Words associated with Christianity and British history taken out of children's dictionary.

Oxford University Press has removed words like "aisle", "bishop", "chapel", "empire" and "monarch" from its Junior Dictionary and replaced them with words like "blog", "broadband" and "celebrity". Dozens of words related to the countryside have also been culled.

The publisher claims the changes have been made to reflect the fact that Britain is a modern, multicultural, multifaith society.

But academics and head teachers said that the changes to the 10,000 word Junior Dictionary could mean that children lose touch with Britain's heritage.

"We have a certain Christian narrative which has given meaning to us over the last 2,000 years. To say it is all relative and replaceable is questionable," said Professor Alan Smithers, the director of the centre for education and employment at Buckingham University. "The word selections are a very interesting reflection of the way childhood is going, moving away from our spiritual background and the natural world and towards the world that information technology creates for us."

An analysis of the word choices made by the dictionary lexicographers has revealed that entries from "abbey" to "willow" have been axed. Instead, words such as "MP3 player", "voicemail" and "attachment" have taken their place.

Lisa Saunders, a worried mother who has painstakingly compared entries from the junior dictionaries, aimed at children aged seven or over, dating from 1978, 1995, 2000, 2002, 2003 and 2007, said she was "horrified" by the vast number of words that have been removed, most since 2003.

"The Christian faith still has a strong following," she said. "To eradicate so many words associated with the Christianity will have a big effect on the numerous primary schools who use it."

Ms Saunders realised words were being removed when she was helping her son with his homework and discovered that "moss" and "fern", which were in editions up until 2003, were no longer listed.

"I decide to take a closer look and compare the new version to the other editions," said the mother of four from Co Down, Northern Ireland. "I was completely horrified by the vast number of words which have been removed. We know that language moves on and we can't be fuddy-duddy about it but you don't cull hundreds of important words in order to get in a different set of ICT words."

Anthony Seldon, the master of Wellington College, a leading private school in Berkshire, said: "I am stunned that words like "saint", "buttercup", "heather" and "sycamore" have all gone and I grieve it.

"I think as well as being descriptive, the Oxford Junior Dictionary, has to be prescriptive too, suggesting not just words that are used but words that should be used. It has a duty to keep these words within usage, not merely pander to an audience. We are looking at the loss of words of great beauty. I would rather have "marzipan" and "mistletoe" then "MP3 player."

Read Rest Here

How sad such beautiful and meaningful words are deemed unecessary. Social engineering is alive and well it would appear. Little by little.....inch by inch.....

I noticed this in the comments, and considered it thought provoking;

As George Orwell pointed out, the aim of NewSpeak was to continually destroy words so that heretical thought, so far as it was based on language, became impossible.

David Crystal states in Chapter 4 of his book entitled 'The Fight For English'

A linguistically or dialectally diverse nation needs a standard language to permit mutual intelligibility.

However one must recall the last lines in Orwell's 1984 to sum it up:

"He gazed up at the enormous face. Forty years it had taken to learn what kind of smile was hidden beneath the dark mustache. O cruel, needless misunderstanding! O stubborn, self-willed exile from the loving breast! Two gin-scented tears trickled down the sides of his nose. But it was all right, everything was all right, the struggle was finished. He had won victory over himself. He loved Big Brother."

The multicultural dream, or experiment if you are of that disposition, failed, so why pander to something that failed.

But academics and head teachers said that the changes to the 10,000 word Junior Dictionary could mean that children lose touch with Britain's heritage.

Isn't that the desired result, and what this is all about?

How to Destroy Nations with Love and Tolerance

When lunatics run free!

I would like to take this opportunity to bring to your attention something which I consider to be a great danger to the British public. Something that I also consider to be swept under the carpet, and only raises it's ugly head when there is a major tragedy which obviously is hard to conceal.

I am talking in this instance about the Authorities charged with protecting us from the mentally ill.

I am going to show three cases in point, which I believe sum up everything that is wrong. Also, let us be in no doubt that these well publicised cases are but the tip of the iceberg.

The first case involves an innocent family man who was unloading his car as he waited for his two sons to return from school, when what is described as a crazed knife maniac calmly walked up to him and stabbed him in the chest.

Notice two things here, this maniac had 'a history of mental illness', ‘an abnormality of the mind which in the opinion of doctors would have impaired his responsibility for the act’. And yet someone made the informed and expert decision to release this man amongst the general public.

Why isn't that person being held to account?

The second case also involves an innocent family man who once again was getting on with family life when tragedy struck. In fact he was asleep in bed with his two year old son. This poor man was literally butchered in front of his two children, receiving 82 stab wounds in the process, turning what should have been a family home into a blood bath.

And once again the psychopath responsible had previous mental history, in fact he had actually been sectioned after being diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic. He also had a history of not taking his medication, which tests later proved to be the case on the day of the frenzied attack.

The victims father had this to say: "Somebody let him out of hospital and seven weeks later he was free to walk the streets." And he is quite correct, someone did. Yet no mention or criticism of that 'someone', yet again heads never roll, nobody held to account over this man's horrific murder.

The third case involves another innocent, this time it is a fourteen year old schoolgirl who pays dearly for other peoples failings. She had a knife held to her throat, and was brutally raped twice in bushes. In this case her attacker suffers from autistic spectrum disorder and schizophrenia, and had been remanded for six years to the medium-security St Andrew's Hospital in Northampton. His crime you may ask? Well he repeatedly stabbed his six-month-old brother in the head then cut off his hand at his former family home in Bristol in 2000.

He had absconded three times, but was later transferred to the low-security Hayes Hospital at Pilning near Bristol in January 2007. So having absconded three times from a 'medium' secure hospital, someone had the brainwave to transfer him to a 'low' security hospital. Madness? You bet!

Anyway during his stay at his new hospital we hear that his mental health started to deteriorate, and staff observed he had a large collection of DVDs with porn films and horror movies. So what do the staff do next? Well they fuel his interest in horror films by taking him to see them at a local cinema.

Here is what the Recorder of Cardiff Judge Nicholas Cooke QC, told him:

'I am satisfied you are exceptionally dangerous and very profoundly mentally ill.

'You suffer from autistic spectrum disorder and schizophrenia and that, combined with an inability to understand the effect of your actions makes you, not only exceptionally dangerous but difficult to treat.

'What you did to your little brother can only be described as an horrific killing.
'I've little doubt that the judge who sentenced you would be horrified that you were given unrestricted to horror films and pornography.

'How on earth could it be thought appropriate that someone who has murdered his brother be allowed to have access to horror films?

'How can it be that the alarm was not raised immediately after someone who has been identified as such a danger was allowed to escape?"

'This is not the first time this has happened - I hope by now the Home Office should consider such things. This needs to be investigated.'

And yet amazingly this psychopath's status was on the verge of being downgraded at the time of his escape.And staff were not allowed to be alone with Him because he was considered to be such a threat.

Although an enquiry in this case is still on going, I very much doubt if anyone will be held to account, and consequently things will proceed as normal and more innocent people will die or suffer.

The lunatics really have taken over the asylum. And they are getting away with it!

Double Standard

I have just been reading an article in the Daily Mail about the demographics involved during the recent elections in the USA.

And this sentence stood out more than any other, as far as I am concerned;

'95% of black voters went to the ballot for Obama and only 4% for McCain.'

Now correct me if I am wrong, but if 95% of white voters had voted for McCain, do you think this would have just been a passing sentence in an article? Or do you think there would have been a bit more made of such a fact?

Well, unless you have lost the capacity to think for yourself, and strangely a lot of people have these days, I think you would have to answer that yes, there would have been a lot more made of it.

It goes without saying that had these percentages been reversed, and 95% of whites had voted for McCain, the anguished cries of racism would be reverberating around the world today, in every newspaper, and on every screen.

In fact the self flagellation of guilt ridden liberals would have been hard for normal people to stomach.

Yet here in this instance racism, or race preference, is not only considered natural, and perfectly acceptable, but actually applauded too. In fact they sound disappointed he never got even more blacks out to vote for him.

There is a huge, and glaring double standard here, yet amazingly, not many people are able to see it.

We live in strange times, of that there can be no doubt.

But at least some people are happy now:

White Flight

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:
White flight is a term for the demographic trend in which working and middle-class white people move away from suburbs or urban neighborhoods that are becoming racially desegregated to white suburbs and exurbs.The phenomenon was first named in the United States, but has occurred in other countries as well.

And one of those ‘other’ countries experiencing White Flight is Britain. According to Trevor Phillips, head of the Commission for Racial Equality, we are not only experiencing it, but it is accelerating.

As record numbers of British citizens are leaving the country, record numbers of immigrants are arriving, and thus the face of Britain is changing at a remarkable rate. According to official figures recently released an unprecedented 196,000 Britons left the country last year, whilst 574,000 people came to live in Britain. Of course those who leave are the very people we can least afford to lose, the backbone of Britain. People like our professionals, tradesmen and skilled workers. To be replaced by what?

The new figures also suggested that middle-class Britons are beginning to move out of towns in southern England that are home to large numbers of immigrants. And towns in Northern England fair little better.

This phenomenon - called 'churn' by Whitehall officials and 'White Flight' by other commentators - saw 240,000 people move out of London last year.

The number of children under 16 dropped by 0.4 per cent to 11,537,000. Overall population numbers went up by 349,000 to 60,587,000, according to the figures.

London

Just over half of the increase was attributed to immigration, the rest to increasing birth rates. These are rising largely because recent immigrants are having more children than the existing population.

One in four of the 734,000 babies born last year had a parent who was born abroad. This is up from one in five in 2001.

The rising number of children born to migrants compares with much lower birth rates among women whose background is wholly British.

As we can see, we as a people are dying out in this country. If we are not moving abroad, we are being out-bred by immigrants or their descendants. And on top of that we have record breaking and unprecedented massive immigration.

Britain is a small island, and already we are witnessing immense strain on our services and infrastructure. Our culture and traditions are subservient to new arrivals culture and traditions, and in some cases perceived to be not only offensive, but also racist too. We witness whole areas, and in some cases towns and cities being taken over by foreigners and their descendants as indigenous people move away to be amongst people that they have more in common with.

I don’t know how much more the British people are going to take, or how long they are going to allow New Labour to remain in power to continue with the eradication of all that we hold dear, but one more term in my opinion will put us as a people in terminal decline.

In the not too distant future if current trends are allowed to continue, there will be no more internal White Flight; as there will be nowhere on this small and overcrowded island to flee to.

Think about that long and hard next time you have the opportunity to vote; I will!

Tribute to European girls

These girls are from Western Europe.

Rudyard Kipling

Rudyard Kipling is my favourite man of words, and a finer patriotic Englishman you will never find.

Every week or so I will add one of his verses.

I will start with one, nay two of my favourites.

The Last of the Light Brigade

1891

THERE were thirty million English who talked of England’s might, There were twenty broken troopers who lacked a bed for the night. They had neither food nor money, they had neither service nor trade; They were only shiftless soldiers, the last of the Light Brigade. They felt that life was fleeting; they knew not that art was long, That though they were dying of famine, they lived in deathless song. They asked for a little money to keep the wolf from the door; And the thirty million English sent twenty pounds and four! They laid their heads together that were scarred and lined and gray; Keen were the Russian sabres, but want was keener than they; And an old troop sergeant muttered, “Let us go to the man who writes The things on Balaclava the kiddies at school recites.” They went without bands or colours, a regiment ten-file strong, To look for the Master-singer who had crowned them all in his song; And, waiting his servant’s order, by the garden gate they stayed, A desolate little cluster, the last of the Light Brigade. They strove to stand to attention, to straighten the toilbowed back; They drilled on an empty stomach, the loose-knit files fell slack; With stooping of weary shoulders, in garments tattered and frayed, They shambled into his presence, the last of the Light Brigade. The old troop sergeant was spokesman, and “Beggin’ your pardon,” he said, “You wrote o’ the Light Brigade, sir. Here’s all that isn’t dead. An’ it’s all come true what you wrote, sir, regardin’ the mouth of hell; For we’re all of us nigh to the workhouse, an’ we thought we’d call an’ tell. “No, thank you, we don’t want food, sir; but couldn’t you take an’ write A sort of ‘to be continued’ and ‘see next page’ o’ the fight? We think that someone has blundered, an’ couldn’t you tell ’em how? You wrote we were heroes once, sir. Please, write we are starving now.” The poor little army departed, limping and lean and forlorn. And the heart of the Master-singer grew hot with “the scorn of scorn.” And he wrote for them wonderful verses that swept the land like flame, Till the fatted souls of the English were scourged with the thing called Shame. O thirty million English that babble of England’s might, Behold there are twenty heroes who lack their food to-night; Our children’s children are lisping to “honour the charge they made—” And we leave to the streets and the workhouse the charge of the Light Brigade! Norman and Saxon (A.D. 1100) “MY SON,” said the Norman Baron, “I am dying, and you will be heir To all the broad acres in England that William gave me for my share When we conquered the Saxon at Hastings, and a nice little handful it is. But before you go over to rule it I want you to understand this:— “The Saxon is not like us Normans, His manners are not so polite. But he never means anything serious till he talks about justice and right. When he stands like an ox in the furrow with his sullen set eyes on your own, And grumbles, ‘This isn’t fair dealings,’ my son, leave the Saxon alone. “You can horsewhip your Gascony archers, or torture your Picardy spears, But don’t try that game on the Saxon; you’ll have the whole brood round your ears. From the richest old Thane in the county to the poorest chained serf in the field, They’ll be at you and on you like hornets, and, if you are wise, you will yield. “But first you must master their language, their dialect, proverbs and songs. Don’t trust any clerk to interpret when they come with the tale of their wrongs. Let them know that you know what they’re saying; let them feel that you know what to say. Yes, even when you want to go hunting, hear ’em out if it takes you all day. “They’ll drink every hour of the daylight and poach every hour of the dark, It’s the sport not the rabbits they’re after (we’ve plenty of game in the park). Don’t hang them or cut off their fingers. That’s wasteful as well as unkind, For a hard-bitten, South-country poacher makes the best man-at-arms you can find. “Appear with your wife and the children at their weddings and funerals and feasts. Be polite but not friendly to Bishops; be good to all poor parish priests. Say ‘we,’ ‘us’ and ‘ours’ when you’re talking instead of ‘you fellows’ and ‘I.’ Don’t ride over seeds; keep your temper; and never you tell ’em a lie!”

Charles Lindbergh's - September 11, 1941 Des Moines Speech

Was just thinking....

I was just sitting back after my traditional Christmas dinner and a couple of glasses of wine, as you do. Feeling so stuffed to the gunwale that you can hardly move, when my mind started to drift to those who are less fortunate than ourselves.

I don't mean the likes of Africans or suchlike, but people nearer to home. Nearer to home, yet distant through time.

To be precise I was thinking about that wondrous and amazing occasion in December 1914 when ordinary soldiers, both British and German, left their freezing mud filled trenches to greet each other in no-man's land during the Great Brother's War.

I have even heard tales told that they kicked a football amongst themselves and exchanged small gifts such as chocolate, cigarettes and the like.

What a fantastic thing to happen amidst such a barbaric, gory and meaningless war.

I was reminded of the impression and the impact this episode had on one man who was there; Henry Williamson.

Here is what Mark Deavin had to say in his piece about Williamson:

Williamson's experiences during the First World War had politicized him for life. A significant catalyst in this development was the Christmas truce of 1914, when British and German frontline soldiers spontaneously left their trenches, abandoned the fighting, and openly greeted each other as brothers.

Williamson later spoke of an "incoherent sudden realization, after the fraternization of Christmas Day, that the whole war was based on lies." Another experience that consolidated this belief was when a German officer helped him remove a wounded British soldier who was draped over barbed wire on the front line. He was thus able to contrast his own wartime experiences with the vicious anti-German propaganda orchestrated by the British political establishment both during and after the war, and he was able to recognize the increasing moral bankruptcy of that establishment. In Williamson's view the fact that over half of the 338 Conservative Members of Parliament who dominated the 1918 governing coalition were company directors and financiers who had grown rich from war profits was morally wrong and detestable.

And here is another article:

The Christmas Truce

You are standing up to your knees in the slime of a waterlogged trench. It is the evening of 24 December 1914 and you are on the dreaded Western Front.

Stooped over, you wade across to the firing step and take over the watch. Having exchanged pleasantries, your bleary-eyed and mud-spattered colleague shuffles off towards his dug out. Despite the horrors and the hardships, your morale is high and you believe that in the New Year the nation's army march towards a glorious victory.

But for now you stamp your feet in a vain attempt to keep warm. All is quiet when jovial voices call out from both friendly and enemy trenches. Then the men from both sides start singing carols and songs. Next come requests not to fire, and soon the unthinkable happens: you start to see the shadowy shapes of soldiers gathering together in no-man's land laughing, joking and sharing gifts.

Many have exchanged cigarettes, the lit ends of which burn brightly in the inky darkness. Plucking up your courage, you haul yourself up and out of the trench and walk towards the foe...

The meeting of enemies as friends in no-man's land was experienced by hundreds, if not thousands, of men on the Western Front during Christmas 1914. Today, 90 years after it occurred, the event is seen as a shining episode of sanity from among the bloody chapters of World War One – a spontaneous effort by the lower ranks to create a peace that could have blossomed were it not for the interference of generals and politicians.

*****

Christmas day began quietly but once the sun was up the fraternisation began. Again songs were sung and rations thrown to one another. It was not long before troops and officers started to take matters into their own hands and ventured forth. No-man's became something of a playground.

Men exchanged gifts and buttons. In one or two places soldiers who had been barbers in civilian times gave free haircuts. One German, a juggler and a showman, gave an impromptu, and given the circumstances, somewhat surreal performance of his routine in the centre of no-man's land.

*****

Captain Sir Edward Hulse of the Scots Guards, in his famous account, remembered the approach of four unarmed Germans at 08.30. He went out to meet them with one of his ensigns. 'Their spokesmen,' Hulse wrote, 'started off by saying that he thought it only right to come over and wish us a happy Christmas, and trusted us implicitly to keep the truce. He came from Suffolk where he had left his best girl and a 3 ½ h.p. motor-bike!'

Having raced off to file a report at headquarters, Hulse returned at 10.00 to find crowds of British soldiers and Germans out together chatting and larking about in no-man's land, in direct contradiction to his orders.

Not that Hulse seemed to care about the fraternisation in itself – the need to be seen to follow orders was his concern. Thus he sought out a German officer and arranged for both sides to return to their lines.

While this was going on he still managed to keep his ears and eyes open to the fantastic events that were unfolding.

'Scots and Huns were fraternizing in the most genuine possible manner. Every sort of souvenir was exchanged addresses given and received, photos of families shown, etc. One of our fellows offered a German a cigarette; the German said, "Virginian?" Our fellow said, "Aye, straight-cut", the German said "No thanks, I only smoke Turkish!"... It gave us all a good laugh.'

Hulse's account was in part a letter to his mother, who in turn sent it on to the newspapers for publication, as was the custom at the time. Tragically, Hulse was killed in March 1915.

Was this instinctive and brotherly act a missed opportunity? Alas we will never know.

But we must learn from the past, the mistakes, the waste, the lies; and we must ensure that we are always on our guard against those who would turn brother against brother.

Put simply..........

No more brother's wars.......ever!

Merry Christmas!