WDL Demo Rss

Hans Rosling: reshaping your world-view



More of Hans Rosling:
Challenge your own preconceptions
Ignorence survey results of the USA

Soziale Kompetenz

Labels: , , , , ,

Richard D. Precht - Soziale Kompetenz:

Unterschied Wut / Zorn

Qualität im Bildungsbereich

Im Handbuch für Schulqualität des Kantons Zürich steht: "Hochwertige Bildungswesen zeichnen sich dadurch aus, dass sie ihre Qualität systematisch beurteilen und die Ergebnisse der Öffentlichkeit zugänglich machen." Falsch. Nehmen wir an, diese systematische Qualitätsbeurteilung ergäbe, dass die Qualität des Bildungswesens ungenügend ist und dieses Resultat würde gemäss obigem Zitat auch öffentlich zugänglich gemacht, kann man dann dieses Bildungswesen als hochwertig bezeichnen? Natürlich nicht. Das Problem hier ist einfach und offensichtlich: Es reicht nie und nimmer die falschen Dinge richtig zu machen. Man muss die richtigen Dinge richtig machen. Wenn eine Qualitätssicherung schon mit so falschen Aussagen anfängt, wie soll ich dann Vertrauen in eine solche Qualitätssicherung bekommen??

So aus der Hüfte geschossen fände ich folgende Definition einiges besser: Hochwertiges Bildungswesen zeichnet sich dadurch aus, dass es die Individuen einer Gesellschaft (vor allem Kinder und Jugendliche) auf ihr Leben in einer komplexen Umwelt so vorbereitet, dass sie mittel- und langfristig – auch bei anspruchsvollen und komplexen Änderungen der Umwelt – persönliche, soziale, kulturelle und globale Herausforderungen meistern können.
Es ist dringend nötig, dass ihr eine wahrhafte, ehrliche Qualitätssicherung des gesamten Bildungswesens vornehmt wenn ihr euch den eigenen Ast nicht absägen wollt. Und genau dies brauchen wir auch in unserer Welt je länger desto dringender. Und das eingangs erwähnte Zitat lässt mich Schlimmeres befürchten obwohl ich mich nicht als Pessimist bezeichnen würde. Falls eine Wirkung plausibel gemacht werden kann nehme ich dazu auch gerne noch detaillierter Stellung. Wenn sie suchen, dann finden sie mich.


Noch ein kleiner Zusatzkommentar: Der Rückschluss dass, wenn ein Bildungswesen seine Qualität systematisch beurteilt und die Ergebnisse der Öffentlichkeit zugänglich macht automatisch ein *hochstehendes* Bildungswesen ist ist natürlich auch falsch.

Ich kann mir zudem auch hochwertige Bildungswesen vorstellen, die zwar eine systematische Qualitätssicherung machen aber diese dann NICHT öffentlich zugänglich machen. Oder gar Bildungswesen, die hochstehend sind ohne systematische Qualitätssicherung. Dennoch bin ich der Meinung, dass jedes Bildungswesen systematische Qualitätssicherung auf die eine oder andere Art betreiben sollte und diese dann auch öffentlich zugänglich machen sollte.

16 Ways I Blew my Marriage

JA vs. Erin Burnett

Julian Assange on CNN,  November 28, 2012. 
Somehow – looking back now with what we know from Snowden – it seems that more people should listen to him talking about a few problems everybody, you included, have or will have soon

For example: 
1. Collapse in the rule of law or in other words: the "state within the state" not accountable to anybody (Swiss Fichen-Affaire anybody?) 
2. Repression of freedom of speech, openly, like in Russia for example, or hidden, like in the US or Switzerland for example (watch the Video for more in depth information)

And sorry, Erin Burnett, when doing the interview, didn't you have this gut feeling, that you would look like a complete fool some day (in the time after Snowden perhaps)? You did have this feeling, right? And worse even, it goes right to the edge of looking like a complete tabloid journalist. This will haunt you for the rest of your life probably… sadly.

WL – Can We Trust The Media

Vergleich Kinderfilm Szenen

Labels: , , , , , , , ,

Dieser Blogeintag soll eine Hilfe sein für jedermann, der sachlich entscheiden will, ob sein Kind reif genug ist, einen gewissen Film zu sehen. Dabei werden drei Dinge berücksichtigt:
1. Die eindrücklichsten Szenen des jeweiligen Kinderfilms
2. Das europäische Filmbewertung FSK (mehr dazu hier)
3. Die amerikanische Filmbewertung

Was Leute, Studios, Kritiker und Filmbewertungs-Agenturen sagen entspricht nicht immer den Tatsachen (mehr dazu später) oder den ganz persönlichen Wertvorstellungen und Lebensumständen. Deshalb ist der wichtigste Faktor eindeutig der Film (beziehungsweise die Filmszene) selber. Ein Anker bildet für mich das Dschungelbuch, ein beliebter Kinderfilm, der keine offizielle Altersempfehlung hat. Er wird allgemein als «kindertauglich» akzeptiert. Die eindrücklichste Szene des Dschungelbuchs ist der Kampf von Mogli mit Sher Khan. Hier ist die Szene:




In einer ersten Ausgabe dieses Blogposts (2013-09-25) werde ich versuchen, die eindrücklichsten Szenen diverser Kinderfilme vergleichend nebeneinander zu stellen. In einer zweiten Phase werde ich weitere Informaitonen hinzufügen wie Altersempfehlungen, Jahrgang, Trailer, etc.

Was dieser Blogpost allerdings nicht kann ist ehrlich, neutral und frei von vorgefassten Meinungen und inneren Bildern urteilen. Da seid ihr gefragt, liebe Eltern. Dieser Blogpost soll in keiner Weise eine moralische Beurteilung darstellen. Aber nur ihr wisst, ob ihr wirklich ehrlich zu euch selber seid und ob euer Kopf-, Herz- und Bauchgefühl übereinstimmt mit dem was ihr hier seht. Persönlich fand ich die Szene mit Mogli und Sher Khan zum Beispiel ziemlich heftig. Ich hatte das nicht mehr so in Erinnerung. Auf der anderen Hand: sind wir nicht schon zu verweichlicht, was Themen wie Tod und Verlust, Agression und echte Empathie angeht? Oder wissen wir heute einfach viel mehr über die Kinderpsyche und was ihr gut tut und was nicht? Ist es die Aufgabe von uns Eltern, unsere Kinder auf die Welt "da draussen" adäquat vorzubereiten? Was meint ihr?

Folgende Filme sollen in Zukunft noch zu der Liste hinzugefügt werden:
Arrietty, die wundersame Welt der Borger (Ghibli) 
Avatar, der Herr der Elemente (?) 
Brother Bear (?)
Das Mädchen mit dem Zauberhaar (Ghibli)
Das wandelnde Schloss (Ghibli)
Das Schloss im Himmel (Ghibli)
Der Gigant aus dem All (Brad Bird)
Mein Nachbar Totoro (Ghibli)
Ponyo, ein Tag am Meer (Ghibli) 
Ratatouille (Pixar)






Arielle, die Meerjungfrau (Disney)





Chihiros Reise ins Zauberland (Ghibli) 
Leider habe ich die Szene, in der Haku in seiner Drachenform zurückkommt nicht im Internet gefunden. Hier ist aber ein fanmade Trailer, der Ausschnitte dieser Szene zeigt. Als Eindruck:



Der Trailer:




Der König der Löwen (Disney)





Der König der Löwen 2 (Disney)





Die Unglaublichen (Pixar)



Der Trailer:


Merida, Legende der Highlands (Pixar)





Wall-E, der Letzte räumt die Erde auf (Pixar)



Der Trailer:





Yakari (Storimages / Delphine Pialot)
Ausschnitt aus Yakari, Folge 4, «Im Land der Wölfe»:


Für den Film Yakari habe ich keinen Trailer gefunden.











Parcours 2013

Body control in urban landscapes:

Ben Wilson's Streetart

FSK Freigaben

Labels:

Was bedeuten die FSK Freigaben genau? Eine Übersicht.



FSK ab 0 freigegeben/Freigegeben ohne Altersbeschränkung

Das Kennzeichen "FSK ab 0 freigegeben" entspricht dem bisherigen Kennzeichen "Freigegeben ohne Altersbeschränkung". Kleinkinder erleben filmische Darstellungen unmittelbar und spontan. Ihre Wahrnehmung ist vorwiegend episodisch ausgerichtet, kognitive und strukturierende Fähigkeiten sind noch kaum ausgebildet. Schon dunkle Szenarien, schnelle Schnittfolgen oder eine laute und bedrohliche Geräuschkulisse können Ängste mobilisieren oder zu Irritationen führen. Kinder bis zum Alter von sechs Jahren identifizieren sich vollständig mit der Spielhandlung und den Filmfiguren. Vor allem bei Bedrohungssituationen findet eine direkte Übertragung statt. Gewaltaktionen, aber auch Verfolgungen oder Beziehungskonflikte lösen Ängste aus, die nicht selbständig und alleine abgebaut werden können. Eine schnelle und positive Auflösung problematischer Situationen ist daher sehr wichtig.



FSK ab 6 freigegeben

Ab sechs Jahren entwickeln Kinder zunehmend die Fähigkeit zu kognitiver Verarbeitung von Sinneseindrücken. Allerdings sind bei den sechs bis elfjährigen beträchtliche Unterschiede in der Entwicklung zu berücksichtigen. Etwa mit dem neunten Lebensjahr beginnen Kinder, fiktionale und reale Geschichten unterscheiden zu können. Eine distanzierende Wahrnehmung wird damit möglich. Bei jüngeren Kindern steht hingegen noch immer die emotionale, episodische Impression im Vordergrund. Ein sechsjähriges Kind taucht noch ganz in die Filmhandlung ein, leidet und fürchtet mit den Identifikationsfiguren. Spannungs- und Bedrohungsmomente können zwar schon verkraftet werden, dürfen aber weder zu lang anhalten noch zu nachhaltig wirken. Eine positive Auflösung von Konfliktsituationen ist auch hier maßgebend.



FSK ab 12 freigegeben

Bei Kindern und Jugendlichen dieser Altersgruppe ist die Fähigkeit zu distanzierter Wahrnehmung und rationaler Verarbeitung bereits ausgebildet. Erste Genre-Kenntnisse sind vorhanden. Eine höhere Erregungsintensität, wie sie in Thrillern oder Science-Fiction-Filmen üblich ist, wird verkraftet. Problematisch ist dagegen zum Beispiel die Bilderflut harter, gewaltbezogener Action-Filme, die zumeist noch nicht selbständig verarbeitet werden kann. 12- bis 15-jährige befinden sich in der Pubertät, einer Phase der Selbstfindung, die mit großer Unsicherheit und Verletzbarkeit verbunden ist. Insbesondere Filme, die zur Identifikation mit einem "Helden" einladen, dessen Rollenmuster durch antisoziales, destruktives oder gewalttätiges Verhalten geprägt ist, bieten ein Gefährdungspotenzial. Die Auseinandersetzung mit Filmen, die gesellschaftliche Themen seriös problematisieren, ist dieser Altersgruppe durchaus zumutbar und für ihre Meinungs- und Bewusstseinsbildung bedeutsam.

Parental Guidance (PG): FSK ab 12 – mit Eltern ab sechs Jahren erlaubt
Haben Filme die Kennzeichnung "FSK ab 12 freigegeben" erhalten, kann auch Kindern im Alter von sechs Jahren aufwärts der Einlass zur Vorstellung gewährt werden, wenn sie von einer personensorgeberechtigen Person begleitet werden. Die Personensorge steht grundsätzlich den Eltern zu. Eine erziehungsbeauftragte Person, die von den Eltern (=Personensorgeberechtigte) autorisiert ist, reicht nicht aus. Weitere Informationen finden Sie in unserer Broschüre.



FSK ab 16 freigegeben

Bei 16- bis 18-jährigen kann von einer entwickelten Medienkompetenz ausgegangen werden. Problematisch bleibt die Vermittlung sozial schädigender Botschaften. Nicht freigegeben werden Filme, die Gewalt tendenziell verherrlichen, einem partnerschaftlichen Rollenverhältnis der Geschlechter entgegenstehen, einzelne Gruppen diskriminieren oder Sexualität auf ein reines Instrumentarium der Triebbefriedigung reduzieren. Auch die Werteorientierung in Bereichen wie Drogenkonsum, politischer Radikalismus oder Ausländerfeindlichkeit wird mit besonderer Sensibilität geprüft.



FSK ab 18/Keine Jugendfreigabe

Das Kennzeichen "FSK ab 18" entspricht dem bisherigen Kennzeichen "Keine Jugendfreigabe". Dieses Kennzeichen wird vergeben, wenn keine einfache bzw. schwere Jugendgefährdung vorliegt. Nach § 14 Abs. 3 u. 4 des Jugendschutzgesetzes erfolgt für DVDs und Blu-ray Discs die Vergabe des Kennzeichnens "FSK ab 18", wenn keine einfache Jugendgefährdung vorliegt, für die öffentliche Filmvorführung, wenn der Film nicht schwer jugendgefährdend ist. Gekennzeichnete Filme, DVDs und Blu-ray Discs werden von der Bundesprüfstelle für jugendgefährdende Medien (BPjM) nicht indiziert.




Keine Kennzeichnung
Bei einer Altersfreigabe für Kinofilme muss nach § 14 Abs. 3 Jugendschutzgesetz (JuSchG) auch bei einer Freigabe "ab 18 Jahren" auf eine "schwere Jugendgefährdung" hin geprüft werden. Hintergrund der gesetzlichen Bestimmungen ist, dass in Einzelfällen auch Jugendliche Zutritt zu den Vorstellungen erhalten könnten. Bei einer Freigabe von Filmen auf DVD, Blu-ray oder vergleichbaren Bildträgern besteht verstärkt die Gefahr, dass bereits Jugendliche Filme sehen, die erst "ab 18 Jahren" freigegeben sind. Hier reicht daher bereits eine "einfache Jugendgefährdung" aus, damit keine Kennzeichnung ausgesprochen werden darf. Es ist daher möglich, dass ein Film, der im Kino eine Freigabe "ab 18 Jahren" erhalten hat, in der gleichen Version für eine Veröffentlichung auf DVD keine Freigabe erhält.

Die gesetzlichen Bestimmungen zum Jugendschutz sind hier eindeutig und bindend für die Arbeit der FSK.

"Keine Kennzeichnung" stellt aber kein Aufführungsverbot dar. Kinos können auf eigenes rechtliches Risiko den Film vorführen - allerdings nur vor Erwachsenen. Kommt ein Gericht – beispielsweise nach einer Anzeige - zur Auffassung, dass es sich um einen "schwer jugendgefährdenden Film" handelt, sind unter anderem Werbung und Ankündigung gesetzlich verboten und daher strafbar (Jugendschutzgesetz, § 15 Abs. 1). Über den Jugendschutz hinaus möglicherweise zu berücksichtigende strafrechtliche Bestände fallen ebenfalls in den Aufgabenbereich der Justiz - und nicht der FSK.



Weiterführende Links:
Download der FSK-Kennzeichen und Anwendungshinweise
Über die Auswirkung der FSK-Altersstufen auf das Fernsehprogramm

Q&A to J .Assange

Just a MUST SEE:

Know your meme

Ieva polkka ;-)



To that finnish young man: well done! Fight for that girl! :-)






Bleach.

Bleach ist ein Manga von Tite Kubo. Diese Szene kommt recht am Anfang (irgendwo zwischen Folge 1 und 10) der Anime-Umsetzung. vor. Die Person, die man sieht, ist Orihime Inoue, die gerade von einem Auto angefahren wurde, als sie vom Einkaufen nach Hause gelaufen ist. Ichigo fragt sie, ob es ihr gut geht, woraufhin sie eben diese Bewegung macht und antwortet, dass alles in Ordnung ist. Ich denke das war ausführlich genug. (Sasori5699)







Hatsune Mika:









Ievan Polkka (grovergep Remix)







And if this song doesn't spook around in your head for the next week or so then you suffer probably from some severe head traume ;-)

Working for the NSA

Great scene from the movie "Good Will Hunting". A bit like a prophecy in 1997, no?

Women Pick up

How to explain to my son, how to show a girl that you like her? Mmmh… Well – maybe I could start with this film, what dayya think?

Hidden Agendas

Excerpt from John Pilgers Book ‹Hidden Agendas›

Regardless of the BBC's enduring facade of 'impartiality' and 'standards', news is now openly ideological and uniform, as the demands of the 'market' supercult are met. When slow news is included, it is more than likely dressed in a political and social vocabulary that ensures the truth is lost. Thus, in Britain, as in the United States (and Australia), the systematic impoverishment of a quarter of the population is routinely filed under 'underclass', an American term describing a corrupting, anti-social group outside society. The solution to poverty, which is the return of vast wealth taken from the poor by the rich, is seldom given a public airing. The 'new' system of capitalism for the powerless and socialism for the powerful, under which the former are persecuted and the latter are given billions in public subsidies, is rarely identified as such. Terms like 'modernisation' are preferred.

Reincarnation or rebirth?

A most frequent misunderstanding. I couldn't have said it better than the people from buddhismnow.com:

Does Buddhism teach reincarnation?
Reincarnation is not a teaching of the Buddha. In Buddhism the teaching is of rebirth, not of reincarnation.

What is the difference between reincarnation and rebirth?
The reincarnation idea is to believe in a soul or a being, separate from the body. At the death of the physical body, this soul is said to move into another state and then enter a womb to be born again.
Rebirth is different and can be explained in this way. Take away the notion of a soul or a being living inside the body; take away all ideas of self existing either inside or outside the body. Also take away notions of past, present and future; in fact take away all notions of time. Now, without reference to time and self, there can be no before or after, no beginning or ending, no birth or death, no coming or going. Yet there is life! Rebirth is the experience of life in the moment, without birth, without death; it is the experience of life which is neither eternal nor subject to annihilation.

Quote from http://buddhismnow.com/faq/#BuddhismReincarnation

 

TIBET situation: critical

I'm not tibetan. I know only few tibetans. Clearly, for me it's a case of justice, of human dignity, of teachings in non-violence.

Revolution

Marius und Ratzfatz im Glashaus. Schiessen scharf. Darf man das? Ist das nicht Revolution? Die stiften doch tatsächlich Kinder an das Grätli ins WC… dürfen die beiden das eigentlich? Ist das nicht inflationär-revolutionär? Also ich find schon, check it out:
















Tubel Trophy

Kein Thema: mitnichten kein Thema mehr! Demit es jede Tubel verstoht…


«das lied sch scho 20 johr alt! aber emmerno en HIT :) »

                                           G90sam (vor einem Jahr auf Youtube)


Frage ist nur, wer bestimmt genau was en Tubel isch oder nicht? Da gibt es Grenzfälle. Und Kontextsensitivität. Aber manchmal, manchmal…














Zweiklassenmedizin


Leudde, ich muss jetzt hier etwas loswerden und ein Feedback ist sehr extrem ausdrücklich gernstens erwünscht. Im Moment fährt meine Gesundheit Rollercoaster mit mir. Bei keinem dieser Dinge bin ich mir einer persönlichen Schuld bewusst aber das Schicksal hat halt auch noch ein Wörtchen mitzureden. Dies soll kein Tränendrüsendücker werden und ich brauch auch keine Bemitleider, das eher so als kleine Einleitung. Der Prolog sozusagen.

                   ***

Ich ruf also heut nachmittag meine Arztpraxis an, die Medix Gruppenpraxis an der Rotbuchstrasse 46 in Zürich, mit der ich einigermassen zufrieden war in den letzten Jahren. Zufällig auch eine HMO-Praxis. Glaub ich. Hat mich wenig gestört, das garantiert auch ein wenig, dass sie effizient arbeiten. So weit so gut.

Nun. Ich ruf also an, die Sprechhilfe oder wie auch immer man dem auf Neudeutsch-Slang heute nennt nimmt ab. Ich erkläre ihr: ich habe drei Probleme:

1. Muttermale, die abnormal wachsen in den letzten Monaten. Eins ist über ein cm gross. Eins ganz neu. Ich möchte das gerne zeigen.
2. Ich schnarche seit ca. zwei Jahren. Doch in letzter Zeit gibt es Hinweise, dass ich Atemaussetzer habe. Möcht' ich auch gerne zeigen.
3. Ausserdem: Letzte Woche teilt mein Vater uns, meiner Schwester und mir, mit, dass er Untersuchungen gemacht hat und in unserer Familie wahrscheinlich ein Zuckerkrankheit-Gen sein könnte. Grundsätzlich halb so wild, aber ich nehme seit ungefähr sechs Monaten massiv zu und - äh - vielleicht sollten wir das auch mal ansehen, denn ich tendiere grundsätzlich seit vierzig Jahren eher zur Bohnenstange.

Sie weist mich darauf hin, dass sie sehr ausgebucht sind. Wenn ich mich erinnere die Dermatologie bis August.

Ok.

Mmmh.

Und jetzt?

Ja, bei welchen von ihren Ärzten ich denn so gewesen seie? Ich so: Zepter, Rapp, wer auch immer, es wechselt bei denen so im Jahresrhythmus oder so…

Sie so: ja eben, ob ich einen Allgemeinarzt bei Ihnen habe. Ich glaub das hab ich, kann mich vor Medix-Namen aber nicht mehr klar erinnern (jetzt fällt's mir natürlich soeben ein, die Seidel, aber eben, etwas zu spät). Sie hat aber inzwischen mein File gefunden, sollte sie das nicht einsehen können? Oder fällt das unter den Sekretärinnen-Patienten-Datenschutz?

Sie so: ja eben, sie seien sehr ausgebucht, aber ich könne das alles auch einem Allgemeinarzt zeigen, der könne mich auch überweisen.

Jetzt werde ich etwas nervös. Denn ich tick so: um unser Gesundheitssystem nicht zu belasten, versuche ich erst zum Arzt zu gehen, wenn ich denke es ist nötig und nicht wenn ich beim Pfeffermahlen zwei mal gehustet habe wie das andere, die ich kenne, tun.

Ich weise sie also darauf hin, dass alle meine drei Anliegen im worst case zu meinem Tod führen könnten und ich deshalb wirklich sehr sehr gerne das zeigen würde und ich mir deshalb nicht gerne zum x-ten mal anhöre, dass sie ausgebucht sind. Ich bin herrgottverdammt noch mal kein HMO Patient.

Aaaah, (grosses Staunen auf der anderen Seite hab ich das Gefühl), sie sind kein HMO Patient???

Nein, bin ich nicht.

Und bitte, wie stellt sich das unsere Gesellschaft vor??

"Hallo, ich bin am sterben und sähe gerne einen Arzt" "Sie sind HMO Patient? Ja warten sie mal, tut mir Leid, wir sind bis August ausgebucht"

Ich hab dann einen Termin bei einem Allgemeinarzt bekommen. Herrn Christmann, diesen Montag um 8.30h. Nüchtern antreten.

Jetzt meine grosse ernüchternde Frage an euch. Und nicht nur an meine Freunde, sondern ganz EXPLIZIT auch an die Ärzte, die Spitaldirektoren, die Mongoloiden, die Narkoleptiker und die Arztpraxissekretärinnen: In was für einer Welt wollten wir leben? Du. Und ich. Hä? Wenn jemand ohne direkt Schuld an seinem Zustand zu sein in einen Unfall oder eine Krankheit verwickelt wird, wollen wir in diesem Fall einen Sozialstaat oder nicht? Klar, dass diese Frage Abzockern egal ist, denn für Geld kann man sich vieles kaufen. Aber Gesundheit lässt sich nicht immer um jeden Preis kaufen. Auch ein Herr Blocher kann morgen an einer genetischen Krankheit erkranken, für die er nicht selber Schuld ist ausser dass er geboren wurde. Wollen wir ein System, dass eine Zweiklassenmedizin ist wie wir es heute haben?





Neulich: Anonym, Gesundheits-Industrie-Angestellte erzählt mir, dass der Herr Kollege Arzt Abzocker seit einiger Zeit nur noch Privatpatienten operiert weil er mehr verdienen will. Deshalb stehe nur noch sein jüngerer Kollege zur Verfügung.

Keine erfundene Geschichte, hab ich so erlebt und kann alle Namen im Klartext nennen.

Die Geschichte geht euch zu wenig weit? Ihr wollt mehr? Hier Beispiel zwei: Anonymzwei, Arzt/Ärztin, und dazu nota bene noch jemand, von dem ich sehr viel halte, erzählt Folgendes: (aus meiner Erinnerung erzählt, vor ein oder zwei Jahren gehört und ey, mein Gedächtnis funktioniert noch ziemlich gut ;). Erzählt während eines Praxisbesuchs also von einer Studie, die aktuell mit Kollegen durchgeführt wird. Es geht um genetische Veranlagungen. Teilnehmer sind freiwillig. Clue ist: es hat da einen Teilnehmer, der so weit ich mich erinnere in der Öffentlichkeit nicht einmal unbekannt ist, bei dem man klar sehen kann, dass in seiner Zukunft eine genetische Krankheit ausbrechen wird. Ich hake ein: ja aber das ist nur eine Wahrscheinlichkeit, oder? Das ist ja nicht sicher, das er die bekommt. Anonymzwei antwortet: nein nein, hier ist das anders. Es steht mehr oder weniger 100%ig fest, dass diese Krankheit ausbrechen wird und wahrscheinlich zu extremen gesundheitlichen Einschränkungen führen wird.

Ha!! Gefundenes Fressen für die Versicherungen. So einer stellt doch ein Hochsicherheitsrisiko terroristischen Ausmasses dar, oder nicht?

Aber eins ist schon klar, odr? Ein Stuhl, ein Tisch, ein Gebäude haben kein Bewusstsein, können nicht leiden, nicht sterben im Sinne eines leidensfähigen Lebewesens. Mit anderen Worten: "Die Gesellschaft", das sind wir. Du. Ich. Und sie, Frau Arztpraxissekretäterin. WIR machen unsere Gesellschaft lebenswert. Wir gestalten unsere Welt massgeblich mit. Oder eben nicht und agieren wie ein lebloses Zahnrad im "abstrakten System" das keines ist.

Es liegt an uns!

Apropos: die Grundidee der Versicherung ist folgende: Ganz viele geben ein klein wenig um diejenigen, die erfahrungsgemäss durch die Maschen der Gesellschaft fallen aufzufangen. Und dies aus dem Bewusstsein heraus, dass es jeden von uns jederzeit überall treffen könnte.

Diese Grundidee ist nicht etwa schlecht. Wenn sie denn so umgesetzt würde. Sie ist sogar nach wie vor revolutionär saugut.

Ich wünsche mir von ganzem Herzen – und das ist jetzt kein Witz sondern mein Todernst – dass die Frau oder der Mann, der in der Studie identifiziert wurde als genetisch veranlagt zu einer möglicherweise tödlichen und mit Sicherheit ausbrechenden Krankheit, einen wundervollen, schmerzfreien, lebenswerten Abend erleben darf. Uneingeschränkt. Frei. Geliebt.



Grrrr, Montag nüchtern? Ehrlich, no joke? Ich hasse das, nüchtern den Tag beginnen zu müssen aber ey, was tut man nicht alles… ;) ;) :)

Churzschluss

When HipHop gives you the goosebumps you know it comes straight from the heart:

Steff la Cheffe, Webba:





Mad C:

Beasts of the Southern Wild


«Hushpuppy: When it all goes quiet behind my eyes, I see everything that made me lying around in invisible pieces. When I look too hard, it goes away. And when it all goes quiet, I see they are right here. I see that I'm a little piece in a big, big universe. And that makes things right.»















The End of USA


The following is today's Statement of Julian Assange about the beginning of the trial of Bradley Edward Manning, the biggest showtrial of recent history. This does not only concern Bradley, or all US citizens, this also concerns you! And you better believe it as long as you still are allowed to do so. And no, I'm not being dramatic here but realistic. We must start to forget the names like Stalin, Mao, Hitler, Franco and start to see the patterns that lead to those catastrophic leaderships. And let's start with it now!



Unfortunately this time we know already who will get eliminated. 
As in reality TV the script of Bradley Mannings trial is already written. 
Let the show begin…








Assange Statement 
on the First Day of Manning Trial
Monday 3rd June 2013, 22:00 GMT

Statement by Julian Assange, published with permission of Julian Assange.
The original text can be found on http://wikileaks.org/Assange-Statement-on-the-First-Day.html



As I type these lines, on June 3, 2013, Private First Class Bradley Edward Manning is being tried in a sequestered room at Fort Meade, Maryland, for the alleged crime of telling the truth. The court martial of the most prominent political prisoner in modern US history has now, finally, begun. It has been three years. Bradley Manning, then 22 years old, was arrested in Baghdad on May 26, 2010. He was shipped to Kuwait, placed into a cage, and kept in the sweltering heat of Camp Arifjan. "For me, I stopped keeping track," he told the court last November. "I didn’t know whether night was day or day was night. And my world became very, very small. It became these cages... I remember thinking I’m going to die." After protests from his lawyers, Bradley Manning was then transferred to a brig at a US Marine Corps Base in Quantico, VA, where - infamously - he was subjected to cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment at the hands of his captors - a formal finding by the UN. Isolated in a tiny cell for twenty-three out of twenty-four hours a day, he was deprived of his glasses, sleep, blankets and clothes, and prevented from exercising. All of this - it has been determined by a military judge - "punished" him before he had even stood trial.


«Brad’s treatment at Quantico will forever be etched, I believe, in our nation’s history, as a disgraceful moment in time" said his lawyer, David Coombs. "Not only was it stupid and counterproductive, it was criminal.»


The United States was, in theory, a nation of laws. But it is no longer a nation of laws for Bradley Manning. When the abuse of Bradley Manning became a scandal reaching all the way to the President of the United States and Hillary Clinton’s spokesman resigned to register his dissent over Mr. Manning’s treatment, an attempt was made to make the problem less visible. Bradley Manning was transferred to the Midwest Joint Regional Correctional Facility at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. He has waited in prison for three years for a trial - 986 days longer than the legal maximum - because for three years the prosecution has dragged its feet and obstructed the court, denied the defense access to evidence and abused official secrecy. This is simply illegal - all defendants are constitutionally entitled to a speedy trial - but the transgression has been acknowledged and then overlooked.

Against all of this, it would be tempting to look on the eventual commencement of his trial as a mercy. But that is hard to do. We no longer need to comprehend the "Kafkaesque" through the lens of fiction or allegory. It has left the pages and lives among us, stalking our best and brightest. It is fair to call what is happening to Bradley Manning a "show trial". Those invested in what is called the "US military justice system" feel obliged to defend what is going on, but the rest of us are free to describe this travesty for what it is. No serious commentator has any confidence in a benign outcome. The pretrial hearings have comprehensively eliminated any meaningful uncertainty, inflicting pre-emptive bans on every defense argument that had any chance of success. Bradley Manning may not give evidence as to his stated intent (exposing war crimes and their context), nor may he present any witness or document that shows that no harm resulted from his actions. Imagine you were put on trial for murder. In Bradley Manning’s court, you would be banned from showing that it was a matter of self-defence, because any argument or evidence as to intent is banned. You would not be able to show that the ’victim’ is, in fact, still alive, because that would be evidence as to the lack of harm.


But of course. Did you forget whose show it is?


The government has prepared for a good show. The trial is to proceed for twelve straight weeks: a fully choreographed extravaganza, with a 141-strong cast of prosecution witnesses. The defense was denied permission to call all but a handful of witnesses. Three weeks ago, in closed session, the court actually held a rehearsal. Even experts on military law have called this unprecedented. Bradley Manning’s conviction is already written into the script. The commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces, Barack Obama, spoiled the plot for all of us when he pronounced Bradley Manning guilty two years ago. "He broke the law," President Obama stated, when asked on camera at a fundraiser about his position on Mr. Manning. In a civilized society, such a prejudicial statement alone would have resulted in a mistrial.

To convict Bradley Manning, it will be necessary for the US government to conceal crucial parts of his trial. Key portions of the trial are to be conducted in secrecy: 24 prosecution witnesses will give secret testimony in closed session, permitting the judge to claim that secret evidence justifies her decision. But closed justice is no justice at all. What cannot be shrouded in secrecy will be hidden through obfuscation. The remote situation of the courtroom, the arbitrary and discretionary restrictions on access for journalists, and the deliberate complexity and scale of the case are all designed to drive fact-hungry reporters into the arms of official military PR men, who mill around the Fort Meade press room like over-eager sales assistants. The management of Bradley Manning’s case will not stop at the limits of the courtroom. It has already been revealed that the Pentagon is closely monitoring press coverage and social media discussions on the case.

This is not justice; never could this be justice. The verdict was ordained long ago. Its function is not to determine questions such as guilt or innocence, or truth or falsehood. It is a public relations exercise, designed to provide the government with an alibi for posterity. It is a show of wasteful vengeance; a theatrical warning to people of conscience. The alleged act in respect of which Bradley Manning is charged is an act of great conscience - the single most important disclosure of subjugated history, ever. There is not a political system anywhere on the earth that has not seen light as a result. In court, in February, Bradley Manning said that he wanted to expose injustice, and to provoke worldwide debate and reform. Bradley Manning is accused of being a whistleblower, a good man, who cared for others and who followed higher orders. Bradley Manning is effectively accused of conspiracy to commit journalism.

But this is not the language the prosecution uses. The most serious charge against Bradley Manning is that he "aided the enemy" - a capital offence that should require the greatest gravity, but here the US government laughs at the world, to breathe life into a phantom. The government argues that Bradley Manning communicated with a media organisation, WikiLeaks, who communicated to the public. It also argues that al-Qaeda (who else) is a member of the public. Hence, it argues that Bradley Manning communicated "indirectly" with al-Qaeda, a formally declared US "enemy", and therefore that Bradley Manning communicated with "the enemy". But what about "aiding" in that most serious charge, "aiding the enemy"? Don’t forget that this is a show trial. The court has banned any evidence of intent. The court has banned any evidence of the outcome, the lack of harm, the lack of any victim. It has ruled that the government doesn’t need to show that any "aiding" occurred and the prosecution doesn’t claim it did. The judge has stated that it is enough for the prosecution to show that al-Qaeda, like the rest of the world, reads WikiLeaks.


«Liberty cannot be preserved without a general knowledge among the people,»

wrote John Adams, 

«who have a right and a desire to know.»



When communicating with the press is "aiding the enemy" it is the "general knowledge among the people" itself which has become criminal. Just as Bradley Manning is condemned, so too is that spirit of liberty in which America was founded.

In the end it is not Bradley Manning who is on trial. His trial ended long ago. The defendent now, and for the next 12 weeks, is the United States. A runaway military, whose misdeeds have been laid bare, and a secretive government at war with the public. They sit in the docks. We are called to serve as jurists. We must not turn away.

Free Bradley Manning.

No copyright has been asserted for this document. Julian Assange has entered it into the public domain.








If you like this essay, you might also like the following ones:

Breaking secrets or leaking crimes? Let's start with the central point: the question is not «Did Julian Assange have contact or even initiate contact with Bradley Manning?», «Did Julian Assange convince or even push Bradley Manning to leak data?» or «Did Julian Assange provide infrastructure to Manning in order to leak data?», no, the central question is: «Did Bradley Manning expose any crimes?»…

The death of our mainstream media The mentioned quotes in the beginning of this essay sadly illustrate the catastrophic shape of much of our old mainstream media. They prove what we suspected for a long time already: our old mainstream media are dead…

The danger of censoring child pornography! Child pornography is not always bad…

Gun Control? We have nothing to fear but fear itself!











Best Films of all Times



So here it comes… My personal list of the top films of all times. The order is just roughly in the correct hierarchical order. Especially all films with rating 3.0 are in no particular order.


3.0 = Very good movie, well executed, entertaining to watch 

3.5 = Great movie, well executed, contains some level of previously unseen concept or a light metalevel or a light reflection of cultural or social life

4.0 = Excellent movie, well executed, contains maybe a level of previously unseen concepts or a philosophic metalevel or a well formulated reflection of cultural or social life

4.5 = Brilliant movie, well executed, contains probably a level of previously unseen concepts, has at least one level of philosophic meta meaning, is a clear reflection of our present times and society as well as a clear reflection of cultural and social life.

5.0 = Superbe movie, well executed, has levels of previously unseen concepts, has several levels of philosophic meta meanings, is a clear reflection of our present times and society and has a deep reflection of cultural and social life, has influenced or will probably heavily influence future film projects, has had or will most probably have a recognizable, direct impact on our real world

Please leave comments and give us your own top ten movies of all times!


01.  5.0  The Matrix Trilogy (including Animatrix)
02.  5.0  Cloud Atlas
03.  5.0  Dogville
04.  5.0  V like Vendetta
05.  5.0  A Clockwork Orange
06.  5.0  Fight Club
07.  4.5  American Beauty
08.  4.5  The great Dictator
09.  4.5  L.A. Crash
10.  4.5  Das Wissen vom Heilen

11.  4.5  Das Experiment
12.  4.5  The Island
13.  4.5  The Ali G Show
14.  4.5  The Truman Show
15.  4.5  Nachbeben
16.  4.5  The Cube
17.  4.5  Memento
18.  4.5  The Lion King 
19.  4.5  Darwin's Nightmare
20.  4.0  Bowling for Columbine

21.  4.0  The Dreamers
22.  4.0  Gomorrah
23.  4.0  Ghost in the Shell
24.  4.0  Petits Mouchoirs"
25.  4.0  The Wave
26.  4.0  2001: A Space Odyssey
27.  4.0  Brothers
28.  4.0  Little Miss Sunshine
29.  4.0  The Stanford Prison Experiment
30.  4.0  Samurai Fiction

31.  4.0  Lola runs
32.  4.0  Fargo
33.  4.0  When the Wind blows
34.  4.0  Samsara
35.  4.0  Sennentuntschi
36.  4.0  The Incredibles
37.  4.0  Incendies
38.  4.0  This Film is not yet rated
39.  4.0  Good bye Lenin
40.  4.0  Der grosse Ausverkauf

41.  4.0  Kids
42.  4.0  Taxi to the Dark Side
43.  4.0  Enron, the smartest Guys in the Room
44.  4.0  Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring
45.  4.0  The Fall
46.  4.0  Ghost in the Shell
47.  4.0  The Dark Crystal
48.  4.0  Beat Street
49.  4.0  Brasil
50.  4.0  The White Ribbon

51.  4.0  Amelie de Montmartre
52.  4.0  Swimming Pool
53.  4.0  Naturally Born Killers
54.  4.0  Flow
55.  4.0  Dances with Wolves
56.  4.0  Star Wars - The Return of the Jedi
57.  4.0  The Road to Guantanamo
58.  4.0  Planet of Apes
59.  3.5  Life of Pi
60.  3.5  The Pink Panther Show

61.  3.5  Boogie Nights
62.  3.5  Whale Rider
63.  3.5  Delicatessen
64.  3.5  Der Totmacher
65.  3.5  La haine – der Hass
66.  3.5  Butterfly
67.  3.5  Romeo and Juliet (Baz Luhrmann's version)
68.  3.5  Pulp Fiction
69.  3.5  Lie with me
70.  3.5  Zatoichi

71.  3.5  Sin City
72.  3.5  Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
73.  3.5  Closer than close
74.  3.5  Eyes wide shut
75.  3.5  Contact
76.  3.5  Grounding
77.  3.5  Ice Age 1–3
78.  3.5  Stig Larsson's Millenium Trilogy
79.  3.5  A Nightmare before Christmas
80.  3.5  Pan's Labyrinth

81.  3.5  We feed the World - Essen global
82.  3.5  Gegen die Wand
83.  3.5  Guru, Bhagwan, his Secretary & his Bodyguard
84.  3.5  Let's make Money
85.  3.5  David wants to fly
86.  3.5  Tron
87.  3.5  Grave of the Fireflies
88.  3.5  Lone Star
89.  3.5  Cast away
90.  3.5  The Crimson Rivers

91.  3.5  Der Untergang
92.  3.5  Django Unchained
93.  3.5  Zatoichi
94.  3.5  Rust and Bone
95.  3.5  Smoke Signals
96.  3.5  The Departed
97.  3.5  The Pillow Book
98.  3.5  What's eating Gilbert Grape
99.  3.5  Eyes wide shut
100.  3.5  Hair

101.  3.0  True Grit
102.  3.0  No Country for Old Men
103.  3.0  Kundun
104.  3.0  Midnight Express
105.  3.0  Schulmädchen Report
106.  3.0  Unlike U
107.  3.0  Silence of the Lambs
108.  3.0  Freudentaumel
109.  3.0  The Bourne Tetralogy
110.  3.0  Fallen Angels

111.  3.0  Terminator 2 und 3
112.  3.0  Amadeus
113.  3.0  Madagaskar 2
114.  3.0  Wallace and Gromit
115.  3.0  La Linea
116.  3.0  Trainspotting
117.  3.0  Laurel Canyon
118.  3.0  The Day After
119.  3.0  Lock, Stock and two Smoking Barrels
120.  3.0  Die Farbe Lila

121.  3.0  Secretary
122.  3.0  Ninja Assassin
123.  3.0  Mirror Mirror
124.  3.0  The Big Blue
125.  3.0  The Big Lebowsky
126.  3.0  Taxi Driver
127.  3.0  The Usual Suspects
128.  3.0  Im Reich der Sonne
129.  3.0  Heat
130.  3.0  Crash (1996)

131.  3.0  Blow
132.  3.0  Mein Freund Winnetou
133.  3.0  Once upon a Time in the West
134.  3.0  Once upon a Time in America
135.  3.0  Fire and Ice
136.  3.0  The Blues Brothers


Added at a later point in time:
4.0  Intouchables
4.0  Being John Malkovitch
4.0  Blade Runner
4.0  eXistenz
4.0  Good copy, Bad copy
4.0  Inception
4.0  Kriegerin
4.0  Exit through the Gift Shop
3.5  The Master

3.5  Inglorious Basterds
3.5  Ground Hog Day
3.5  Adams Aebler
3.5  American History X
3.5  Forrest Gump
3.5  Wall-E
3.5  Alexis Sorbas 
3.0  A Christmas Carol
3.0  Das Leben der Anderen
3.0  Nuovo Cinema Paradiso


Delusive Revolution

Great Rap with great lyrics. Too seldom. Sadly. I present: Devilz-Speciez. Enjoy!

… and all becomes clear.


«And all becomes clear. Wish I could make you see this brightness. Don't worry, all is well. All is so perfectly, damnably well. I understand now, that boundaries between noise and sound are conventions. All boundaries are conventions, waiting to be transcended. One may transcend any convention, if only one can first conceive of doing so. Moments like this, I can feel your heart beating as clearly as I feel my own, and I know that separation is an illusion. My life extends far beyond the limitations of me.»

– Robert Frobisher to his beloved in the Film ‹Cloud Atlas›















If you like this essay, you might also like the following blogs: 


What are we capable of? Anonymous. Who is Anonymous? Anonymous is you…

Mainstream Media are dead (Of course, the following statements have nothing to do with journalism. Least with ‹professional› or even ‹scientific› journalism. They do not only misrepresent the truth in one way or the other, they are partially outright lies…

A V's awakening god is in the reign…

Osho Today I stumbled over some video-footage of Osho and have to say: I don't think it's soo bad what this guy is talking about. Some of his ideas are even quite appealing! But his humour is defenitely much better than the humour of most of the people that I know…







Final Logo Publication«

This is the final publication of my logo work originally executed for #OpThunderbird. I herewith transfer my ownership and all legally transferable rights of all logo files and photographs offered in this blogpost for download to the internet connection calling itself «Anonymous» under following conditions:

a) The OpThunderbird Logo belongs to Anonymous as of now.
b) No one else is allowed to claim any rights over the logos I created.
c) It is also not allowed to claim to enforce any rights in my or Anonymous' name (> Gema-Vermutung).
d) Derivative works do automatically stand under the same conditions as the ones mentioned here
e) Commercial use of my work is allowed insofar as 100% of the gain is immediately reinvested into the support of any Anonymous activity. Material reinvestments are much preferred over "salaries" or "financial rewards" for anybody.


>> download logos: OpThunderbird.zip
>> download photographs of logo: OpThunderbird Photographs.zip



examples of the logo:













examples of the photographs:




























Life of PI

Erst habe ich die Buchempfehlung meiner Schwester nicht so ernst genommen. Aber nachdem ich jetzt den Film gesehen habe… Ein ausgezeichneter Film: Life of Pi. Und die Metaanalyse wird im Film gleich hinterher geliefert. Ganz ehrlich, ich weiss nicht, ob ich die Metaebene selber gesehen hätte…
















AIDS Patient Zero


AIDS Patient Zero 

von Vic Dillinger – Mar 27, 2012 – edited Apr 20, 2013 


False Positive

Good investigative work requires dogged determination.  Running an enigma to ground can take years.  Occasionally, medical mysteries initially thought solved are found later to have very different truths at their cores. 
One such mystery concerned the AIDS epidemic in America.  As long as the killer remained comfortably within the gay community not much was done to investigate.  As soon as AIDS found its way into the heterosexual population, though, suddenly America’s interest in ferreting out the cause was paramount.  Panic stricken virologists and other epidemiologists worked feverishly to isolate the source of this sexually transmitted disease first endemic among homosexual men. 
AIDS is what defined the decade of the 1980s, a decade that lived in fear beneath the penumbra of a certain and tortuous death from a highly communicable pathogen. Somewhere, there was a Patient Zero, the epidemiological well-spring from which this plague spewed forth.
“I’m Candy – Fly Me!”
There is an interesting correlation between homosexuality and the airline industry.  At least, there is a publicly perceived correlation as it pertains to airline flight attendants.
The very first air flight attendants (in the 1920s) were men.  These positions were desirable; the men who did these jobs executed their duties more like up-scale, futuristic train porters and ship stewards than as menials.  As with many professions (especially in service jobs such as telephone operators, bank tellers, et al) the sky porters known as “stewards” were exclusively male.  World War I saw the shift from male to female telephone operators and bank tellers; with a dearth of male workers during World War II, employers turned to the fairer sex to fill their employment needs in the airline industry, too. 
The commercial airlines recognized the goldmine presented by hiring female “stewardesses”.  Certainly, they were paid less.  There was also marketability to women that men did not have – women could be hawked by an airline as possible sex partners for the discriminating male traveler choosing its service over another.
The airline industry developed glamour.  The titillation of a sexy stewardess in uniform, pandering to any business traveler’s ego, was priceless.  These were women without boundaries, women who went anywhere, anytime.  Therefore, they must be promiscuous.  The unspoken possibility of sex with a globe-trotting gal was also alluring.  Married women were aggressively discouraged from working as stewardesses.  The single women, all within a certain preferred range of body type, height, and attractiveness, were wanton women (in the minds of the average male of the day).  Although morbid obesity was not the problem in the 1940s it is today, there were no “big girls” on board.
Thus, by the late 1940s male flight attendants were not only undesirable, they were suspect as well.  Occupying a job with women that devoted itself to customer service, good manners, and fine grooming, the stewards garnered suspicions of being “queer.”
 
By the 1950s, this homophobia was rampant, and in the conservative times of Eisenhower and McCarthyism, men were slowly pushed out of the steward jobs. As further incentive to not hire men as flight attendants, the death of a gay steward in 1954 became a scandal sufficiently great to lead to a rash of “fag bashings” (both gay men and lesbians were targeted) in Miami, Florida.  It was one of the nation’s worst anti-gay outbreaks in history. Homophobia was so great by the late 1950s almost no airlines in the United States would hire men as flight attendants – even Eastern and Pan Am stopped hiring stewards. Stewardesses were marketed as young, beautiful, and sexually available—this was hardly an acceptable career choice for any he-man.  In the same way that the sexual orientation of male nurses was suspect, only “pansies” wanted to be stewards.
The discrimination in the labor market meant the United States Supreme Court had to step in and force airlines to hire male flight attendants.  This happened in 1971 after nearly 20 years of female-dominated service.  Even then, the Court’s decision forcing US airlines to hire men was greeted with derision in the press.  It also raised homophobic fears of placing men in such a servile and sexualized role.  
Air Canada
For one gay man, however, being a steward was all he’d needed to satisfy both his wanderlust and his physical lust. 
Gaëtan Dugas was a French-Canadian born February 20, 1953.  His life was on a collision course with history.  In 1972, Dugas first became sexually active.  [He would later claim he had over 2,500 sexual partners in his lifetime, whether all male is unknown.  He may have been bisexual.]  In 1977, he was legally married in Los Angeles, California, in an illegal attempt to gain United States citizenship.  He found work as a flight attendant on Air Canada.  This career choice allowed him the freedom to move around the world, visiting exotic locales, and meeting many strange men for anonymous sexual encounters. 
The hedonism of the 1970s raged unchecked, and by the middle of the decade “gay” culture became pop culture.  Gay and straight partiers found their Valhalla in New York City in a crummy little club in the 1970s called Studio 54.  This rat hole was converted into a hot spot known all over the world.  Celebrities fell all over themselves to get in and be seen there.  Its allure was its faux air of exclusivity.  No club before or since carried the cachet of Studio 54.  Co-founded and owned by a cabaret-style, (almost a caricature) flamboyantly gay man, Steve Rubell, and a straight-laced heterosexual lawyer, this kitschy club defined hipsters in the Seventies. 
The music was disco, the dance beat adapted from gay men and their party scene.  The mock S&M dance moves, the sweaty bodies, the throb of the music, the drugs consumed, and the fact that not just anyone could get in heightened its allure. The term “velvet rope” came into existence then – a red velvet rope became the literal and symbolic barrier between the plebes on the street and the hipsters within.  Each night crowds gathered outside Studio 54’s doors; admission was granted whimsically by a group of door men and many times by Steve Rubell himself.  The criteria for entry were pure sadism: one night only women  might be allowed in; other times, a sloppily dressed man might be sent away while another, looking exactly like that man but “famous”, would be let in.  Gay-themed parties were held there often, and casual sex in the bathrooms and the “exclusive” privacy lounge was common among all attendees.
The music scene was fueled by this gay celebration, none more blatantly than by a vocal group of disco hustlers calling themselves “The Village People”.  They dressed in favorite and stereotypical gay icon costumes – a policeman, a construction worker, a cowboy, a gay biker, and a Native American.  They were hugely successful for a short time with big sellers “In the Navy”, and “YMCA”.  More subtly, Donna Summer performed her brand of dance music that was embraced by the gay community as was she.
In conjunction with Studio 54, other bars for gay men to frequent thrived.  Another meeting place were the bathhouses still found in many larger cities.  Once serving the utilitarian function for neighborhood residents to bathe (considering most homes up until the late 1920s did not have indoor plumbing) these quaint reminders of The Good Old Days were social gathering places for gay men.  They were prevalent in New York City and in San Francisco. [Bette Midler, a great favorite among gay men, got her start singing in gay bathhouses; her piano player in those days was songwriter/musician Barry Manilow).
On October 31, 1980 – ominously enough, Halloween night – the gay male steward Gaëtan Dugas visited a gay bathhouse for the first time on a layover in New York City.
The Road to Zero
Gaëtan Dugas fit right in with the gay community of the bathhouses.  He was blond, voluble, and open.  Sex for him was a series of anonymous engagements, many times conducted hastily in bathroom stalls.  He took on whatever he felt like.  As well as many other men, he was developing what would become known as “The Clone Look”: close-cropped hair, largish but well-groomed mustache, muscle shirts, short shorts.  [The quintessential version of “The Clone Look” would be Freddie Mercury (rock band Queen’s lead vocalist who died of AIDS) after about 1981.] 
A strange disease lurked among the gay denizens and creepers of the bathhouses, though.  Men began dying of pneumonia and other respiratory illnesses, but only after drastically losing weight and developing horrific skin lesions on their faces, necks, backs, and chests.  This disease became known in the gay community as “gay cancer”.  It was particularly volatile, and it progressed rapidly.  Dugas caught it early, possibly with his first encounter in the Ney York gay bathhouse on Halloween 1980.
Meanwhile, as a symbolic sign of the coming Armageddon, Studio 54 was forced to close its doors for liquor license violations and tax evasion; entrepreneurs Steve Rubell and his business partner were sentenced to short terms of imprisonment.  [Rubell later died of AIDS.]
The End of Days was seemingly at hand.
Concern for dying gay men was not paramount on America’s mind.  As more cases of the mysterious killer emerged, the name was changed from “gay cancer” to “gay-related immune deficiency” (GRID).  This, at least, was an open recognition that whatever was causing the disease was compromising a body’s immune system.  It didn’t explain, however, the rather esoteric choice of gay men (and soon discovered, IV drug users) as victims.  It wasn’t until the first heterosexual cases of “gay cancer” emerged that the disease was examined more closely.
Dugas, meanwhile knew he was sick.  But one can’t spread cancer, of course, because cancer isn’t contagious. He indiscriminately continued having sex with men as his whims overtook him.  His “advantage” was his mobility – as a flight attendant, he might be in any part of the US, Canada, or the world on a moment’s notice.  His bitterness about having gay cancer crossed over into his attitude about his lackadaisical attuned as well.
First denying he was sick, he later willfully and maliciously spread the disease to unsuspecting partners.  After having casual sex in a darkened room once, a male interviewee later reported he had turned on a light in the room where Dugas lay naked on a bed.  This man spotted the lesions (Kaposi’s sarcoma) that were the classic earmarks of “gay cancer” on Dugas’ chest.  When he remarked upon it, Dugas replied sardonically, “It’s gay cancer.  Maybe you’ll get it.”
Gay men realized the danger.  Many made the intuitive leap early that perhaps certain activities, such as anal intercourse, might be transmitting the causative agent.  Higher-profile gay men began dying as well as underground sub-culture members; most notably was the early AIDS death of the most macho of men, The Marlboro Man.  The Marlboro Man was an advertising icon of the popular cigarette brand, Marlboro.  This blond “cowboy”, a homosexual actor, featured heavily in print ads.  He was the quintessential rough and tumble outdoorsman.   He wore The Clone Look of his day, the same sandy-blond hair and mustache affected by Gaëtan Dugas.
By April of 1982, 248 cases of the disease were reported.  A virus was isolated in 1983 and later named Human Immunodeficiency Virus or HIV.  The disease it spawned was rechristened, in light of its indiscriminate virology, to Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome or AIDS.  That same year, 248 cases of the disease were reported and local health departments in conjunction with the Center for Disease Control (CDC) in Atlanta began investigating.
Of the 248 cases known before the detection of the virus, interviewing led to the shocking revelation that at least 40 AIDS victims had one thing in common: all had either had sex with a certain blond, gregarious Air Canada flight attendant, or they had sex with someone who did. This networking connection was made in 1984, and it was critical – it meant medical and public health officials investigating the source of AIDS might have finally gotten the breakthrough they needed. 
Gaëtan Dugas, the narcissistic and embittered flight attendant, alternately feeling morose and spiteful about his condition, was given the code name “Patient Zero”, the source of the AIDS epidemic in North America.  AIDS now had a face.
Omega Man
There is an apocryphal story that Patient Zero was really Patient “O” (as in the 15th letter of the English alphabet, first letter of the word “Omega” for the last letter of the Greek alphabet, Ω).  Furthermore, it was alleged that a journalist misinterpreted the “O” (for “Ω”), and instead wrote up his report, referring to the AIDS’ source as “Patient 0” [“zero”] instead.
This makes little sense.  The Greek letter “Ω” always refers to the end of an event or series, not its beginning.  Dugas was “Patient Zero”, not “Patient Ω” – if the intent was to use such a Greek designation, he would have been named “Patient Alpha” (“Α” or “α”)  for “the beginning”. 
Running Dugas to ground, however, was pointless.  At the time, there were no criminal laws penalizing the willful spread of a known fatal disease (since then, law changes allows charges of attempted and pre-meditated murder to be brought in many states against anyone who is HIV-positive purposefully engaging in unprotected sexual intercourse with an unwitting partner).
Dugas remained unrepentant.  He originally denied that whatever disease it was he had could be transmitted sexually.  His own words on the subject: “Of course I'm going to have sex. Nobody’s proven to me that you can spread cancer.”  His depraved indifference to his sexual partners’  well-being was summarized with “It’s their duty to protect themselves. They know what’s going on out there. They’ve heard about this disease.”  The last element of his bitterness was voiced by his wish to take others with him: “I’ve got gay cancer. I’m going to die and so are you.” 
Gaëtan Dugas died in Quebec City, Quebec, Canada,  on March 30, 1984, at the age of 31.  His cause of death was kidney-failure brought on by his weakened condition from an onslaught of infections and ailments from AIDS.
In his wake, one of the unfortunate legacies he left was a renewed homophobia relative to male flight attendants.  They became a lightning rod for America’s fear and anger over AIDS and its links with homosexuality. “Patient Zero”, Gaëtan Dugas, was reviled; in death he was even accused of bringing HIV to North America and spreading it around the country.
Less Than Zero
Years later, once medical science, and particularly genetics testing, had reached a greater level of technological advance, a revision of the “Patient Zero” findings of 1984 seemed necessary.  What was learned by later research was both fascinating and horrific simultaneously.  It turned out, HIV had not only been in the world for over a century, but it had been in the United States as early as 1966. 
Almost any medical professional worth his or her license, whenever a patient dies of a strange ailment, takes the precaution of preserving tissue and blood samples for future research.  It is extremely fortunate that some doctors going all the way back to the late 1950s had been so far-sighted.  Working backward and re-examining suspicious or otherwise unresolved deaths from contagion globally proved enriching in piecing together the history of AIDS. 
In 1979, before Dugas was infected, a bisexual German concert violinist, Herbert Heinrich, died.  In 1989, after testing of medical samples from his body, it was learned he was HIV-positive. 
A year earlier, a Portuguese man known only as Senhor José died under mysterious circumstances.  He was treated at the London Hospital for Tropical Diseases to no effect.  In later years, examination of preserved tissues verified he died of AIDS; the causative virus, HIV-2 was present, making him the first known confirmed victim. Genetic research on the virus indicated he probably contracted the disease in 1966 in Guinea-Bissau (on the northwest coast of Africa).  Three gay men in California and six Haitian immigrants to the United States were later confirmed as AIDS victims from that same year.
Grethe Rask was a Danish surgeon who had traveled to Zaire in 1972 to lend medical aid for the sick there.  She returned to Denmark in 1976 and became unrelentlessly ill.  Her symptoms confounded her colleagues.  She died in December 1977.  Several years later in 1984, it was confirmed through testing she was HIV-positive.  During her time in Zaire, it was known she was directly exposed to blood – it is believed this was the source of her infection.
In 1976, a Norwegian sailor, designated with the alias “Arvid Noe”, died; his wife and nine-year-old daughter died the next year of the same wasting disease.  In 1961, the 15-year-old Noe had sailed on his first voyage to Africa.  He worked a merchant vessel that plied along Africa’s west coast from mid-1961 to mid-1962; during this voyage he was treated for gonorrhea.  He sailed again to Africa in 1964, with a port of call in Kenya in eastern Africa.  In 1966, Noe started suffering from chronic joint pain and recurrent lung infections.  By 1968, he could no longer pass a physical to sail, so he worked as a long-haul truck driver. 
Noe’s condition stabilized, but then flared up again in 1975 (coincidentally the same year a strange disorder called “slim disease” was reported in Africa for the first time, the beginnings of epidemic AIDS).  In addition to the respiratory condition and joint pains he developed motor skill problems and dementia before he died.  Both his wife and daughter developed an illness that mimicked his symptoms, and they died in 1977. Doctors, helpless to find the cause of death for the Noe family, preserved some tissue samples.  In 1988, further testing showed Noe, his wife, and his daughter had all been HIV-positive
Gateway to the West
In America, the results of further research lead to the conclusion that Gaëtan Dugas had not been the true “Patient Zero” after all. Dugas may have personally, and directly, been responsible for dozens of AIDS cases (and no telling how many more indirectly), but he did not bring AIDS to the US, nor was he the first confirmed AIDS victim.  As noted, several California men and some Haitian immigrants were found later to have succumbed to the disease before Dugas.
That dubious distinction of being America’s “Patient Zero” – the first documented and verifiable case of AIDS in the country – belongs not to Dugas but to a mildly mentally retarded black teenager named Robert Rayford (born ca. 1952-1953).
Rayford lived in a brownstone in a poor neighborhood in St. Louis, Missouri.  His mother’s name was Constance Rayford, and he had a brother named George.  Rayford was described as slender.  His retardation left him relatively uncommunicative from shyness. 
Rayford, as early as his 13th year or sooner, was sexually active.  Beginning in 1966, he started having some physical problems that seemed chronic.  His legs swelled, and he developed sores on his genitals and body.  Finally, in 1968, the boy admitted himself to Barnes Hospital (now Barnes-Jewish Hospital) in St. Louis.  His complaints were multiple – the swelling in his legs was bothersome, his genitals and legs were covered in warts and sores, and his testicles were severely swollen.  He was also emaciated (having lost much weight suddenly), and even though he was an African-American male he was considered “pale”.  He also had shortness of breath.  His symptoms led his caregivers to erroneously conclude he had lymphedema (a swelling caused by lymphatic problems).
He also had a chlamydia infection (a parasitic venereal disease), clearly indicating he was sexually active.  He led doctors to believe his activities were strictly heterosexual, even claiming at one point to having a girlfriend (who failed to surface).  Diverting conversations occurred between Rayford and his primary care giver when questioned about his sexual activities: “Yeah, I’m the stud all the time”, was one such response.  His doctors had not considered homosexuality initially; they thought he was referring to relations with girls.  He always refused a rectal exam.  It seemed clear based on his behavior and physical problems that he was, indeed, a homosexual prostitute (assuming the submissive role in anal intercourse). 
His first months in the hospital were spent with his doctors cutting back on his water and salt intake, and they wrapped and raised his legs, all to cut the swelling. Despite this, the inflammation moved up his body and into his lungs.  Antibiotics were tried in varying dosages, but Rayford’s condition continued to deteriorate. 
The teen seemed stabilized by late 1968.  In March 1969, however, all of his symptoms reappeared and rapidly worsened.  His breathing labored; his white blood cell count (as part of routine blood work) was noted to have dropped dramatically.  The only thing concurred at the time was that Rayford’s immune system had been somehow compromised.  He developed a fever and died either in the late hours of May 15, 1969, or the early hours of May 16 (sources differ).  His primary physician recalled, “Eventually his entire body constituted almost one wave of hard lumps and watery swellings.”
Without a precise diagnosis, Rayford’s cause of death was attributed to the catch-all vagary “loss of vitality”.  Intractable fluid imbalance and lung disease were listed as contributors.  An autopsy revealed a surprise – his body carried a very rare cancer called Kaposi’s sarcoma. [Today, this cancer and its lesions are bellwethers of AIDS.]  Anal scarring also indicated repeated sexual penetration.
Because of the baffling nature of his case, doctors preserved several tissue and blood samples for later evaluation.  In 1987, eighteen years after his death, molecular biologists at New Orleans’ Tulane University tested specimens of Rayford’s preserved blood and tissues.  Their findings were stunning: a virus “closely related or identical to” HIV-1 was detected.  Further confirmation testing in 1989  proved Robert Rayford (teenage male homosexual prostitute of St. Louis, Missouri) was the earliest confirmed victim of AIDS in North America.
Ground Zero
Dating America’s exposure to AIDS is irrelevant: AIDS is a global problem.  And continuing research has led to many more interesting facts about the spread of HIV… 


… finish reading this great article of Vic Dillinger here: http://www.infobarrel.com/AIDS_Patient_Zero