Archive for the ‘Avenues of Harm’ Category

A man who stabbed his girlfriend 26 times has been jailed for at least 11 years today. Read the article at the link then read on. Basically there are people out there who are mentally unstable. How else can you explain this kind of behaviour?  I was young once and I had loves and lost a few and never once did I think stabbing her 26 times then stabbing myself would sort things out.

Mental illness is the only rational explanation, otherwise we have to acknowledge that some people aren’t as good as others. By good I mean balanced, stable, smart, thinking whatever. I am so glad this nutter is Anglo-Celtic or whatever. A white, non-muslim, male heterosexual. If he were anything else the loonies on one side would scream, see, told you they were all bad while the loonies on the other side would be screaming about how its not his fault because he is a minority and so on.

Bad has no colour bar, it cares not your orientation or religious beliefs. Bad is bad. Period. It is easier to hold views that say he is bad because all (insert personal bias) are bad and it is not so comfortable or easy to accept that this is not the case in reality. That not all (insert personal bias) are bad nor are all (your own ‘type’) good.

The lesson to be earned is that we need to teach our children survival skills. Skills such as the ability to pick up on body language signs that signal the potential to cause harm. Word signals that should ring alarm bells. Just as we don’t teach them how to really handle money and what life is really about, we need to teach them to disregard the gonads and go with the hairs on the back of the neck.

We also need to acknowledge that the brain is susceptible to malfunction just as any other organ is (although technically the brain is not an organ).  let’s try and stop judging people as being less than ourselves for having mental health issues and feel some compassion for them and their loved ones. At the same time, let’s not excuse their behaviour. They may not be responsible but if only for the sake of their victim’s closure they should be punished for their actions, or else let us change completely how we as a society think about crime, punishment, health and society. Hmmm, maybe that is the answer after all.

Read this, then shake your head in wonder. How can anyone treat anyone like this, let alone a sibling? Some might say that these people are African and Africans are still pretty savage and primitive and in many ways there is still a lot of primitive and savage behaviour found in Africa… but that isn’t the answer. This is a human thing. All of our ancestors believed in witchcraft and similar supernatural concepts. Many in our so called civilized western world still do. There are many people who do cruel things to people, even their own children and they don’t try to blame witchcraft, so let’s not point the finger, or the bone, at any race. Like I said, this is a human thing.

Run a search using words like ‘boy+tortured+parents’ and see how many articles there are. Just this past week I read two reports of parents torturing their little children. Why? The only reason I can think of is that they are psychotic, brought about by substance abuse or circumstance. By circumstance I mean they were brought up that way and know no different. The cycle of poverty, low IQ, lack of education and abuse creates a class of human who can still create life, they just have no idea how to nurture it.

How we treat each other is a major issue for us all, at grass roots level. It is not confined to any social class but it is more prevalent in low socioeconomic classes. It is not confined to any one race but it is more prevalent in some than others, but not because that race is genetically inferior, so don’t go down that path. That race is that way because of other factors, not genetics. Given a fair run anyone from any race can achieve anything. The reality is that for many, there is no fair run. Even for those where society attempts to level the playing field, too often they or someone influential near them sabotages any chance they have of making worthwhile change.

Like I always say; if you can’t be a part of the solution, don’t be a part of the problem. How do you treat other people? Start with your loved ones, then move to your friends and work outwards to neighbours and colleagues and then consider strangers and people of other classes and races. Do you give them all a fair go or lump them all into the same pile because of the actions of some? If we are going to change the way we as a society think and interact, then we need to start with the person we have the most influence and control over. Ourselves.

A Filipino guide has escaped from Muslim kidnappers in the southern Philippines by diving overboard. The guide was with a Swiss and a Dutchman, taken hostage by Muslim criminals off Tawi Tawi. The daring escape was successful, but just as easily could have ended up with the escaper being killed. It is a proven tenet of escape and evasion that the sooner you can escape after capture the better your chances. Once you and your captors settle into a routine of sorts it gets harder to get away, not to mention you will be further from help and in the middle of their chosen territory. While the escaper feels guilty he left the other two behind, the reality is his life, as a Filipino, is worth less than the two foreigners and most likely he would be killed to show the kidnappers mean business.

An asteroid the size of a mini-van just missed the earth by some 59,000 kilometres. OK, so how is that news? The reality is it would have broken up on entry but what if it were bigger? Think of all those craters on the moon and how they got there. A really big asteroid would be tracked for some time, allowing the rich and powerful to get to the other side of the earth when it hit, I’m sure of that. After all, civilization must go one and they are the ones with the power and the money. As for the rest of us, we are replaceable. Cynical? Perhaps but the longer I live the more cynical I seem to become. Or is that wisdom?

The reality is that if we are wiped out the earth will continue on. We won’t but the earth will. It has been here billions of revolutions around the sun and will be here for billions more. We’ll be dust but then that is the way it is. There is nothing we can do to stop an asteroid wiping us out if our number is up so don’t worry about this unlikely event. Worry instead about your elderly neighbours. Have you seen them lately or have they died, alone and unremarked in their bed? Worry about your kids or your parents. Family is all. Have you seen each other lately? Hugged? Been there for each other?

When the going gets tough, who can you rely on? It will rarely get tougher than the days between the announcement we are all doomed and the strike of the asteroid, should that ever happen. In those few days or weeks, we will see the best and the worst of our fellow humans. How will you behave?

A US university student bought a second hand text book for a course she was taking about terrorism and when she opened it a packet of white powder fell out. Her first thought was it was anthrax but the local police tested the contents and declared them to be about $400 worth of cocaine. what if it had been anthrax? What if the book mix up led to her meeting the intended recipient one dark night?

The probability of anything bad happening is pretty low but not zero. Where do you think Hollywood screenwriters get their ideas from? Real life. Then they glam them up but the original story is usually based on something they read about in the press, like this story. If you don’t want to be the subject of a screen adaptation, what do you do? There is no simple answer to that because as I said, the odds of it happening to you are pretty slim. This woman did the right thing. She carefully took the packet to the police station. I would have called the police and asked them then and there to come and collect it. If she had been stopped and searched for whatever reason enroute, telling the judge you ‘found it’ and were on your way to hand it in might not work. Especially in the USA with their draconian drug laws and zero tolerance to letting their corporate prisons miss out on one more profit center.

I read with sadness and anger that another teenager had committed suicide due to being bullied. This included ‘cyber bullying‘ and the report made a big deal about how the bullying never stopped. When the girl got home it was there on her social network page. OK, this is where it gets a little hard for me to follow. If the bullying was going on online… why not close the account? Why not change name and password? Why not simply stop going online? Sooner or later the bully would get the hint and lose interest.

I am sorry, it is a tragedy for sure but the biggest tragedy has to be that the girl valued her social network more than her life. She would rather kill herself than go without her Facebook or whichever social network it was. This is ridiculous! Don’t blame the social network or the internet, don’t even blame the bully. If the bully intended her to kill herself, then charge him and take him through the courts. If the bully was just another mental midget, troubled teen with issues, then that is sad but the choice to end it all was hers, nobody else’s.

Which makes me think that some people are predisposed to dealing with stress and pressure that way, rather than fight back, confront the bullies or simply switch off the computer. It is sad, no argument but I think we need to keep things in perspective and not get too wound up, too ‘you poor thing’. We are tending to get softer and softer as we conquer more and more of the every day risks life has for us. We will never totally eradicate all risk and that is a good thing because danger is the best instructor there is.

Just when I thought I might feel sorry for myself for some, at the time earth shattering issue…. I read about Connie Culp. I no longer have any problems. This poor woman was shot in the face by her husband in 2004. He is now out of prison and on parole but so what? She faces (no pun intended) the rest of her life with a face transplant. She is grateful to be alive, grateful for the transplant and taking life one day at a time. That, ladies and gentlemen, is courage. Too often we forget that once the ambulance drives off and the CSI guys solve everything in the next 45 minutes plus commercial breaks (that is an intended pun) it isn’t over for the victims of the crime.

Connie Culp has endured pain, ridicule and no doubt a loss of self esteem we can’t begin to imagine. Yet she is still punching back. That is the survivor mentality you need to make it sometimes. Have you got it? Have I? I hope I never have to find out.

Yesterday in Melbourne a pit bull savaged and killed a four year old girl as she clung, screaming and terrified, to her mother’s leg. As a parent and having five girls of my own ranging from nearly 2 to nearly 13 my heart goes out to Jaclin Apuk Awen, who fought the dog with her bare hands to try and save little Ayen Chol. My wife asked what could she do it it were her and I had to think hard. These pit bulls are not easy to kill, and make no mistake you would have to kill it to stop it. They are bred for one thing and that is killing and they lock on and never let go once they get a grip. They are savage beasts that have no place in civilized society. None whatsoever.

I told my wife that she would have to grab a back leg and lift the dog up and break the leg, I showed her how to snap it at the ankle joint or rip the knee from the hip, then crush the testicles if it is a male dog and then, if it lets go, smash it against the ground until it is dead. Of course, it takes strength to do this and the dog will not stand still. It will be a whirling dervish and you will get badly bitten but hopefully you will save your child. I said if you poked the eye as she suggested, you must insert your thumbs and pop the eyeball out but the dog will likely keep biting and tearing, even when blind. She said to choke it but they have such strong neck muscles so I said if it were me and I could drop my weight onto the neck I would but the dog will not be stationary, it will be moving and hard to pin down. This is what they are bred to do, albeit against other dogs.

My father taught me to grab the front legs and pull them apart and tear the dog’s heart but I would hesitate to put my face so close to the dog’s to get such a grip. If the opportunity presented itself, though, I would try that or, if I had a belt or shirt I could use to entangle the dog, or strangle it with, I would use that. I once fought off a pit bull like dog that attacked my own and all I could find to help was an empty soft drink can. I beat the dog with that but it would not let go. I tore the can in half and used the sharp edge against its throat, slicing and hacking, all the while my puppy screaming and the owner yelling at me not to hurt his dog. Too bad. The dog finally let go after I had slashed half its face off. The owner wanted to sue me once he realised he would lose if he tried to fight me, I made a terrible sight, covered with dog’s blood and still pumped with adrenalin from the fight. In the end he just walked away and I took my puppy home to clean his wounds.. and mine.

The owners of these dogs are too often gutless thugs with no brains who think by having such a ‘tough’ dog it makes them tough. It doesn’t and they don’t have the brains or the common sense to control the animal and be able to keep it under control all the time. Those people who believe they are sensible and reasonable and argue the case for having such dogs are little better than the thug owners, just more articulate. These fighting breeds are all about stroking the egos of men who otherwise have nothing else in their lives as civilization has passed them by. Certain ethnic groups get their kicks at illegal dog fights. Close by where I live they hold them on secluded semi-rural properties and the men who attend these fights are basically either evil or dumb or both. Some of these people even steal large dogs such as German Shepherds and Rottweilers to fight their Pit Bulls, Tosas and other fighting breeds.

I usually stand up against calls to ban anything, preferring to live and let live believing people can choose to take part or not. But these dogs have no purpose other than to kill and their owners have no right to hold that power over others unless we have the means to defend ourselves properly from them. Since we can’t carry handguns, that means the dogs must go. Every time a child is savaged or killed the call goes out and is ignored due to a lack of political guts. How many more children must we lose before our elected representatives take action? The law is not enough because it relies on the owners to control the dog and they can’t, won’t or simply  don’t. I know any dog, even our little poodle, can turn and savage, even kill, a child. But he isn’t built for killing nor is he bred for it and he is a lot easier to defend against than a pit bull. If you want these dogs for hunting then go live in the bush, there is nothing to hunt here. If you want a dog to guard your home, then buy and properly train a suitable animal with a balanced temperament. Oh, proper training requires time, energy, effort and often money. All too hard. Better to just swagger along with the dog and your tatts and your caveman attitude.

Incredible as it sounds, a young Russian woman was eaten alive by bears and called her mother on her mobile phone while it was happening. The mother bear killed her stepfather, then chased her and knocked her down. She managed to call her mother on her cell phone and described how the bear came back with her three cubs and continued to eat Olga. Her story is chilling and very disturbing, but it happened. It was a tragic example of one of the Avenues of Harm – Nature, that we so often forget. We are so desensitized by television and wildlife documentaries we forget these are, indeed, wild animals. It is nothing personal for them, a matter of survival but none the less horrific or tragic.

One can only begin to imagine the sheer terror she experienced until shock set in and she would have become calm. She states she no longer felt any pain, but to have suffered for so long is truly tragic. What is so very touching and speaks so much for the character of the young lady is that she asked her mother to forgive her for any sins she may have committed. I’m sure she was a good daughter and a lovely human being and along with her stepfather, will be sadly missed. As disturbing as this story is, I have published it here for two reasons. First, so that we all remember that nature is not a theme park, it is dangerous and it can take your life. Second, that while Olga Moskalyova died alone, she is not forgotten and her death should stand to remind us all of how precious life is. Go and hug your kids.

There is nothing I wish to say about this piece of offal that I can publish on this site. Let that suffice. On the topic in general, though, this makes a point about our perception of the aged and the disabled. While today’s 65 may be the new 55 and I am the first to admit we no longer seem to ‘age’ the way we did when I was a teen, we still tend to place age limits on various activities. We seem to be amazed that someone past retiring age has leapt out of an aeroplane on a tandem sky dive or returned to university for a degree. This is just as true for criminal activity as adventure sports or tertiary education achievements.

Just because someone is ‘old’ doesn’t make them honest, decent or nice. The same goes for disabled people. OK, they had Life deal them a crook hand but not every wheelchair bound man or woman is a nice, pleasant, role model for young adults kind of person. I know some very nasty blind people, the odd vicious cripple and what and some people on disability pensions who are just the same as us ‘able’ bodied types; sometimes nice and sometimes not so much fun to be with.

The same for age. There are some people who, even in Kindergarten you know are going to be societal problems some day. Old, past retirement men and women who would take you for everything you have if you gave them have a chance. Don’t make the mistake of stereotyping anyone. Just as we can’t assume every young teenager is a gang banger or because that kid is indigenous he must be up to no good (pick your own prejudice and apply) we can’t think that everyone old enough to be a grandparent is safe to leave your kids with.

This tragic case proves once again rape is not a sex crime, it is a power crime. The rapist got his thrill, but what about the terror experienced by his victim? No doubt that is what he fed off. He may be mentally unstable but that does not excuse his behaviour, nor should it allow him to escape severe punishment. He needs to know what it is like to be the victim. I am sure some other thrill seeker will give him a taste of what he dished out when he gets to Pentridge.

Man Raped 85yo Woman For A Thrill

A man who bashed and raped an 85-year-old woman at a Melbourne train station says he did it for a “thrill”.

Victorian Country Court Judge Duncan Allen said 65-year-old Allan Richard Hodson’s attack on the elderly woman in January was “spine chilling”.

“It’s hard to imagine any rape of this type – a rape of a stranger in a public place – that is a lot worse than that,” Judge Allen said during Hodson’s pre-sentence hearing on Friday.

Prosecutor Chris Ryan said Hodson “chillingly” described to police his motivation for the attack.

Hodson told police “here’s a good opportunity, I suppose, to have a bit of a thrill”, he told the court.

Hodson also admitted to police his victim was frail and he punched her forcefully during the assault in a train station toilet.

He told police he threatened to hurt the woman if she told anyone.

“I know where you live and I will come back and cut you.”

Mr Ryan said Hodson, of Bairnsdale, had travelled to Melbourne that day for a psychiatric visit and had drunk four bottles of beer before the attack.

The pre-sentence hearing before Judge Allen is continuing.

http://au.news.yahoo.com/vic/latest/a/-/newshome/9938521/man-raped-85yo-woman-for-a-thrill/