Saturday 31 July 2010

Link Tank 31/07

Late on parade ... 'twas a messy night.

"Around the end of the 1980s, science took on a distinctly authoritarian tone"

The case against legalisation of pot in California is nothing but scaremongery

Why the best thing to happen would be for the 2012 London Olympics to fail miserably

Wyclef Jean to run for Presidency of Haiti?

An environmentalist and Professor of physics points out that the BP spill really isn't that bad

Shape-shifting dinosaurs

South Africa fast-tracks a ban on internet porn

If you smoke and have friends, you'll live as long as if you don't smoke but have no friends

In Australia, a 'hoon' must mean something completely different

800 years of odd laws

Are aid NGOs damaging business enterprise in Africa?


4 comments:

Woman on a Raft said...

"We expect resistance from those who claim the freedom to access pornography as a fundamental right," Rorwana said. "However, it is well established in legal circles that the rights of children are paramount. By comparison, viewing pornography remains a peripheral right."

Watch out for this; it is a noxious re-working of what the concept of the rights of children so that the entire population can be treated as minors. Grimly ironic that it should be an African state which is putting it forward because this was one of the bases of slavery; that an adult black person could not possibly be capable of making their own decisions.

In child-law terms, that concept has already been stretched beyond what was originally intended i.e. the protection and custodianship of an identifiable sub-group who are poorly placed to defend themsleves.

The paramountcy principle does not mean that the rights of all adults must be set aside simply because some other adults have children. It only means that in limited situations, the rights of a particular child have to come before the rights of the particular adults involved.

So she's plain wrong - no such thing is established in legal circles, although you'll meet lawyers who grandly assure you it is.

rsw37 said...

What does a 'hoon' mean in England?

Dick Puddlecote said...

WoaR: That para leapt out of the page at me too. It's truly staggering that people can think in such a way, isn't it?

rsw37: A buffoon (Buff Hoon), after this guy.

As in the headline here. ;)

Dick the Prick said...

They may take my country, but they will never take my porn!! Think a few ISPs may have a whinge about it too - take porn from the interweb and traffic will plummet.