Beating a dead horse

Posted on 19/09/2013 by freelander

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Over the past week Spain has had enough of reading and listening, on all Spanish media, hundreds pontificating voices talking from resentment or envy, from animosity or defeatism, from mockery and even perfidy, what a ridiculous chimera it was of Madrid to run for hosting the 2020 Olympics, what an absurd idea or what a crazy aspiration; talking how Madrid could not have won or how they deserved being defeated. These backwards jinxes, these foretellers of the past and these fans of anothers’ failures have done their best to poke the embers where the hopes and illusions of millions of Spaniards still burn down, as does the work of all who fought for Madrid to win. Beating a dead horse is a symptom of little courage and too much meanness, worse yet when it’s done from the pulpit of the radio, the TV or the papers. Woe enough have those who betted on Madrid’s success, and they don’t need to be further scolded by those who, before September 13th, dared not bet for the defeat. Where were all these voices before Olympic Committee’s decision? These smartasses who, today, express their sagacity in hindsight or cock a mean snook at Madrid, where were they? None of these prophets “ex post” dared to forecast the result. But, of course, it is very easy to foresee the past.
Mean attitude have the Spanish citizens who puddle into defeatism or wish to others what they would not want for themselves.
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Durante la pasada semana los españoles nos hemos hartado de leer y escuchar, por todos los medios de comunicación, cientos de voces pontificando, desde el rencor o la envidia, desde la animadversión o el derrotismo, desde el escarnio e incluso la perfidia, cómo la candidatura olímpica de Madrid había sido una ridícula quimera, un despropósito o una loca aspiración; cómo Madrid no podía haber ganado y cómo se mereció perder. Estos cenizos retroactivos, futurólogos del pasado e hinchas del fracaso ajeno se han dedicado a fondo a atizar los rescoldos donde aún hoy se consumen la esperanza o la ilusión de millones de españoles, y el trabajo de todos los que lucharon por conseguir que Madrid fuera sede para el 2020. Pero hacer leña del árbol caído es, me temo, síntoma de poca valentía y bastante ruindad; peor aún cuando se dispara desde el púlpito de las ondas o desde las columnas de opinión. Bastante pena tienen quienes apostaban por el éxito para que ahora vengan los que, antes del 13 de septiembre, no apostaron por la derrota, a cebarse en los despojos. ¿Dónde estaban todas esas voces antes del fallo del Comité Olímpico? Tanto enterado que hoy expresa su sagacidad a posteriori o su mezquino corte de mangas, ¿dónde se hallaba? Ninguno de estos profetas “ex post” se atrevió a pronosticar el resultado. Pero, claro, resulta muy fácil adivinar el pasado.
Lamentable actitud la de esa España que se enfanga en el derrotismo o que les desea a otros lo que no querría para sí.
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Goodbye Lolita. (On the age raise for sexual consent in Spain)

Posted on 13/09/2013 by freelander

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Spanish Government will raise the age of sexual consent from thirteen to sixteen. This change -it is said- aims to fight against abuse and child prostitution, not to penalize “sexual relationships among equals”. To this purpose, it will be considered a crime (abuse) to perform sexual acts with a person under sixteen, even if he/she consents, but with an important qualification: there will be no crime if both are alike in age and maturity, not to penalize behaviours that might belong to social reality.

lolita-lolita

It’s certainly laudable to protect minors; but there are two sides of this project which call my attention. One is this new figure of speech: “sexual relationships among equals”, subjective and ambiguous as they come, and introductory of an unwanted moral content in the Penal Code; not to mention that it might even violate the Constitution, as far as it restricts the minors’ freedom to choose their sexual partners. Besides, it suggests -or, at least, opens the door to- the possibility of extending, under the same “equals” fundation, the exemption of responsibility to other typified criminal behaviours.
The other is the wrong -to my belief- assumption that only sexual relationships “among equals” (whatever this means) belong to the social reality. No doubt, such relationships are much more common than those taking place among “unequals”; but dismissing the latter from social reality is a too bold step. Statistics support that many Lolitas choose an adult as their sexual playmate, and it’s also not unfrequent to find boys who sleep with women of age. Why these cases should be outside of social reality?
For typifying a crime, we must in the first place to attend to the legal right we want to protect; in this case, minors’ sexual freedom. But protecting a freedom by way of curbing it sounds somewhat puzzling, and we wonder: what does sexual freedom precisely mean? Lacking a legal definition, and linking to the aim of fighting sexual abuse, it’s reasonable to understand it as, for instance, the freedom to decide, consciously and responsibly, upon how a person wants to sexually dispose of their bodies; and this ability to freely and maturely decide, this sexual responsibility, the teenager either has it or lacks thereof, but it has nothing to do with the “likeness in age and maturity” of the chosen mate. (Quite another thing would be the how easily they can be influenced; but, had we to take into account this ductility of human will in every behaviour, we’d end up doing without the principle of responsibility and, then, we’d have to dismantle the whole penal thingy.) Thus, if the Government considered that people under sixteen lack the necessary ability for taking a mature decision on their sexual activities, all sex with them should be penalized, with no exception. But this is not the case: the future revision of the Spanish penal code, by allowing sex among equals, clearly means that preserving the virginity of minors until they can dispose of sensibly is not its goal; and the only conclusion is, the boasted protection of minors consists simply in limiting the range of people they can chose as mates: only those who are alike in age and growth. We don’t aim, then, at our children not playing doctors before sixteen, but at them playing among themselves. We don’t mean to defend our Lolitas‘ integrities, but to keep Humbert Humbert away from the party.
On the other hand, Spain struggles for many years to achieve an earlier sexual education and development for teenagers; our broadcast programming abunds in uncurbed content full of explicit references to sex and promiscuity which can’t but arise sexual interest of children and stimulate their replaying of the watched behaviours; and during the last decades the age for having the first sexual experiences has dropped one or two years. In such a society sounds somewhat contradictory to postpone the legal acknowledgement of such earlier sexual ripeness.
Then, how this selective curb is justified?, how can we explain this sexual consent age’s leap from thirteen to sixteen… only when it comes to sex with adults?
And which is the undefined limit for this “alikeness in eath and ripeness”? Definitely not sixteen, as, happening to be absurd to incriminate two minors who had had sexual intercourse between them, making victims of themselves at the same time, the exception wouldn’t be necessary in the legal text. Eighteen, perhaps? Hmm… Sexual relations between a boy eighteen and a girl fifteen don’t seem to be outside the “social reality” that wants to be respected, as such couples must be, certainly, quite common in our nowadays sexually liberated society. Twenty, then? Maybe. We don’t know, and we won’t know until we build case-law along the years to come. Every new breach exposed to our judges’ capriciousness turns into a crack for Justice, in upper-case letters.
Be as it will, there is an undeniable conclusion: when we fight sexual abuse and seek minors’ sexual freedom protection, if we consent young adults having intercourse with minors and we forbid the same to the rest of adults, we’re presupposing the laters fulfilled abuse, violating the sacred presumption of innocence. And this, reader, is an outrage; a discrimination implying the system’s incompetence, or failure and give up, to objectively tell in which cases there is abuse and in which don’t. It’s easier to imprison any adult who had sexual relations with a young teenager, regardless of the consent, than trying to find out whether or not there was abuse. Worse yet: it’s not only easier, but politically more profitable, as it suits the morals of a vindicating and outspoken part of the population who don’t like their young daughters -it’s always the daughters- to go out with older boys, and who would be delighted to see these in jail..
El Gobierno reformará el código penal para elevar la edad de consentimiento sexual desde los trece a los dieciséis años. La medida -se dice- va encaminada a luchar contra los abusos y la prostitución infantil, no a penalizar las relaciones sexuales entre iguales. A tal efecto, se considerará hecho delictivo (abuso) la realización de actos sexuales con un menor de dieciséis años aunque éste preste su consentimiento, pero con una importante salvedad: no habrá delito si ambos están próximos en edad y madurez, para no criminalizar conductas que puedan responder a la realidad social.

lolita-lolita

Aspiración encomiable es la de proteger a los menores, desde luego; pero hay en este proyecto, para empezar, dos aspectos que me llaman la atención. Uno de ellos es esta nueva figura de las “relaciones sexuales entre iguales”, subjetiva y ambigua donde las haya y que, además, introduce en el Código un indeseable contenido moral; por no mencionar que puede vulnerar la Constitución en cuanto restringe la libertad de los menores para elegir a sus parejas. (Aparte, esta figura sugiere -o al menos deja abierta- la posibilidad de extender, con idéntico fundamento de igualdad, la exención de responsabilidad a otras conductas tipificadas como delito.)
El otro de los aspectos llamativos es la asunción de que sólo responden a la realidad social las relaciones sexuales “entre iguales”. No niego que tales relaciones son mucho más frecuentes que las que puedan darse “entre desiguales”; pero de aquí a desterrar de la realidad social a estas últimas va un paso demasiado atrevido. Las estadísticas avalan que muchas jovencitas eligen por compañero de juegos eróticos a un adulto, sin faltar casos de jovencitos que se acuestan con adultas. ¿Esto no forma, también, parte de la realidad social?
Cuando se tipifica una conducta como delito, ha de atenderse en primer lugar al bien jurídico que se desea proteger; en este caso, la libertad sexual de los menores. Mas proteger una libertad a base de restringirla es algo que no se entiende muy bien, así que tenemos que preguntarnos: ¿qué se considera concretamente libertad sexual? A falta de una definición legal, y enlazando con la aspiración de luchar contra los abusos, parecería razonable entenderla algo así como la libertad para decidir, de manera consciente y responsable, lo que cada uno quiere hacer con su cuerpecito serrano y olé; y esta capacidad de decisión libre y madura, esta responsabilidad sexual, se tiene o no se tiene, pero es ajena a la “proximidad en edad y madurez” del compañero elegido. (Cosa muy distinta sería la mayor o menor facilidad para ser influido; pero si hubiésemos de tener en cuenta esta ductilidad de las voluntades en todas las conductas acabaríamos por prescindir del principio de responsabilidad y, a continuación, desmontaríamos de arriba a abajo todo el tinglado punitivo.) De este modo, si el legislador considerase que los menores de dieciséis años carecen de la capacidad necesaria para tomar una decisión madura sobre sus actividades sexuales, debería penalizar sin excepción todos los actos sexuales realizados con ellos; pero no es así, ya que la futura redacción del Código penal deja claro, al permitir el sexo entre iguales, que preservar la virginidad de los adolescentes hasta que puedan disponer de ella con sensatez no es su objetivo. De modo que sólo puede concluirse que la tan cacareada protección de los menores se limita a restringir el espectro de personas con las que éstos pueden aparearse: sólo con quienes estén próximos en edad y desarrollo. No se persigue, pues, que nuestros chavales no jueguen a médicos antes de los dieciséis, sino que jueguen sólo entre ellos. No se busca defender la integridad de nuestras Lolitas, sino simplemente alejar a Humbert Humbert de la fiesta.

Publicado en Estrella Digital

Carta publicada en Estrella Digital


Por otra parte, cabe preguntarse cómo se justifica el salto de los trece a los dieciséis para el consentimiento sexual en una sociedad que lleva lustros intentando orientarse hacia una educación y desarrollo sexual más temprano para los adolescentes; en una sociedad cuya emisión televisiva abunda en inacotados contenidos, llenos de erotismo, desinhibición y promiscuidad que no pueden sino estimular el interés sexual de los niños y su repetición de las conductas observadas; y en una sociedad donde, durante las últimas décadas, se ha reducido sensiblemente la edad en que los preadolescentes se estrenan en el maravilloso mundo del placer. Siendo así las cosas, ¿no es contradictorio retrasar la edad para el reconocimiento legal de esta temprana madurez sexual?
Como cabe, desde luego, preguntarse también cuál es el indeterminado límite para esa proximidad en edad y desarrollo. Si la reforma se hubiese redactado sin la salvedad del “sexo entre iguales”, sólo podría cometer tal abuso quien estuviera por encima de los dieciséis, ya que por debajo se daría la paradoja de ser ambos amantes, al mismo tiempo, víctimas y abusadores. (En efecto, si dos jóvenes de catorce y quince años se acoplan voluntariamente bajo la mirada de Eros, ¿quién habría abusado de quién? Ambos serían delincuentes y víctimas, así que ninguno debería ser castigado.) Luego es evidente que esa “proximidad” apunta a una edad más elevada. ¿Dieciocho años, tal vez? Hmm… no parece que las relaciones entre un chaval de dieciocho y una chica de quince caigan fuera de esa realidad social que el reformador afirma respetar, ya que tales apareamientos han de ser muy comunes en la liberada sociedad contemporánea. ¿Veinte años, entonces? Supongamos que sí, aunque bien podrían ser veintidós o veinticinco; no lo sabremos hasta que haya abundante jurisprudencia. (Y, mientras tanto, cada fisura que se abre a la arbitrariedad de los jueces se convierte en una gran brecha para la Justicia, con mayúscula. Inocentes pagarán por estos remilgos legales.)
Concluyamos el razonamiento partiendo de este último supuesto: que el consentimiento sexual de un menor de dieciséis exime de responsabilidad penal por abuso a jóvenes de hasta veinte años por término medio. ¿En qué se fundamenta esta selectiva restricción de la validez de ese consentimiento? Si el objetivo es luchar contra los abusos y progeter la libertad sexual de los menores, ¿por qué éstos pueden tener relaciones con un joven de veinte y no con uno de veintidós? La deducción me parece clara: porque en el segundo caso presuponemos el abuso y en el primero no; con lo cual acabamos de vulnerar el sacrosanto principio de presunción de inocencia. Y esto, amigo lector, me parece un atropello que, además, supone una discriminación por la edad y constituye la prueba del lacerante fracaso judicial para discernir (o la renuncia a intentarlo), en cada caso particular, cuándo ha habido abuso y cuándo no. Por el “delito” de tener relaciones con un quinceañero es más cómodo condenar a todo el que pase de los veinte (o la edad que sea), se haya violentado o no la libertad sexual, que intentar discernir si hubo abuso. Más aún: no sólo se viola la presunción de inocencia, sino que se introduce en el código penal un componente moral que, para colmo, sólo acomoda a un sector de la población: a quienes, viendo con muy malos ojos que sus hijas -siempre son las hijas- se enrollen con tíos mayores, estarán encantados de que los encierren.

Posted in Opinion | 2 Comments

Public health in Madrid. A disinterested strike?

Posted on 20/08/2013 by freelander

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El otro día escribí una carta a los periódicos; una de tantas que les envío. Tengo suerte y, con frecuencia, me las publican; aunque, curiosamente, no siempre escogen las de mayor relevancia. En ocasiones he visto impresas algunas de las más impopulares mientras que otras, de marcado interés común, no han llegado a superar el filtro de los jefes de redacción (pese a que cada una de ellas la envío a unos ciento veinte medios). Esto me ha servido para aprender bastante sobre los periódicos y sus intereses. Pues bien: de todas esas cartas que, enviadas, han quedado sin publicar, en pocos casos me ha sorprendido tanto la falta de eco como en el asunto que a continuación expongo.
Vaya por delante que, en un país europeo moderno como se supone que es España, me parece casi imposible, a nivel personal, no estar en contra de cualquier medida que pueda suponer la más mínima merma en su calidad. Soy el primero en cuestionar las medidas que, en este sentido, está tomando el ejecutivo madrileño, y creo que en esto estamos casi todos de acuerdo (o al menos así lo espero).

Eslóganes

Eslóganes “desinteresados”


Ahora bien: de las huelgas que he visto en mi vida, ninguna he encontrado tan engañosa -por no decir fraudulenta- como la que en estos días llevan a cabo los empleados del sector sanitario público de Madrid. Desde luego, me parece muy legítimo que, quienes teman por sus condiciones laborales o sus puestos de trabajo, acudan a un medio tan democrático como es la huelga para conservarlos; pero, por favor, que no le tomen el pelo a la gente ni quieran encandilarla como a niños: “La sanidad no se vende”, “Los recortes matan” o “Luchamos por tu salud” son el tipo de consignas que están utilizando para ganrantizarse el apoyo popular; pero estos lemas rozan, en mi opinión, lo insultante. ¡Hombre!, no ofendan la inteligencia del pueblo ni exploten el romanticismo de una supuesta cruzada altruista sin precedentes, haciéndonos creer que están inmolando sus economías domésticas (ya que su huelga les pasará factura en las nóminas de noviembre y diciembre) y luchando como mártires con el principal objetivo de salvaguardar “el derecho a la salud de todos”. Vaya por Dios, ¡qué nobleza! No digo que no haya seres humanos capaces de un gran desinterés, pero, si los hay, son -por desgracia- una ínfima minoría; y el colectivo médico, que yo sepa, no destaca especialmente por su bondad; no más que cualquier otro, al menos.
A poco que se piense, pronto se comprende que el personal sanitario no está haciendo más que pelear por lo suyo, como lo haría cualquier hijo de vecino; pero ¿cuántos de ustedes creen, de verdad, que si las medidas de privatización hubiesen venido acompañadas de mejoras salariales y laborales para cada uno de esos empleados, se habrían movilizado en esta huelga?
(Aparte, en los tiempos de graves recortes presupuestarios que corremos, con las arcas públicas bajo mínimos, no me parece de recibo que estos huelguistas hayan empapelado sus batas, los centros y los hospitales con decenas de miles de folios impresos a costa del contribuyente, agravando aún más nuestra carga tributaria. No es el montante de ese gasto, sino el gesto, lo que en este caso destaco.)
Los médicos ganan, los contribuyentes pagan.

Los médicos ganan, los contribuyentes pagan.


Pues bien: de este punto de vista no se ha hecho eco la prensa esta vez; y no por falta de gente que opine como yo, me consta. Opiniones bastante más impopulares he visto publicadas. Por eso me pregunto: ¿a qué temen ahora los medios? ¿Conservamos aún, en el siglo XXI, los restos de un temor primitivo, subconsciente y reverencial a la medicina? ¿O es que el colectivo médico tiene un poder fáctico mucho mayor del que yo le atribuía? Nunca deja uno de aprender cosas sobre la prensa y, también, la sociedad en la que vive.
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Let me first state that, in a modern European country as Spain is supposed to be, I deem close to impossible (at a prsonal level) not to be against whatever proceedings that may entail the smallest loss in health care quality. I believe -or at least hope- that most of us would agree in this; and, in any case, I’m the first one to quarantine the measure taken by the Executive of Madrid: to privatize the management of public health services.
Slogans

“Disinterested” slogans: HEALTH CARE IS NOT FOR SALE. WE DEFEND IT.


However: of all the strikes I’ve seen in my life, none as deceptive -not to say dishonest- as the one recently undertaken by the public health workers in Madrid against that measure. Of course it’s absolutely rightful, for those who fear for their jobs or labour conditions, to go on strike in order to keep them. There’s no question that. But, please, don’t try to cheat on the rest of the citizens and kindle us like children: “The health care is not for sale”, “Spending cuts kill lives”, “We fight for your health” are the kind of slogans being used -or rather say abused- by these workers in their attempt for achieving the population’s support. These kind of slogans dwell, in my opinon, on the verge of insult: they offend our intelligence and exploit the romanticism of a presumed, unprecedented altruist crusade on humankind’s behalf. These strikers are trying to make us belive that they’re inmolating their domestic finances (as they’ll lose part of their wages during the strike) and struggling, like martyrs, just for the sake of safeguarding “our universal right for health”. How noble of them! I’m sure that there exist, here and there, some people capable of enormous disinterest; but these are, unfortunately, a meagre minority in our societies; and, as far as I know, doctors don’t outstand in this; no more than any other group, at least. So, if we think a little, it’s quite easy to understand that, with their strike, the public health staff are but defending their own interest, as any other person would; but if the privatizing measures taken by the government of Madrid would come along with wage increases and working improvements for those workers, how many among you would believe that they’d undertaken a strike “for defending our health”?
Funny enough, and despite a large share of the population realizing this, the mass media haven’t echoed such point of view. Not a single printed word I’ve read denouncing the fallacious slogans of these strikers. And this makes me wonder: what are the newspapers afraid of? Do we still retain, in XXIst century, the vestige of a primitive, subconscious and reverential fear of medicine? Or does the medical corporation have a factual power much bigger than what I thought?
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Fix for Macbook white screen of death. Shame on Apple!

Posted on 18/12/2011 by freelander

If one day, on booting your Macbook (likely, after doing some serious modification to your hdd or filesystems), you hear the startup chime but you get an empty white screen showing no activity at all, which stays there forever, then you’ve come across the dreaded white screen of death.

In order to fix it, first you can try the (sufficiently explained somewhere else) recommendations of the sort: insert the System Install medium, reset the SMC, reset the PRAM, hold down the Option, C or N keys, boot off the network, etc. But if nothing of that works, don’t panic! Don’t pay much attention to posts out there saying that your hard drive/motherboard is “fried”, nor take yet your machine to the Apple service for getting stolen once again. There are many chances that nothhing is wrong with your hardware. Follow the steps I explain here and, instead of a very expensive repair bill, you’ll probably only spend (depending on your model) $12 on a Phillips #00 screwdriver, plus maybe $14 on a Torx T5.

Now, before you proceed to the fix, I think it’s good you read this brief explanation about how a Macbook boots, so you know what’s going on.

The sequence is more or less like this: the EFI firmware tries to boot either off the hard drive or off another bootable medium (a CD/DVD unit, an install USB stick, the network, etc), if previously so set via OS-X’s Startup Manager. Now, let’s consider the two cases, starting from the second: when the firmware is NOT set to boot off the hard drive, it looks, as instructed, for the alternative boot medium that it was told; but if it doesn’t find it (or the medium isn’t bootable), then it will automatically revert to booting off the hard drive. However, when the firmware is set to boot off the hdd (which is the default) and this drive isn’t bootable (for whatever reason) then it WILL NOT automatically try to find any other alternative boot media, so it doesn’t boot at all, thus presenting to you the white screen of death. This is the stupid logic for which you’ve paid a fortune, instead of buying a cheaper and bullet-proof PC.

Now, how can you work around this problem? Here comes my “copyrighted” fix. It’s quite simple:

Step #1. With the help of the screwdrivers that I mentioned above, remove your Macbook’s back cover and unattach the hard drive from the motherboard (in iFixit you have a great tutorial on how to do it. Don’t be afraid. It’s extemely easy, and even fun. I’m sure you can do it). Having NO hard drive at all is the only way to force the system firmware to automatically look for alternative boot media. So, now

Step #2. simply make available such medium (USB, DVD, network…) and, voilá!, after one minute or so, you’ll take a deep sigh because when you see the little spinning icon, and the laptop will boot. Congratulations: you’ve done the most difficult part; the rest is easy:

Step #3. Once your laptop booted, it’s essential that you go to the Utilities menu, open the Startup Manager and set the computer to, next time, boot off anything except the hard drive, or you’ll be in the same SHITuation upon next boot! Next,

Step #4. attach again the hard drive to the motherboard and reboot. It should boot as instructed, presenting no white screen. Now go again to Utilities menu and, using the Disk Utility, repair or (in the worst case) format your hard drive, as needed.

That’s all! SHAME on Apple for neither fixing their firmware nor offering this solution it in their support webpage, but, instead, joyfully getting your money twice: first when selling their crap, second when fixing it.

Notice: I am the “discoverer” of this fix, and I’ve published it here for Apple’s shame and for your benefit. If I’ve spared you one week anguish and/or a $500 bill at the nearest Apple workshop, you might like to show your gratefulness by inviting me a beer. Simply donate here what you’d pay for a beer in your favourite bar. Cheap and nice, huh? 😉

(One last word: due to the excessive amount of comments to this thread, no newer can be posted. I believe that most doubts or questions have already being posted and replied. Please read carefully throughout the comments, because your answer is probably there.)

Posted in Binary world | Tagged , | 41 Comments

Fighting obesity?

Posted on 25/09/2011 by freelander

I’ve been six hours packing at home, struggling with my stuff to make the suitcase comply with the airlines’ weight allowance: 20 kg. You can’t easily do with less than 20 kg of luggage for a one month holiday, and it’s time-consuming to select the most necessary things, all the essentials and nothing but the essentials, and still leave some margin for the gifts you’ll bring back home.
Now I’m waiting at the boarding gate, and I see this massive guy, probably no less than 120 kg fat, sitting in front of me. And I think: that man has paid for his ticket the same I paid! Now, how fair is that? Airlines are only too ready (and happy!) to charge you a forfeit if your luggage exceeds the limit in just one kilo, but then they don’t penalize that colossus, even though he’s worth much more than me and my suitcase together. Actually I could carry two more pieces of luggage and still I’d be lighter than him, with the added advantage, in my favour, that in case of an emergency my baggage could be thrown overboard to drop ballast, whereas a person couldn’t. So, to be fair, I should be entitled to 50 full extra kg of staff, then offered a discount for ‘disposability’.
That’s why I believe that governments don’t really want to fight obesity. Politicians talk and talk about healthy eating and responsible feeding our kids, but that’s only drivel: if they truly wanted to end with obesity, it would be as simple as passing a bill to allow–or even force airlines to tariff per kilo of total weight; say, for instance, passenger plus baggage limit: 100 kg; anything above that, pays forfait. Then you’d see a sensible percentage of obese people start exercising and eating healthier: if only they had to pay extra in the airplanes!
But of course governments won’t do that, even if only because the food industry is so powerful and gluttons keep the market wheel spinning round, injecting money into the system with all the food they buy, which creates jobs and makes companies richer and more powerful. Monsanto probably loves fat people, and of course governments love Monsanto, needless to say why. So, unlike me, obese can’t be spared. I’m almost worthless for the system, perfectly expendable. But them? They’re the fuel of these greedy economies.
Meanwhile, here I am, sparing clothes for a 20 kg allowance. How fair is that?

Posted in Opinion | 2 Comments

Twelve moons

Posted on 15/10/2010 by freelander

When I was between my twenties and my thirties I had a great love. Back then, I promised to myself that some day I’d write her story; a story that would astonish – if not shock – any reader who wouldn’t simply opt for disbelief. But what! Wasn’t she the most exceptional, the most overthrowing, fiendish and maddening woman that any man could possibly have? Now, half as many years later as I was in that time, and soundly healed from all the grief that I underwent thereafter, I’m offering this story to you.
She brought to my life as much misery and affliction as a man can endure; yet, one hour by her side was worth a week of woe, and I was granted many more of the former than of the latter during our twelve full bittersweet moons together.

She was a girl in a thousand.

Lewd as a cat in heat she was, sporting a red lipstick wound for a mouth that, when widened to a broad bright smile, underlined the gaiety of two dark-brown piercing eyes upon an oval face, contoured by a long copious black mane cascading both sides over the shoulders as low as the tip of her swollen, preternatural firm teats that pointed up to heaven in a silent and continual thanksgiving to the divine powers that forged them.

On our amatory strivings she made a total and blind offering of her anatomy, not scrimping a single inch of flesh, a cleft in her body or a twist of her flexible figure. There were no prohibitions or unfulfilled fantasies with her, no refusals or lame procrastinations. Magnanimous, obliging and grateful, she would promptly get aroused; and often, the touch of a passionate kiss or a caress, the tickling stimulus of an ardent word whisperd by the ear, or simply the heat of my intense, kindled stare, sufficed for her to accomplish one more of those countless orgasms that, like beads in a rosary, she would thread into a longlasting ecstasy that lingered on until eventually she almost lost her conscience, her sense of place and time, and fainted; an ecstasy that would finally drive me as well to a devastating paroxysm of pleasure.

Oh, was she nymphomaniac? Not exactly; rather, she was the sex just because. Always ready for it, but not ruled by it.

Nothing and nobody could actually rule her. Such was her almighty will. Generous and unsatiable, but free above everything. She wouldn’t take any bounds to the flesh or to the heart, though she would willingly give you her soul on an only condition: no questions and no reasons. Questions annoyed her and she would only answer you with lies; smart lies whose secret was only hers, but that you would believe; lies that overlapped each other, subtly dragging you with them one more step towards an abyss of madness. And reasons? There was no other reason than her own sovereign will; and if her will was yours, what else could you ask?

But don’t try to deceit her! She would quickly uncover the sham no matter where this lay, and whatever you could do, she could always do better. If you wanted to fool her, she fooled you twice. Victorious in any battle, her brain could rival with the most outstanding ones: witty, sharp, funny, invincible. She could scan your thoughts and read into your mind, and all the passion and ardor that used in bed would turn into cold steel at the least suspicion of her freedom being hampered; then her look and words would cut like a chisel.
Was she insane? Demented and paranoid? Of course she was! Totally unsound. But hers was a godly disorder, the very source of her conspicuity and strength.
For twelve moons she was my god and my priestess, offering me her whole self; and though she was alien to pain I swear – I swear that I once saw her weep.

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Twilight in Kraków

Posted on 23/08/2010 by freelander

It was one of the saddest evenings of my life, I believe.

We were walking in silence along the stale Berdnardskiego park and -as who bleeds to death- with every new step we took a stronger affliction overcame us.

In the orangey eventide, we came to sit on an old stoney stands half in ruins, eaten up by the grass. Down, at the other end of the field, some men played ball and their scattered voices, indistinct, emphasized the silence and isolated us even from ourselves. It was our farewell walk, though we hadn’t confessed it to each other.

The gaiety of the eve rendered, by contrast, more despondent the failure of that day. We had agreed on spending a few ones together and giving us a last chance for working it out. But, as usual, after the mirth and glee of the first hours, we had been quarrelling that morning and a mute and persistent silence, filled with gloom, settled down between us and left us helpless. Let’s go for a walk, proposed she for running away from that agony of dead feelings.

Sheltered by the player’s voices, our stares lost in the nothingness, we watched the minutes fall, and strike, like mourn chimes. I told her you move away from the people that loves you because you believe you don’t deserve being happy. I told her but you don’t have to atone for any sin, you have the same right to happiness as any other. She looked at me with a smile full of tenderness but as sad as life, and I, desolate, could see how her love, like the setting sun in the twilight which embraced us, died away behind her big blue eyes, second after second… and I couldn’t but sit there and watch.

The silence spoke to ourselves yet for a while, waiting for the twilight to die. Then, she slowly turned to me and kissed me on the cheeks, while onto hers, two heavy tears -breaming over her long eyelashes- trickled down, leaving the bright and salty trace of sorrow.

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