Canberra: 2 February 2012 --
Would
you believe it if I told you that the ELCC (the English
Language
Central Commission) has declared that within a few months the
letter
'z' will disappear from the English alphabet and simply be
replaced
with 'x' when a word begins with 'z', or 's' in every other
case where
it is found? This is ostensibly to resolve the problem
of British
versus American spelling... you will note that this author,
for
instance, always writes 'visualise', not 'visualize'. Of
course it
also means that 'zoo' becomes 'xoo'... yada, yada, yada!
Of course you wouldn't! What a relief that must be for the
residents of
New Xealand! And thank God there is no ELCC - we leave that
sort of
thing to the French.
So why, people, are you sending me a
copy of an email purportedly published yesterday, Wednesday
1st
February 2012 suggesting that a declared atheist, born in
Wales, and
leading perhaps the most left-wing controlled Government in
Australian
history, has suddenly forked far right of Genghis Khan? A few choice
tidbits from the so-called 'article':
Muslims who want to live
under Islamic Sharia law were told on Wednesday to get out
of Australia.
We
speak mainly ENGLISH, not Spanish, Lebanese, Arabic,
Chinese, Japanese,
Russian, or any other language. Therefore, if you wish to
become part
of our society, learn the language.
Most
Australians believe in God. This is not some Christian,
right wing,
political push, but a fact, because Christian men and women,
on
Christian principles, founded this nation, and this is
clearly
documented.
If you aren't happy here
then LEAVE. We didn't force you to come here. You asked to
be here. So accept the country YOU accepted.
There
is no doubting that Australia has had its multicultural ups and downs
and that some immigrants have not felt welcome. It may also be true
that some have brought that on themselves, but it is completely untrue
that anything of the kind was said by Julia Gillard yesterday, or by
Kevin Rudd before her, or by John Howard before him - and the same
letter turned up for each Prime Minister.
This
raises a question of greater importance for all of us, since email
forms an important part of the work of many people today, even given
the shift to Facebook, Twitter and 'chat'. In fact, it behoves anybody
who propagates email to (1) check facts (2) check sentiments being
expressed (3) recognise tell-tale signs of hoax letters - things like
'send this to everyone you know' or variants thereof, use of capitals
(roundly rejected by people who know what 'flaming' and 'shouting' are
about), credibility by association - though there are some real doubts
on this score this time round!
And if you happen to agree with each and all of the sentiments
expressed above, that's fine, but it is worth being very careful about
sharing those ideas by email. The same might be said for any so-called
virus threat - never, and I repeat, never, send one of these: they
often contain the virus!
Yesterday, a young Salesian just about to begin his theology
studies
(and possibly in a country where some of his race have run
into
difficulties from attitudes of the kind expressed above) sent
me a
lengthy presentation on email behaviour. It occurred to me
then that
its contents are deserving of wider readership, though
possibly adapted
somewhat to our own situation. Email might be 'old hat' for
people who
have developed the skills to use 140 characters in tweets -
but it still accounts for a very substantial part of daily
'conversation' in
the digital continent. Maybe there are some skills we all
still need to
learn, and if we are going to move on to 140 characters as the
way to
do it....well, Aussie football fans might enjoy this one: #Google Australia announced it
had partnered with the Australian Rules Football League to
develop the gBall.
At least it's funny, when you read the subsequent tweets: "the
gBall contains inbuilt GPS and motion sensor systems to monitor the
location, force and torque of each kick. The data is interpreted by a
new curvilenear parabolic approximation algorithm developed in Google's
Sydney office, known as DENNIS ("Dimensional, Elastic, Non-Linear,
Network-Neutral, Inertial Sequencing"), which plots the ball's
trajectory, accuracy and distance". And there, by the way, you have another 'hoax' indicator - tecchie lingo!
We
can have a laugh
about other people different from us - so long as it's a
laugh. I hope
I can get away with leaving you with the following:
Five Germans in an Audi Quattro arrive at the Italian border.
The Italian Customs agent stops them and tells them:
"It'sa illegala to putta 5 people in a Quattro."
"Vot do you mean it'z illegal?" asks the German driver.
"Quattro meansa four" replies the Italian official.
"Qvattro is just ze name of ze automobile", the Germans retort
unbelievingly.
"Look at ze papers: zis car is designt to kerry 5 persons."
"You can'ta pulla thata one on me!", replies the Italian
customs agent.
"Quattro meansa four. You hava fivea people ina your car and
you are thereforea breaking the law."
The German driver replies angrily, "You idiot! Call your
zupervisor over, I vant to speak to somevone viz more
intelligence!"
"Sorry", responds the Italian official, "he can'ta come.
He'sa busy with a 2 guys in a Fiat Uno.
