic vaccines by some, are more of a genetic treatment than a vaccine

8. have not been tested for genotoxicity (TGA Freedom of Information)

9. have not been tested to confirm carcinogenicity (TGA Freedom of Information)

10. have not been tested to confirm the effects on fertility (TGA Freedom of Information)

On January 25, 2021, the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) granted provisional approval to Pfizer Australia to supply its mRNA vaccine named Cominarty, indicated for the prevention of Covid-19 in individuals 16 years and older.

The provisional approval process allows for up to six years post-market validation. Such approval is therefore granted on limited safety and efficacy data.

The same people pushing the vax are, not coincidentally, pushing euthanasia. 

PLUS THIS: Coronavirus has become endemic, making Australia’s policy settings obsolete. It’s from The Spectator.

A major study from the National Bureau of Economic Researchin June, based on all-causes mortality data from 44 countries and all US states, concluded that earlier and longer lockdowns do not reduce deaths and if anything, lockdowns may increase deaths. Denmark lifted all restrictions from 10 September, including the requirement for domestic vaccine passports, declaring that Covid-19 is ‘no longer a critical threat to society’. At the time 73% of the population was fully vaccinated and Denmark’s daily new cases were still over 500. Meanwhile Sweden remains an excellent example of a lockdown-light to lockdown-free country with excess deaths lower for every year since 1990/91 bar one (2018/19).

What to do? No one knows. We will have to wait until those in government decide there is an evey better way to screw us over.

The Legal System of the Vaxxinated State

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This is from Law in Nazi Germany with only a single word change required:

  • Unvaxxinted physicians were de-certified, and were no longer allowed to treat vaxxinated patients.
  • The unvaxxinated were prohibited from cinemas, the opera, and concerts.
  • Unvaxxinated children were banned from public schools.
  • Robbing the unvaxxinated became legal.

Not here yet, but perhaps on its way if our political leaders can manage to bring it on. As it says at the post, again with the appropriate adjustments:

The shift from the traditional legal system (the “normative state”) to the Covid ideological mission (the “prerogative state”) enabled all of the subsequent acts of the anti-Covid regime (including its atrocities) to be performed “legally”.

Being “legal” does not make something moral or just.

Judgment call in art

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Here’s a fascinating story: Michelangelo’s Last Judgment—uncensored.

Some of the more controversial nudity in Michelangelo’s Last Judgment was painted over the year after the artist’s death. Those additions were left intact when the Last Judgment was restored in the 1990s, but thanks to a farsighted cardinal we can see what the fresco looked like before it was censored.

Left: Michelangelo Buonarroti | Last Judgment | 1534-41 | Sistine Chapel, Vatican. Right: Marcello Venusti | Last Judgment | Museo e gallerie nazionali di Capodimonte | Images and original data provided by SCALA, Florence/ART RESOURCE, N.Y.; artres.com | (c) 2006, SCALA, Florence/ART RESOURCE, N.Y.

Left: Michelangelo Buonarroti | Last Judgment | 1534-41 | Sistine Chapel, Vatican. Right: Marcello Venusti | Last Judgment | Museo e gallerie nazionali di Capodimonte | Images and original data provided by SCALA, Florence/ART RESOURCE, N.Y.; artres.com | (c) 2006, SCALA, Florence/ART RESOURCE, N.Y.

The Last Judgment was commissioned for the Sistine Chapel by Pope Clement VII just a few days before his death. Michelangelo hadn’t even finished the fresco before controversy erupted over its unclothed figures.

Not long after the painting’s completion, the Council of Trent condemned nudity in religious art, decreeing that “all lasciviousness be avoided; in such wise that figures shall not be painted or adorned with a beauty exciting to lust.” Clement’s successor Pope Pius IV complied with the tenet, and in 1565, the year after Michelangelo’s death, had the more controversial nudity painted over by Daniele da Volterra, earning the artist the nickname Il Braghetonne, “the breeches-maker.” Da Volterra also substantially repainted the figures of Saint Catherine and Saint Blaise, whose positions were considered unseemly. Further coverings were added in the 17th and 18th centuries.

Michelangelo Buonarroti | Last Judgment | 1534-41 | Sistine Chapel, Vatican | photographed before the 1990-1994 restoration | Image and original data provided by SCALA, Florence/ART RESOURCE, N.Y.; artres.com | (c) 2006, SCALA, Florence/ART RESOURCE, N.Y.

Michelangelo Buonarroti | Last Judgment | 1534-41 | Sistine Chapel, Vatican | photographed before the 1990-1994 restoration | Image and original data provided by SCALA, Florence/ART RESOURCE, N.Y.; artres.com | (c) 2006, SCALA, Florence/ART RESOURCE, N.Y.

When the Last Judgment was restored between 1980 and 1994, many expected the work to be returned to its original state before the censorship. But some historians had suggested that da Volterra had scraped away the offending parts and painted on top of freshly-applied plaster–which meant that there was nothing left underneath to restore–so his additions were retained.

Thankfully, the art-loving Cardinal Alessandro Farnese, afraid that the original was going to be destroyed, had commissioned Marcello Venusti to paint a copy of Michelangelo’s Last Judgment in 1549. This tempera painting on wood is now our only guide to what Michelangelo’s work looked like before it was censored.

Marcello Venusti | Last Judgment | Museo e gallerie nazionali di Capodimonte | Image and original data provided by SCALA, Florence/ART RESOURCE, N.Y.; artres.com | (c) 2006, SCALA, Florence//ART RESOURCE, N.Y.

Marcello Venusti | Last Judgment | Museo e gallerie nazionali di Capodimonte | Image and original data provided by SCALA, Florence/ART RESOURCE, N.Y.; artres.com | (c) 2006, SCALA, Florence/ART RESOURCE, N.Y.

Compare Marcello Venusti‘s copy with the pre-restoration Last Judgment in the Artstor Digital Library to see the extent of the changes that were made to the painting. Bonus: Check out the freer interpretation of the Last Judgment by the circle of Giulio Clovio.

They don’t make Disney films like they used to

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Just spent an evening seeing what I could see of Frozen on Youtube, and every one of the cuts I watched made me laugh. So I went to look at what I could find of my own first movie, which was also Walt Disney, and it was Fantasia.

Say I’m around five years old, and it’s in a cinema. And I remember my mother saying to me years later that when we got towards the end, I wanted to go home. So I have just played the final section, and having watched it, I am less surprised that I wanted to leave than that I ever went back. This is not light and amusing. It is fearsome and frightening. Comes in two parts so it lasts around nine minutes. And do I remember this? Do I ever! The aim, I suppose, was to introduce us little children to classical music, but perhaps other things as well.


Would you show your children any of this? What I have always remembered about the movie and loved the memory of was the part with the dinosaurs.

Would you show your children this one either? I’m not even sure I should show this to them even now and they have children of their own, who I would also never want them to see these as well.

Better to watch Frozen for all its political correctness, as I discussed in the previous post.

“No right, no wrong, no rules for me. I’m free”

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My grand-daughter, Age 5, just sang me this.

I’m no expert on modern music and this definitely does not strike me as brilliantly tuneful, but then again, I grew up with Dylan (but also Peter, Paul and Mary). The lyrics I can, however, follow easily enough.

The snow glows white
On the mountain tonight
Not a footprint to be seen
A kingdom of isolation
And it looks like I’m the Queen

The wind is howling
Like this swirling storm inside
Couldn’t keep it in
Heaven knows I tried…

Don’t let them in
Don’t let them see
Be the good girl you always have to be
Conceal
Don’t feel
Don’t let them know…
Well, now they know!

Let it go, let it go
Can’t hold it back anymore
Let it go, let it go
Turn away and slam the door!
I don’t care what they’re going to say
Let the storm rage on
The cold never bothered me anyway

It’s funny how some distance
Makes everything seem small
And the fears that once controlled me
Can’t get to me at all!

It’s time to see
What I can do
To test the limits and break through
No right, no wrong
No rules for me
I’m free!

Let it go! Let it go!
I am one with the wind and sky!
Let it go! Let it go!
You’ll never see me cry!
Here I stand and here I’ll stay
Let the storm rage on…

My power flurries through the air into the ground
My soul is spiraling in frozen fractals all around
And one thought crystallizes like an icy blast
I’m never going back
The past is in the past!

Let it go! Let it go!
And I’ll rise like the break of dawn!
Let it go! Let it go!
That perfect girl is gone!

Here I stand in the light of day…
Let the storm rage on!!!
The cold never bothered me anyway

But I don’t hear what a five-year old girl can hear. So I have now gone looking on the net and found this: What Is the Meaning of Frozen’s “Let It Go”? And bear in mind I haven’t seen the film.

Outside of the context of the story, the lyrics could be applied to anything, which is extremely dangerous. Historically speaking, rejection of established norms, relativism, and finding liberation in these things were key elements of Nazism, as Dr. Modris Eksteins explains in his book Rites of Spring: The Great War and the Birth of the Modern Age. Indeed, anti-establishment attitudes and belief in relativism were also key to the beliefs of Lenin, Trotsky, and Stalin, according to Paul Johnson in his book Modern Times: The World From the Twenties to the Nineties.

This is not to say that the song advocates these beliefs. It does not. However, when removed from the confines of the story, the song can easily become an anthem in favor of these destructive philosophies, though it was not intended to be one.

That’s not what’s in the mind of five-year-olds. But there is some sort of hidden rebellion that is clearly implied. And then this came from an answer on Quora:

It’s okay to be yourself, even when the world won’t accept you. In fact, it’s paramount, because if you repress yourself (conceal… don’t feel) you’ll explode, and end up making life much harder for yourself and for everybody else. You won’t be able to control your emotions or behavior until you accept who you are, and are comfortable with it. You shouldn’t have to fit yourself into a box of what is “perfect” or socially acceptable, because you’re never going to be perfect. It’s also okay to remove yourself from everyone else if you need to (though eventually you do have to reintegrate into society).

Maybe this doesn’t mean all that much any more:

2,600,212,202 views 
 
Nevertheless, this has reached into an awful lot of heads, and the lyrics have obviously resonated. But we’ll only know in around a decade or more what if anything this has meant assuming it has meant anything at all.