Doctor Who got it wrong. The term "Union Jack" is the proper name for the British flag. The term "Union Flag" is also the correct name, though the former is more popular. It is not, however, known as the Union Jack "only when it's flown at sea", as Rose Tyler suggested in the episode 'The Idiot's Lantern'.
A "jack" is a flag flown on a ship from the jackstaff. The British flag was called the Union Jack some one hundred and fifty years before the jackstaff came into being.
For some unknown reason, the term "Union Flag" has been increasing in popularity in recent years - in preference to "Union Jack". Either or both names refer to the same flag, no matter where it's flown.
Monday, 8 September 2008
Cyber what?
"Cyberspace", "cybersex", "cyberworld" and even "cybernet". What do these terms mean?
From the Oxford Dictionary Online:
cyber-
Apparently the root is Greek: kubernetes, which is a person that steered a ship or vessel. So, basically something that controls or directs a machine. In today's parlance that might be a computer. Cybernetics deals with control systems - particularly that relating to the interaction, on a symbiotic level, of organism and machine. A cyborg is just that - a machine (in the mechanical sense) in control of an organism.
These days though, the cyber- prefix is applied to the Internet: a machine in control of an organism? Cybersex... machine sex? That's not the case though. The Internet is basically the tool by which humans control communication. It's not a vessel or ship, it's not steered and it doesn't have any moving parts.
When I began using the Internet, back in the early 1990s, smilies were used to denote sarcasm, virtual is how we described the 'world' or 'space', and netsex was the term used to describe text-based sexual interaction of humans through the medium of computer screens using keyboards. No mechanical parts are used... well... maybe some are, but that falls outside the scope of this article! Certainly, netsex is not the sexual interaction of cyborgs that the word cybersex implies. Internet space, or the virtual world, is not the inner-workings of a cyborg, or the physical dimensions of it.
I'm curious as to when the Oxford English Dictionary decided to add this word, incorrectly in my opinion, to it's lexicon, and why. Why does the dictionary not describe the meaning of the word in relation to human-machine hybrids or androids etcetera.
From the Oxford Dictionary Online:
cyber-
/sib
r/
• combining form relating to information technology, the Internet, and virtual reality: cyberspace.
— ORIGIN from CYBERNETICS.
Apparently the root is Greek: kubernetes, which is a person that steered a ship or vessel. So, basically something that controls or directs a machine. In today's parlance that might be a computer. Cybernetics deals with control systems - particularly that relating to the interaction, on a symbiotic level, of organism and machine. A cyborg is just that - a machine (in the mechanical sense) in control of an organism.
These days though, the cyber- prefix is applied to the Internet: a machine in control of an organism? Cybersex... machine sex? That's not the case though. The Internet is basically the tool by which humans control communication. It's not a vessel or ship, it's not steered and it doesn't have any moving parts.
When I began using the Internet, back in the early 1990s, smilies were used to denote sarcasm, virtual is how we described the 'world' or 'space', and netsex was the term used to describe text-based sexual interaction of humans through the medium of computer screens using keyboards. No mechanical parts are used... well... maybe some are, but that falls outside the scope of this article! Certainly, netsex is not the sexual interaction of cyborgs that the word cybersex implies. Internet space, or the virtual world, is not the inner-workings of a cyborg, or the physical dimensions of it.
I'm curious as to when the Oxford English Dictionary decided to add this word, incorrectly in my opinion, to it's lexicon, and why. Why does the dictionary not describe the meaning of the word in relation to human-machine hybrids or androids etcetera.
Tuesday, 2 September 2008
Taxi tours, Israel, Palestine and an American Jew in Belfast
I came across a blog on a website called Salon. Salon describes itself as an "award-winning online news and entertainment Web site", and has apparently been featured on ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS, NPR, CNN, MSNBC, CNBC, "Good Morning America," "Morning Edition," "Talk of the Nation," "Crossfire," the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Boston Globe, Time, Newsweek "and other major media". It is based in San Francisco, and was founded in 1995. It has had positive reviews in the Washington Post, 'Time' magazine and 'Forbes'.
The article itself is, at the time of my writing, six years old. It starts off fair enough with the sub-headline, "In Northern Ireland, anti-Semitic groups back Israel and Sinn Fein flies the PLO colors." After that, it takes a nose dive.
The writer, Aaron Tapper who describes himself as an American Jew, tells us how he and his "American friend" took a taxi tour around Belfast, "as Irish flags were raised atop storefront canopies and park fences while people ran through the streets waving the green, white and orange colors over their heads," suggesting that this behaviour was occurring throughout the city because of the Republic of Ireland's (he simply says "Ireland") success at drawing with Germany in the World Cup. It didn't occur to him that he was in Northern Ireland and that Northern Ireland has its own team. It hadn't occurred to him that had he arrived on a different day, he might have seen similar "ebullient patriotic Irish fervor". Aaron distinguishes between the "ebullient" (positive) flag-waving of one side and the "ominous" (negative) flag-waving of the other.
In the Shankill Road part of the tour, to which he is attributing the negative "ominous" comment, he claims to have seen "numerous English flags". I can't remember a time when English flags were flown in the Shankill Road, though there might have been an occasional one flown - perhaps on the occasion of the Queen's Jubilee, for example. Presumably the Israeli flags he claims to have seen "paired with" the English flags were just as common on the day he visited. Don't get me wrong - there is the occasional Israeli flag flown in Loyalist areas of Belfast and the Northern Ireland flag is very similar to the English flag, so it would be easy to confuse the one for the other. Another addition to possible confusion is that the flag of Northern Ireland has a six-pointed star in it. Now this may or may not be the result of the suggestion that the people of Ulster are the descendants of one of the Lost Tribes of Israel. It may simply be a geometric shape used to denote each of the six counties that are in Northern Ireland. In addition to the star the flag has a Red Hand of Ulster, having been based on the Ulster Flag, which is crowned.
Aaron progresses by telling us of another Protestant area he was driven through called the Village. He tells us how "KAT" stands for "Kill All Taigs", but failed to notice equivalent graffiti from the other side, such as "KAH" ("Kill All Huns" - derogatory slang for Protestants). Of course, perhaps he hadn't noticed any of those particular equivalents, or the taxi driver hadn't pointed them out to him.
I should take the opportunity to point out that Aaron is correct when he says that "many Irish Catholics deem" the UDA, UVF and UFF to be terrorists. So do many Irish Protestants. The implication, it seemed to me, was that Protestants in Northern Ireland do not 'deem' those groups to be terrorists. All of them are proscribed in British law. There is a fringe element within Loyalism (ie. within the aforementioned groups) that supports the racist supremacism of neo-Nazi groups. These same types (or their children) tend to write graffiti on walls such as "Fuck the PSNI" (the PSNI being the Police Service of Northern Ireland).
Aaron continues by suggesting that a professor (of what?) from Queen's University informed him that the usage of Israeli flags in Northern Ireland is a "belief that" Loyalists hold that the British government "should resort to" a military response against the IRA. Not the whole of the IRA though - just the "violent extremists within" it. He then provided what we must assume to be an actual quote from the professor, in which he doesn't suggest anything of the sort. Nor does he distinguish between the "violent extremists" of the IRA and the.. what..? The IRA Chess Association?
The good professor's take on the issue may or may not be entirely correct. If we are to assume that it is at least correct in part though, can we logically conclude that Roman Catholic sympathy for Palestine is most likely based on an assumed commonality of interest in promoting or supporting 'terrorism'? And yes, I noticed the "scare quotes" around the word terrorism also. I wonder if the professor wiggled his fingers in the air when he said it, or was that some interpretation by the boul Aaron? It's almost as if Aaron doesn't believe the IRA to be anything more than a Bridge and Chess-playing social club, wherein the crack is ninety and damn those nasty Brits for spoiling all our board game fun!
Aaron then puts his spin on things by suggesting that "many" people see the ancestors of "today's Irish Protestants" as "colonialists" and "foreigners" who "took Ireland" in the name of the "British royal crown". Perhaps we shouldn't tell him that "many" people see the ancestors of today's Irish Roman Catholics as colonialists and foreigners who took Ireland over a thousand-year period when they arrived from a region of modern-day Spain. Of course, like Aaron's justification for the IRA, that's an oversimplification. Should Aaron, the American, be reminded of how "many" people see the ancestors of today's "Americans" as colonialists and foreigners who took much of North America?
At least Aaron has the good grace to point out the infamous mural which depicts the IRA "affiliate" holding up a bazooka (rocket launcher) with a PLO "affiliate". He goes so far as to suggest that if one visits the Sinn Féin HQ, one will find a Palestinian flag hanging next to "that of Ireland". I wonder if one visited the Sinn Féin HQ, or did one get told about this flag. I also wonder if one took the time to visit a PUP, DUP, UUP, Alliance Party or SDLP office in one's travels.
To round off his take on why there should be Palestinian and Israeli flags in Northern Ireland at all, Aaron tells us that it is perhaps best understood via a 21-year-old Roman Catholic student.
I wonder what would have happened if he had taken the time to interview a Protestant student. What would the response have been? I'm guessing something along the lines of, "Huh? I've no idea - I don't hang about with Loyalists!"
The article itself is, at the time of my writing, six years old. It starts off fair enough with the sub-headline, "In Northern Ireland, anti-Semitic groups back Israel and Sinn Fein flies the PLO colors." After that, it takes a nose dive.
The writer, Aaron Tapper who describes himself as an American Jew, tells us how he and his "American friend" took a taxi tour around Belfast, "as Irish flags were raised atop storefront canopies and park fences while people ran through the streets waving the green, white and orange colors over their heads," suggesting that this behaviour was occurring throughout the city because of the Republic of Ireland's (he simply says "Ireland") success at drawing with Germany in the World Cup. It didn't occur to him that he was in Northern Ireland and that Northern Ireland has its own team. It hadn't occurred to him that had he arrived on a different day, he might have seen similar "ebullient patriotic Irish fervor". Aaron distinguishes between the "ebullient" (positive) flag-waving of one side and the "ominous" (negative) flag-waving of the other.
In the Shankill Road part of the tour, to which he is attributing the negative "ominous" comment, he claims to have seen "numerous English flags". I can't remember a time when English flags were flown in the Shankill Road, though there might have been an occasional one flown - perhaps on the occasion of the Queen's Jubilee, for example. Presumably the Israeli flags he claims to have seen "paired with" the English flags were just as common on the day he visited. Don't get me wrong - there is the occasional Israeli flag flown in Loyalist areas of Belfast and the Northern Ireland flag is very similar to the English flag, so it would be easy to confuse the one for the other. Another addition to possible confusion is that the flag of Northern Ireland has a six-pointed star in it. Now this may or may not be the result of the suggestion that the people of Ulster are the descendants of one of the Lost Tribes of Israel. It may simply be a geometric shape used to denote each of the six counties that are in Northern Ireland. In addition to the star the flag has a Red Hand of Ulster, having been based on the Ulster Flag, which is crowned.
Aaron progresses by telling us of another Protestant area he was driven through called the Village. He tells us how "KAT" stands for "Kill All Taigs", but failed to notice equivalent graffiti from the other side, such as "KAH" ("Kill All Huns" - derogatory slang for Protestants). Of course, perhaps he hadn't noticed any of those particular equivalents, or the taxi driver hadn't pointed them out to him.
I should take the opportunity to point out that Aaron is correct when he says that "many Irish Catholics deem" the UDA, UVF and UFF to be terrorists. So do many Irish Protestants. The implication, it seemed to me, was that Protestants in Northern Ireland do not 'deem' those groups to be terrorists. All of them are proscribed in British law. There is a fringe element within Loyalism (ie. within the aforementioned groups) that supports the racist supremacism of neo-Nazi groups. These same types (or their children) tend to write graffiti on walls such as "Fuck the PSNI" (the PSNI being the Police Service of Northern Ireland).
Aaron continues by suggesting that a professor (of what?) from Queen's University informed him that the usage of Israeli flags in Northern Ireland is a "belief that" Loyalists hold that the British government "should resort to" a military response against the IRA. Not the whole of the IRA though - just the "violent extremists within" it. He then provided what we must assume to be an actual quote from the professor, in which he doesn't suggest anything of the sort. Nor does he distinguish between the "violent extremists" of the IRA and the.. what..? The IRA Chess Association?
The good professor's take on the issue may or may not be entirely correct. If we are to assume that it is at least correct in part though, can we logically conclude that Roman Catholic sympathy for Palestine is most likely based on an assumed commonality of interest in promoting or supporting 'terrorism'? And yes, I noticed the "scare quotes" around the word terrorism also. I wonder if the professor wiggled his fingers in the air when he said it, or was that some interpretation by the boul Aaron? It's almost as if Aaron doesn't believe the IRA to be anything more than a Bridge and Chess-playing social club, wherein the crack is ninety and damn those nasty Brits for spoiling all our board game fun!
Aaron then puts his spin on things by suggesting that "many" people see the ancestors of "today's Irish Protestants" as "colonialists" and "foreigners" who "took Ireland" in the name of the "British royal crown". Perhaps we shouldn't tell him that "many" people see the ancestors of today's Irish Roman Catholics as colonialists and foreigners who took Ireland over a thousand-year period when they arrived from a region of modern-day Spain. Of course, like Aaron's justification for the IRA, that's an oversimplification. Should Aaron, the American, be reminded of how "many" people see the ancestors of today's "Americans" as colonialists and foreigners who took much of North America?
At least Aaron has the good grace to point out the infamous mural which depicts the IRA "affiliate" holding up a bazooka (rocket launcher) with a PLO "affiliate". He goes so far as to suggest that if one visits the Sinn Féin HQ, one will find a Palestinian flag hanging next to "that of Ireland". I wonder if one visited the Sinn Féin HQ, or did one get told about this flag. I also wonder if one took the time to visit a PUP, DUP, UUP, Alliance Party or SDLP office in one's travels.
To round off his take on why there should be Palestinian and Israeli flags in Northern Ireland at all, Aaron tells us that it is perhaps best understood via a 21-year-old Roman Catholic student.
I wonder what would have happened if he had taken the time to interview a Protestant student. What would the response have been? I'm guessing something along the lines of, "Huh? I've no idea - I don't hang about with Loyalists!"
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)