Notices by M. Grégoire (mpjgregoire@mastodon.club), page 29

@keithzg @ink_slinger I like to think of my work (not the project management side) as "craft". Making things!

As Frederick the Great said, "My people and I have come to an agreement which satisfied us both. They are to say what they please, and I am to do what I please."

#FrederickTheGreat
#liberalism

For instance, she proposes a society with bookshops in which one can find books that disagree with the official history. She says that is a sign of a "democratic" society. To me on the other hand, that is the sign of a "liberal" society [0]. It seems obvious to me that a democratic society can have legal censorship or stifling conformity; and that a non-democracy could have a very open discourse.

[0] Though #liberal has other meanings as well, with less connection to freedom of speech.

Listening to #CBC #Ideas, the person being interviewed says we must draw distinctions between nationalism and patriotism, between democracy and majoritarianism, between populism and anti-elitism, etc.

On the one hand she's right; on the other it seems hopeless that we'll ever resolve political or philosophical controversies if when she uses a word and I use that word it doesn't have the same meaning.

Maybe if we stop talking about abstractions and move to specifics discourse can be productive.

1854: No Irish Need Apply - The New York Times
https://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/08/insider/1854-no-irish-need-apply.html

Before reading this article, I thought "No Irish Need Apply" was possibly a myth, but to the degree that it did occur it was pure bigotry. But the clippings shown are for Protestants wanting their children to be raised by Protestants; that's much more understandable.

#Irish #discrimination

Also good:

The Say-But-the-Word Centurion Attempts a Summary -- Les Murray

https://www.poetrylibrary.edu.au/poets/murray-les/the-say-but-the-word-centurion-attempts-a-summary-0569005

#poetry #LesMurray
#Christianity

The Dream of Wearing Shorts Forever -- Les Murray
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=cPneEIuFF90&feature=youtu.be

#poetry #LesMurray
#Australia

@xvu The joys of living in the #tropics...

I remember once I had a Canadian guest coming to visit, so I bought a box of Raisin Bran, put it in the cupboard unopened of course. When the morning came to feed my guest, I opened the box to find all these little black things inside...

moving around...

ants!

@RealTimeWWII Churchill claimed that in the defence of Crete, the Allied troops "broke the tip of the spear" of the German forces. That is, the German paratroopers who could have led the invasion of England were used up on Crete.

Of course, #Churchill wanted to find a reason to explain why sending troops to Crete had been strategically useful.

#WWII

@thurloat Does eshell count?