My Dear Hard Drive

Archive for the ‘Society’ Category

I stumbled across a thought today in the super market. I was looking around watching the men shopping for weekend before Australia Day barbecue probably, because there was an unusual amount of men around. I like watching Aussie men because they feel so comfy. And then it hit me: “They are not confused about what they are or what they should be.” The Australian culture is pretty clear about its ideal man, agreed upon by all, mothers, sisters, brothers, mates, teachers, customers, children… Everyone agrees on what a decent, good Aussie bloke is like. It’s not like that in many countries. We have sub cultures, different ideas and ideals, metrosexuals, gangs, players and stayers, in Australia, all of those fall under one; A good Aussie bloke. (Or maybe it’s fair dinkum Aussie bloke?)

A good Aussie man has a great sense of humour. That is the requirement number one. Maybe that’s why I haven’t yet seen one believable emo in this place. They have to know how to joke and how to take a prank. They are a cheery bunch, and when I met my nephews(-in-law) for the first time, the most prominent feature of either one was a beaming smile. (Both of them are so damned skinny they nearly disappear behind all that smiling they do.) Even when the Aussie men are serious, you can’t completely wipe out the humour, which is similar to the men of my home county back in Finland, maybe that’s why I feel so at home here, someone described them as: “being with a straight face but not serious”.

The Aussie bloke loves his shed where he pretends to be working on things – sometimes he even manages that. Mainly the shed is for male bonding purposes, but working is definitely allowed. The shed is an important part of even the life of Aussie gay men, who instead of chopping wood or working on a boat create art in their shed. Completely allowed.

Ideally, the Aussie Bloke is a sports man. What ever sport he chooses is good, but the heights of masculinity cannot be surpassed if you are an Aussie Footy player. (That’s Australian Rules Football.) Whether you like footy or not – some idiots here hate it, they’re all women though, and if not, they at least should wear a skit – everyone is in agreement that a footy player is definitely a good bloke (or in trouble with the police for violent behaviour or sexual offences, which is definitely not looked favourably upon and is not fit for a good Aussie bloke).

It is also worth a mention, that it is very much allowed for that Aussie bloke to be a good father and a family man. In many cultures, when a man marries, he loses some of his masculinity, and automatically becomes “pussy whipped” as they say here. That is the general assumption, and men with family and kids are kind of snickered at for getting themselves “trapped”. The same is not true in Australia. A man with a wife and kids is still every bit the man as he used to be before he fell in love. (Just to compare, some American male celebrities are instructed to hide the fact they have families in order to still be cool.)

But really, these rules are not that rigid. As long as you’ve got a sense of humour and you can make people (girls) laugh, and you’re fair (dinkum?), you’re alright, no matter what banner you march under…

And not all that surprisingly the best clips to describe Australia are beer commercials…

Popularity: 78%

Last night there was a documentary, No Past to Speak of on the television about the virgin rapes in South Africa. And if that wasn’t enough, the correct term would be an infant rape. In South Africa, certain parts of it, AIDS is very common. Nationally, the HIV prevalence percentage is a staggering 28%. That is more than every fourth person. In the worst affected province, KwaZulu-Natal, the percentage is as high as 37.4. What makes it disturbing that there is a myth going about that having sex with a virgin will cure you of AIDS. If you are ignorant enough to believe that, the logical conclusion to make is to have sex with as young child as possible, to make sure she is a virgin. Mothers leave their infant daughters knowingly to be raped, possibly for money, possibly to save a loved family member, who knows, but it happens. In the documentary, the focus was on a young child, who was raped at the age of 5 months, in her home, with the acceptance of her mother. She was adopted by a midwife who worked in the hospital to everyone’s great relief.

They are working hard in South Africa, to dispel the myth of virgin cure, but naturally it is not easy. People who believe it won’t be easily swayed, they have no respect for women or children, or female children at that, and they are desperate to find a cure. They have a task group Men as Partners working on influencing the men to stop raping, and stop hurting women in general. What was shown on the program, their tactics didn’t really seem that effective to me. They got the first part right; There is no use having women talk to the men, they will not even bat an eyelid for what a woman would want to say… But are they really going to believe a group of “preachers” who clearly are not their peers, who carry banners around about being a partner… If I was one of those rapists, I would probably laugh at them and pretty much hate their guts. Naturally, this group is taking the civilized approach to the problem, but I’m thinking the first priority is to change the way people think about rapists. It’s not about growing a respect for women and children, it is about gaining respect amongst your peers that should be stressed.

In western society, it is seen that a man who hits or rapes women or children is the scum of earth. In prisons, men serving for rape are the lowest of the low, and naturally the spit bucket of the lot is the man raping children. This same mentality should be infused into the troubled areas of South Africa. It should come from the inside, or seemingly from the inside, from people who have respect in the community. Who have the power to deny respect or to give it. At this point, it is important that men start despising each other for raping, so that the act will take away your status in the society. They should be laughed at, ridiculed, made to understand that their act is not an act of masculinity or bravery, or even a logical response to fear of death, but ridiculous, despicable, LAUGHABLE display of ignorance and weakness. It should come from movie star -like figures, heroes who resonate with the community. If there isn’t any, put some there. Under cover cops will have tips for you, and actors will give some more tips on how to act brave and admirable. Get the young men and train them to be heroes amongst men. Change it from the inside – that’s what I would do anyway.

Clearly, it is easier said than done, and going into the society won’t be safe. These people would truly be heroes in the good old fashioned sense of the word, and who knows, maybe there isn’t such people around. If not, then there’s always the option of making movies. Now there’s a good one for you Hollywood folk to work on. Oscar guaranteed. Chop chop, get to work now!

Why not start another rumor?
One thing that could work is alter the above rumor a bit. If they want magic, give them magic, but in a less harmless form: Tell them that you can cure yourself from aids by having sex, but you can’t just rape any virgin! It has to be a virgin with HIV, she must be at least 16 years old and she has to want to have sex with you too. If they don’t believe you, ask them if they have ever heard anyone being cured by raping a virgin? When they say no, that’s a good well there you go. This is why. You could create a whole story around it. A virginal HIV-positive girl has a type of AIDS that will cancel out the male AIDS, because she got it from her mother, and not from a man. They are much more likely to accept a similar truth to the one they have, than to completely wipe it out of their world because someone told them it won’t work. Consider it a white lie, it’s a far better one than the one they go by right now. This is how religions started, you had to make people behave badly – tell them that there’s an invisible God that will punish if they do. Works like a charm, still.

Popularity: 36%

As I already told you, I got a new Barbie-doll just in time for New Years Eve. As I liked her so much, she needed the perfect name. As she was a gift from my husband, he had to agree on the name. Now, I have to say, the seriousness of naming a Barbie-doll doesn’t even come close to naming a baby, and we still could not agree on the name until yesterday.

First, I wanted to name her Norah. My husband refused, because, to him the name was a bogan name. (Translation to you non-Aussies, bogan is Aussie for a ‘hick’.) Now I still completely disagree, and even though he told me to ask ‘any Aussie’, I haven’t got the same response to the name. Regardless, Norah was vetoed.

I was rather heart broken, but suggested, as suggested to me by a lovely member of theBdoll.com, Valkyrie. A vampiric name that would easily shorten itself into Val. The hubby vetoed. That was the first name of his mother, who hates her name and uses her second name. As much as I love my mother-in-law, associating her with my favourite, super sexy Barbie-doll didn’t really fly with me either.

For days I tried to fit names after names on her, but then, out of the blue I noticed a cashiers name tag. ‘Rebecca‘ it said. I almost leaned over to kiss her, Rebecca is a fantastic name – not too pretentious, not too common, doesn’t sound like a bloody Disney-character, has a great opportunity to nicknaming and has a lot of character. My husband agreed, Rebecca is a lovely name. So for 2 days my doll was called Rebecca. BUT…

As I finally found a lovely name like that, even the list of baby names on a recent BlogCatalog-conversation that made me want to puke wouldn’t sway me from believing that there could be even more lovely girl names. I overheard a new mother gloat on Saturday night that she’s out for the first time without Olivia. It was very scary she said, but what ever she went on to next was lost with me. Olivia. Now that is a lovely name, isn’t it? My husband disagreed. Even though Olivia was a lovely name, it wasn’t sassy enough for my red headed doll. So he went online to look some real red head names.

We got a short list Agnes, Meg, Megan, Jonet, Gayle, Esther. And now, I’m leaning towards Megan. I am imagining my favourite Ken-doll Alex lovingly call her Nutmeg. That is because she’s a bit nuts and her nickname is Meg. Get it? *looks excitedly towards the reader*.

All that fuss over a doll’s name made me think what a huge responsibility it is for a parent to pick the right name for the child. Some children have the luxury of having a pet name… that they like. My family tried to call me “Riinukka” or worse still, “Riinuli” for years, but finally stopped after I got a temper tantrum every time I heard either of them. It fought against everything I knew about myself. First, it was continued from my already hated first name Riina, which to my musical ear sounds like screaming. Secondly, the thing I liked about my name was that it was a strong name. It was no push-over name, and what do they do, they put the demeaning endings to them, making the name sound like someone who was cuddly and sweet. I may have been shy, but good heavens I was not cuddly. Eventually, I required everyone to call me Riku, which is a guy’s name.

There was another thing I liked about my name. It was unique. I met another Riina when I was 10 years old or something. I was shocked. I hated her from the day I met her, because the bitch had the audacity to use my name. Every day I felt sorry for my class mates who had been named with the current fashion names, and they had to attach the first letter of their last name to make a difference between other class mates. When their mates got tired of using their real name with the letter attachment, they twisted their last names into something like Silli, which means a Herring. No matter how much young Mr. Herring objected to his name, it was way too convenient to call him that, because there was two others with a little more fortunate last names that weren’t easy to twist into funny nicknames.

So, consider this a plea for the children you are about to name. Think about it. Automatically disregard the top 30 most popular names in your country. Don’t name them after the biggest stars, no matter how much you love the starlets. Try to find a name with as little baggage with it as you possibly can. Consider the name of the distant auntie you hate if her name is nice. (I was about to be named Jenny, but my grand mother knew a Jenny she didn’t like. I so wanted to be a Jenny. Maybe I wouldn’t have been half as shy if I didn’t have to be afraid of hearing my name being uttered out loud.) Think and consider. It’s not just your little baby. The little baby will grow bigger, and she or he has to go into the world with that name attatched to him or herself. Use your imagination to find the meanest associations you can think of with the name. If you can’t think of any, maybe the class mates can’t either. Here’s to hoping.

Popularity: 44%

Where has this world come to. Here we are debating over the issue of the lack of scientific proof of Gay people being born gay or having chosen to be gay… There is not sufficient amount of scientific evidence, they say. The evidence that exists, must be manufactured by pro-gay activists. Now the irony is, that these people fight the battle of an entity, that hasn’t been even remotely proven to be real, regardless of a lot of people believing that he is.

We don’t know if God exists. We have absolutely zero (0) chance of ever finding out for any reasonable certainty that God exist. Secondly, we don’t know even with a remote certainty about his views to gay people. We have a lot of interpretations of a book that hasn’t been proven to have anything to do with the real God, if there is one. And yet, we’re expected to accept legal decisions that are largely based on wild assumptions of this entity and his opinions versus not quite conclusive scientific evidence and the testimony of people who actually are gay. Like if there was even people who had MET God, let alone BEEN God, they would have a fight, but we have a whole bunch of people who ARE Gay, who somehow are not entitled to an opinion on whether or not they chose or did they have the right to choose to be gay.

We know that gay people exist. We are not sure if God exists. Which is more important? Do you think that God disappears if being gay became the norm? (As if it would.) Are you worried about the mortal soul of these gay people? Why not let them have the choice of risking burning in hell for their “choices” and mind your own god damned business. (Pun intended.)

Popularity: 13%

There is a lot to be said about sexually transmitted diseases spreading and unwanted pregnancies increasing as a result of the True Love Waits -approach, or otherwise known as abstinence only -sex education. Personally I am even more worried about the emotional and mental health issues that may follow from this type of teaching, especially from the female point of view.

I know we don’t like the idea of our kids having sex. We don’t even like the thought of our parents having sex. In fact, I don’t think any of us really likes to think about anyone they know having sex, so I understand why we would have the need to control our loved ones willingness of having sex. Parents say it’s not good for you, it harms you both physically and emotionally, and that can be true, but instead of teaching the kids how to have safe sex, some of them opt out by teaching that not having sex is the only option.

Now I am not against the idea of abstinence, up to a point. It is good to wait until you are emotionally good and ready, and by “emotionally” I don’t mean being in a loving and caring relationship necessarily, but that you want to have sex and you don’t have moral qualms about what you’re doing and you are strong enough to face the potential problems that could arise from it. And by potential problems I mean people giving you shit about it (even tough I don’t think it’s none of their damned business), sexually transmitted diseases (including AIDS but not limited to it) and unwanted pregnancies (that you have to deal with one way or another).

I saw a documentary about the True Love Waits campaign some time ago, and what I saw then, disturbed me a great deal. A teacher was holding up two tooth brushes, one used, one in the neat wrapping and asked which one would the kids use if they had the choice. They, of course, chose the one in wrapping. The teacher went on to explain that just like the toothbrush, you should choose a partner who hasn’t had sex before and you should “keep yourself in wrapping” until you are married. Then they went on to explain all the things that are wrong in using a used toothbrush – you don’t know where it’s been and you can get diseases and it’s vile… All true in the case of a toothbrush, but it maddened me to think that someone would actually think it’s the same thing with people. A toothbrush doesn’t have a heart. They don’t love you. They don’t have emotions, personality or anything to give you except clean teeth. You will throw one out after using it for a month if you do as your dentists tell you to. A human being won’t loose his or her value after it has been “used”. A human being has nothing to do with toothbrushes.

Now lets imagine a sensitive person who actually takes this garbage to heart. Let’s imagine it’s a girl. She has one weak moment and has sex with a boyfriend she loved to bits. It felt good and right in the moment, but after the heat of the moment, the guilt starts creeping in. You are worthless now. Nobody will love you. Your boyfriend lost all respect for you now. DO you think he will “buy the product after having used it?” No way, he’ll find a new product, a new girl and marries her. He wouldn’t marry you! So she believes that and starts acting accordingly. Blames the boyfriend for hating her now, not having respect and looking at other girls. For a while he tries to convince her that he still loves her, he doesn’t want anyone else and he certainly haven’t lost his respect for her. However, he gets tired of convincing her and decides that there will be no future for them at this rate, leaves her “and proves her right”.

So she will now have to go on as a “used toothbrush” that nobody will want. That is her reality, that is what she has been taught. She is broken by having sex, that is what she believes, when in fact the thing that broke her was her sex ed. She has no respect for herself, so when that guy comes in that will tell her she’s all right, an he will love her regardless, she will take the offer. No matter she’s not really that into him, but he said he’d love her, regardless. She gets married, has a baby and finds out she married an abusive man. She gets beaten up every now and then, then he apologies and says that it is all because you had sex with that man. He thought he would be strong enough to handle that, but jealousy just sweeps over him every now and then, and that is why he lost control… He loves her so, regardless. And she understands him, she deserves no better than getting beaten up on a regular basis. She’s a slut after all.

Okay, let’s move on to the scenario #2, when she does wait until marriage. She’s 18, her hormones are running wild and she can’t wait to have sex. She has a boyfriend, not the man of her dreams by a long shot, but he’s there and he’s willing, like her, to marry before having sex. So they decide to marry, and jump into bed with high hopes. This is it! This is the way God intended! Marital blizz! So they have sex. He’s ecstatic in the morning, and thinks this is so fantastic. He has someone to have sex with for the rest of his life. She is not so excited. It wasn’t nearly as good as she thought. She doesn’t feel more in love with him now that they had sex. The sex wasn’t great at all. She didn’t orgasm, even though she did everything right. He didn’t even notice. She’s too embarrassed to say anything besides, she doesn’t want to hurt his feelings. Suddenly she sees years and years of unfulfilled hopes and dreams stretch in front of her to be shared with that man… And she’s probably pregnant by the end of the week, because birth control was never an issue. She struggles ahead for the next 15 years and decides it is time to face the truth and divorce him and find someone she’s really into. With 8 kids it might be a bit of an issue, but still, you have to try.

If there are teens reading this… Let me tell you something. Don’t ever put a value on yourself by the number of people you have slept with. Not if you think it’s cool to have a lot of partners, and not if you think it’s uncool. Put a value on yourself based on your personality. How funny you are. How loving you are. How people enjoy being in your company, how well you take care of your pets, how responsible you are, how talented you are, but never by the number of people you sleep with. You can NEVER be sure that the person you have sex with will stay with you, whether or not you marry him or her, but at the same time, whether or not you have sex with people will not make them loose respect for you or make them not want to marry you. That doesn’t even come into the radar screen! What matters is your respect for yourself, and how you treat people. I can tell you that I’ve had sex with a lot of guys, and only ONE ever treated me with disrespect. He however wasn’t healthy. I learned later on that he had some sort of a mental disorder which made him a little… Well, mental. However, I walked out on him as I deserve no disrespect no matter where it comes from. I am afraid though, that if your school teaches abstinence only from a religious point of view there can be people who try to make you think less of yourself by making remarks about having had sex before marriage, but you should not take those comments into heart. As for people marrying you after having sex with you; I had sex with my husband before we got married, and here he is, still loving me and respecting me, as I do him. And all of the happily married people I know have had sex before marriage. (I don’t really hang out in the circles that believe in abstinence.)

Educate yourself on birth control, there is heaps of information online. Choose the method best suited for you (condom is always a good choice unless you have latex allergy, and if you do there are latex free condoms available). And, never, ever ever let anyone dictate to you who you should or should not sleep with. It is YOUR CHOICE, and yours alone. And never ever disrespect yourself for your choices, because that is the only way anyone will have the grounds of disrespecting you. Read about sex, as much as you can, from as many sources as you can, hell, watch some porn while you’re at it (as long as it’s legal of course). You need to know what it is to know what you’re signing up for or signing out of. You need to be aware of what you like about it and what you don’t like about it, so you’ll be able to inform your partner. Oh, and masturbate. It’s good for you and I promise won’t make your palms hairy.

Popularity: 30%

Spurred by the comment I received to the Obama-post, I started thinking about what a war is like to most nations apart from USA. Most nations, when they say their soldiers protect their nation, actually do mean that. USA has had what… One attack on their own soil, and that was hardly a military attack. They are STILL terrified of it. American civilians, thank God, have no idea what a war is like. I can say much the same for myself, thank God, but I can’t say the same for my family members, of whom some are old enough to have fought or lived through our two latest wars, the Winter War, which was fought at the same time as the World War II, and/or the Continuation War. By “us” I mean the Finns.

Finns do not have a hired army, apart from some staff members that stay on duty the whole time. If there should be a war, it would affect every family in Finland. Virtually every male, between ages 18 to 60 will be sent off to protect our borders. That excludes those who are incapacitated and includes men who refuse to carry a gun but will serve in other duties, and some women who serve in arms on voluntary basis. That guarantees, that there will not be wars that are of selfish reasons by the government leaders, as they will be sending their own sons to the slaughter just as they send those of the common citizen. Nations like that usually fight only when it is absolutely necessary, and not because some reason made up by the government to justify spending tons of money on an army.

This was the case when the Soviet Union led by Joseph Stalin attacked Finland on November 30, 1939. The reason was, that Soviet Union (now Russia) wanted to protect their capital of the time, Leningrad from Germans, as it situated too close to the Finnish border. They were worried, that Finland, despite it’s neutral position to WW2 would still allow Germans to attack through it, or could not stop them from doing it. Finland refused the request to use the land for military purposes, so SU attacked.

Now imagine. You sit peacefully in your home, listening to the news on the radio, and you hear that your country is being attacked by a country of a massive size, with an army 4 times the size of yours, and that is only counting their strength in soldiers sent your way. (If it was USA, it would probably mean something like the combined forces of all European countries, Russia, and probably South-America as well, and I don’t think it would still create terror similar to that of Finns.) You know that Sweden, on the west side of your country, has agreed not to join the war on your behalf in exchange of a promise by Russians that they won’t cross their border when they get there. WHEN they get there, they say. They are planning to walk all over your country in two weeks, and there is nothing stopping them, but an army of 250 000 men shooting pea guns. An army including your husband, your sons, your father and your brothers, and not only them, but every man you’ve ever known, unless they are over or under that age limit of 60 or 18. You thought they went to military rehearsal, but now you know they were sent to the border in case there is a war.

If you would live in Helsinki, the capital, you would know to expect bombing. You would know exactly where the bomb shelters are, and how many seconds it takes for you to collect your kids and run to the shelter. You would sleep with your clothes on, so you wouldn’t have to run to the streets in your nightie. The city would be sitting in a total darkness at nights, and what long nights they are in the winter, so that the army can misguide the Soviet bombers to bomb an inhabited island before the actual city by lighting little fires in there. Other towns were not as well protected as Helsinki was, and I used to live in a house that was one storey shorter than it started out with, the Russian bombers had shortened it a bit. At least it was still standing. The attic, where I dried my laundry, once was the top floor, now blown to pieces. Someone had lived there. I hope they heard the warning sirens in time and ran to bomb shelters before that happened.

You would eventually decide that it would be better for your children to live somewhere safe and you ship them off to Sweden to be raised by people you have never met, and to be treated like second class citizens all through their childhood and young adult life. You, and many of your friends would never see the children again, and some of them would never learn to speak your language. You would no longer work at what ever you did before, but you would be making clothes for the army, or filling shells of bullets with gun powder. You would go to the store hoping they had something to sell today, as you ran out of food a week ago. My grand mother once told me how she spent her last money on a bowl of pea soup at the bus station knowing that the next time she would get paid was a week from that, and she would not have a thing to eat until then. And that was after the war.

Should you live close to the Russian border, you would have left in a big hurry after the news… A little before possibly. You would pack everything you can on a horse carriage and take that last look at your home knowing that it might not be standing the next time you see it. You might not ever see it again, because your home village would be overtaken by Russians and you could never return. If you decided to stay regardless, like some people did, you wouldn’t know what would happen to you. There are no rules on a war path.

It was an impossible war, but the Soviet Union never made it to the Swedish border. Now look at the statistics here and understand why it was a miracle that Finland survived.

We received help from USA in the form of clothing and food, which we paid back before scheduled. (How ever did my grand parents and their generation ever managed that I don’t have an idea off.)

(Click on Read more to find some videos of the war, in English aired in USA.) Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 9%

I have been saying through the last few weeks, that I do think McCain will take presidency, even though I hoped that it will be Obama. I thought it would be tight, but in the end go to McCain, but I am extremely happy to say I was wrong. You have given yourself a brand new reason for being proud, proud Americans.

The symbolism of this election is more important than that of the political reasons behind it. The person, Obama, who is vibrant and engaging, a true leader, will be welcomed not only to the hearts of the Americans, but into the hearts of the people of the world. I truly believe that you have got yourselves a new J.F. Kennedy, a great American president, widely loved and respected, regardless of the obvious differences between the two.

But now, Americans, look out for your new president. I am afraid that he is a combination of J.F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King, and we all know what happened to them. Be suspicious and observing when ever you are in his presence, and look out for him. Do not let him be harmed, you worked hard to get him, now you must work hard to keep him.

Regardless, congratulations to each and every one of you, and of course the man himself!

Popularity: 6%