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| My caption:"Freedom's just another word for nothin' left to lose"? - In this case there's plenty! |
American electoral politics have become more than slightly unhinged this year. From this brief overview of Prada male fashion for coming seasons, it appears the fashion world may not be far behind. "Some people are merely boringly insane. Others are precociously loopy as a lariat. And then, most dangerous of all, are those who are crazy as a soup sandwich."
(Harlan Ellison when working as Creative Consultant on the CBS-TV reboot of The Twilight Zone, 1983.
Diego Goldberg's The Arrow of Time celebrates 40 years this year - it's now updated with current facial portraits of the family.
How to be a Grandpa.Give your granddaughter a pad of post-it tabs and hold still.
No training necessary. Grand-daughters supply all the imagination.
"Politics is the art of choosing between the disastrous and the unpalatable."
John Galbraith.
Lastly...something completely different:
These words came from the writings of the late Jonathan Cainer, from the section "Introducing the Moon" in The Psychic Explorer which rests in my bookshelf. It's described as "A down-to-earth guide to six magical arts: astrology, auras, the Tarot, dowsing, palmistry, ESP", by Jonathan Cainer & Carl Rider. First published in 1986. Astrological input from Mr. Cainer; Mr. Rider is a writer and philosopher who specialises in psychic and paranormal research.
Our modern world is very solar. Despite recent advances in the feminist cause, we still live in a society dominated by male energy - and perhaps that is one reason why masculine sun signs have become so popular! There is a strong tendency for most of us to accept glib, generalized information and simplified scientific truisms. The sun rules "simplicity", and it also speaks of "material growth and self-interest", two very characteristic 20th-century ideals. The lunar principles of compassion, sympathy and understanding do exist in our world, but most of us would agree that they normally play a muted second fiddle in the process of human motivation.
.......It is crucial to recognize that people of either sex have two sides to their personality. Inside every macho man is a soft, poetic, sensitive individual trying to get out. Inside every soft woman is a strong, capable and ambitious person waiting for an opportunity to express herself. However, most women, at least on a superficial level, find it easier to identify with the lunar side of their character, while most men have more affinity with solar energy. In other words, women are often more in touch with their moon signs and men with their sun signs.
If you can accept the notion that each individual is not just a one-dimensional personality with a cardboard cut-out facade but a complicated, sensitive mixture of differing (and sometimes opposing) inclinations, you are ready to enter the world of real astrology......
Does Brexit conservatism foretell a similar fate for the USA? Fortunately, the Saturn-Neptune square will be fading, with 6* of separation...another Aquarius Moon, though, and several spurious aspects. Neptune on the S Node...delusions of past grandeur?
ReplyDeleteAn article on the Intercept site indicates nothing happens until Article 50 of the EU agreement is instigated and so far, no go. "...the measure Britons just voted for 'was an advisory not a mandatory referendum,' meaning that it is not legally binding on the government.":
"British Exit From EU Not Inevitable, Despite Referendum"
https://theintercept.com/2016/06/24/british-exit-eu-still-not-inevitable-despite-referendum/
A big UGH to Prada's fashionable men for spring-summer 2017. Maybe Justin Beiber will embrace the look and set the trend.
I have my own "Arrow of Time" called my bathroom mirror. I'm not too excited about pictures of myself anymore, not that I ever was, but I've gained a tremendous likeness to my maternal grandfather these past several years...LOL.
As for eye-wear, I only require magnification for reading and everyday tasks. Always off-the-shelf glasses from my local grocer or drugstore, usually not exceeding a couple of dollars, specially if on sale. I do need to increase the magnification, so I'll be upgrading soon to the telescopic level.
Re - Son and granddaughter...The old-fashioned way of "blurring" the faces. Living in the digital age, we've become accustomed to seeing the faces of the innocents as obnubilates.
Cainer was obviously naive or new to the feminist movement when he wrote his paragraphs. Thirty years later, his words smack of sexism, though I'm sure he thought otherwise at that time. One of the pluses to astrology is the obliteration of gender...knowing the sex of the individual isn't required to interpret a natal chart, nor would I identify the gender based on the chart.
Our current gender identification dynamics have some novel introductions of late. I just read that demonyms such as latino-latina are now appropriately defined as latinx. Same for salutations and honorifics:
" 'Mx.' was added to Merriam Webster's unabridged dictionary in April, has begun to be used on official forms in the UK (the Royal Bank of Scotland has been an early adopter), and appeared in two recent stories in the New York Times, once as a preferred honorific for a Barnard College student who doesn't identify as male or female, and once in a story about 'Mx.' itself."
http://kottke.org/16/06/x-marks-gender-neutral
mike ~ mike ~ It's hard to compare the UK with the USA in relation to Brexit. We may be similar in some ways but quite different in others. there's a lot of BS being written around the net regarding Brexit currently by people who don't know enough about it.
ReplyDeleteYes, I'd read a while ago that the referendum need not be binding - but so far it appears it will be. I wish they had included in the requirements some cut-off percentage of difference between leave and remain. 52+ and 48+ seems not a big enough divide to take such a huge step into the unknown. I'm not confident that enough of the voters knew exactly what they were setting in motion. I've signed a petition for another referendum - yesterday there were more than 200,000 signatures on it, making it essential that parliament must consider the request. I'm not optimistic though.
I was surprised at your comment about Jonathan Cainer's words. I see no sexism there at all. I've always considered that we all have a bit of male and a bit of female within us - the yin/yang. Astrology doesn't indicate gender - but it does indicate the balance of male/female positive/negative yin/yang - whatever one terns the polarity thing.
mike ~ Re the petition - update this morning
ReplyDeletehttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/petition-eu-referendum-million-signatures_us_576e58ebe4b0dbb1bbbab919?section=http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/petition-eu-referendum-million-signatures_us_576e58ebe4b0dbb1bbbab919?section=
Re - The petition - It seems strange to me to call for another referendum. I don't like Hillary as the DNC nominee and there was some hook-by-crook activity there, but so be it. To the best of my knowledge, the Brexit vote was a legitimate vote, at least the mechanics of it. Weather may have been problematic in the vicinity of London, which was thought to be a pro-EU area. A re-vote will only deepen the divide, regardless of outcome. What happens if the re-vote results in pro-EU? Hold another election, the third, to determine the actual outcome? It's unfortunate that the gravity of this referendum was not thought-out by the average voter before the votes were cast.
ReplyDeleteThe planetary transits' astrology of that particular day was certainly not the best for an election, particularly the Moon's position and aspects it made. I suspect the emotional, feeling, subconscious mind of the voters was expressed that day rather than the more rational, intellectualized focus on the decision.
Re - Cainer - The excerpt, "Inside every macho man is a soft, poetic, sensitive individual trying to get out. Inside every soft woman is a strong, capable and ambitious person waiting for an opportunity to express herself. However, most women, at least on a superficial level, find it easier to identify with the lunar side of their character, while most men have more affinity with solar energy.", is full of stereotype by today's standards. Cainer wasn't being discriminatory, but he was applying traditional stereotypes based on societal and cultural expectations. I'm not trying to belabor the point, but nowadays there should be no dividing line between the genders, unless one wants to identify or apply it to themselves. Gender isn't even defined by gonads or genetic Xs and Ys anymore...LOL.
In the too many articles I've read on Brexit, two comments stood out...can't find them, but the paraphrase:
ReplyDelete- The UK wants a divorce, while retaining a friends-with-benefits association with the occasional shag.
- The UK is treating the EU as if there's a drawbridge between them, but not remembering which side the hinge is on.
mike (again) ~ In my opinion the referendum was a very bad idea to start with! A referendum on a simple proposition, easily understood by ordinary people, is one thing - this was a quite different and crucially important and complex matter. Anyway, it's done now, and the petition is just - well - a petition indicating displeasure, and I guess that's all it will amount to, letting off a bit of steam.
ReplyDeleteYou have said though, astrologically, all may not be as it seems on the surface right now - we'll see in a month or two. The exit ain't going to be quick and easy, no matter what the EU officials demand.
The more I read about voters' supposed motives, the more I am confused about Brexit.
There appears to have been a tangle of anti-neo-liberal feelings to policies of the EU (much the same as Bernie supporters here feel about DNC, Clintons etc.) But there are also heavy strands of something far more dangerous: nationalism, anti-immigrant feeling, something so right-wing as to be almost fascistic - the Trump-like factor. Those two strands of motivation are so different. Which will be uppermost when the dust settles (if it ever does)?
Re Jonathan Cainer's words: We all read things differently, we shall agree to (slightly) disagree. I do agree that there should be no dividing lines, in how we approach people. That old "Men are from Mars Women are from Venus" thing has always irritatesd me. But there are biological and hormonal lines which define male/female, can't deny that. I've had arguments before stating more or less what you are saying and been shouted down.
I like to approach a person as a person, a human. This is partly why I cannot get on board the Feminism (capital F) bandwagon. Equal pay, equal opportunity, equal treatment - yes, of course. Beyond that it becomes reverse sexism, in my view.
"Saturday and Sundries" That's clever.
ReplyDeleteanyjazz ~ Ta!
ReplyDelete