thumping the tub
Tub-Thumper - 1. A speaker or preacher who for emphasis thumps the pulpit; a violent or declamatory preacher or orator; a ranter. (from oed.com). This blog will be a combination of reasoned posting somedays and an occasional rant.
Friday, March 23, 2007
AUDIO BOOK AND OSCAR WILDE
As I intimated a couple of posts previously I am recently back from a year away from home.

One thing that bugged me was that I wasn’t able to get any books when I was away. Well, I could have, but I am not interested in the Da Vinci Code or where men and women are supposedly from (I always thought they were both from earth) or any of that sort of bollocks.

Consequently, for the first time I got into audio books (downloadable) because I hate reading full books on the computer – it is just not the same.

I started to find it quite enjoyable to stick one on while I was pottering about the house doing housework and so on.

I have kept the habit since I returned and I was on my way to the shops listening to ‘The letters of Oscar Wilde’ yesterday and this little quote really made me laugh…

“It was a fatal day when the public discovered that the pen is mightier than the paving stone and could be made as offensive as the brickbat. They at once sought for the journalist, found him, developed him and made him their industrious and well-paid servant.

In the old days men had the rack, now they have the press. That is an improvement certainly but still it is very bad and wrong and demoralizing. Somebody (was it Burke?), called journalism the fourth estate – that was true at the time no doubt but at the present moment it really is the only estate – it has eaten up the other three.

The ‘Lords Temporal’ say nothing, the ‘Lords Spiritual’ have nothing to say and the House of Commons has nothing to say…and says it.

We are dominated by journalism. The tyranny that it proposes to exercise over peoples private lives seems to me quite extraordinary. The fact is that the public have an insatiable curiosity to know everything, except what is worth knowing.

Journalism, conscious of this and having tradesman-like habits, supplies their demands.

In centuries before ours the public nailed journalists ears to the pump - that was quite hideous. In this century journalists have nailed their own ears to the keyhole – that is much worse. The private lives of men and women should not be told to the public, the public have nothing to do with them at all."

If you change the references to "the public" and "men" in general in the first and second paragraphs to "rulers" I think he makes a tremendous point and I couldn't agree more.

It is also a rather good comment on the celebrity culture we have now.

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posted by michael the tubthumper @ 11:40 am   14 comments
U.S. MONETARY Cost of the War in Iraq - other people are spending too, and the human cost is much higher
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What is Tubthumping and who is doing it?

Name: michael the tubthumper
Home: Glasgow, Scotland
About Me: Tub-Thumper - 1. A speaker or preacher who for emphasis thumps the pulpit; a violent or declamatory preacher or orator; a ranter. This blog will be a combination of reasoned posting somedays and an occasional rant. 28 years old, I write and research for a couple of websites and also do my own stuff.
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Thumping The Tub Video

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I have made a few short movies. Here are links to free downloads for them all in the order that I made them (as far as I can remember). Please feel free to use, distribute, disagree with, shout at etc etc

  • Praise The Lord and Pass The Ammunition

    • This was a REAL song from World War 2. I was so stunned by it I had to make a movie

  • How Far Is It From Here to Nuremberg

    • This is my attempt at a video for the excellent, if worrying, David Rovics (see links) song

  • What You Like

    • I believe the word for this is "splenetic". Only 20 seconds long.

  • Imperial Measures

    • What is going on in Iraq? Some things you knew, some you didn't. A couple of bits of info are out of date now.

  • Wish You Were Here

    • Wish You Were Here is a 6 minute film about the unprecendted rate of animal extinction we are currently experiencing

  • Gorillas and us

    • I don't like creationism, neither did Douglas Adams
    Recent Thumping
    Older Thumping
    Links

  • spinwatch
  • adbusters
  • internet archive
  • art not oil
  • blairwatch
  • bushflash
  • camcorder guerillas
  • corporate watch
  • campaign for press freedom
  • noam chomsky
  • common dreams
  • counterpunch
  • cost of war
  • david rovics
  • democracy now
  • dissident voice
  • the dossier
  • downing street says
  • etims
  • robert fisk
  • food not bombs
  • global research
  • gmwatch
  • impeach blair
  • indybay video
  • killing hope
  • lobbywatch
  • mediachannel
  • medialens
  • mickey z
  • mixed up records
  • george monbiot
  • mark thomas
  • john pilger
  • radio 4 all
  • schnews
  • snow shoe films
  • sourcewatch
  • tom englehardt
  • ukwatch
  • video activist network
  • howard zinn
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    some of the blogs I look at
    Arse of the month

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    The inaugural 'Arse of the month' award goes to our very own Scottish First Minister Jack (Joke) McConnell. He seems to spend a lot of his time sucking up to english politicians and yet it appears they don't even know his name. Follow the link to see..

    NODOBY KNOWS ME
    It's All Gone Scottish

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    A list of some other Scottish sites and blogs most of which, if not all, are pro-independence. I don't agree with content on all of them obviously. Some are Scots at home, others abroad.

  • The Scottish Patient
  • Kim Ayres
  • Our Scotland
  • average tosser
  • 1820
  • big stick small carrot
  • J. Arthur MacNumpty
  • World of Jack McConnell
  • The Firefox Chronicles
  • Independence 1st
  • Radio Free Scotland
  • Scots and independent
  • Scottish Independence Guide
  • TCOAW
  • Small Nation
  • Inveresk Street Ingrate
  • Radical Glasgow
    		•
    Want to Swot?

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    If you like this site and think it is time to start getting informed here are a few real favourites of mine that will help you blow away the corporate and government propaganda you are constantly bombarded with. It is added to every so often.

  • politics and the english language
  • Beyond Hope
  • the gore exception
  • your tax dollars at work
  • a cultural chernobyl
  • choose life (not trainspotting)
  • shooting an elephant
  • a war crime within a war crime...
  • the menace of liberal scholarship
  • the modern era of law
  • naming the problem
  • the four ages of sand
  • a news revolution has begun
  • come september
  • money is the cause of poverty
  • countering corporate power
    		•
    Other Stuff

    Who links to me?

    For a DotSCOT Domain!

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