last words

My life took a radical turn in March 2022.After an epileptic seizure in a local shop I ended up at the hospital where they had to put me in an artificial coma to be able to take aMRI of my brain etc. They found an anomality, drilled a hole and after analyzing the biopsy learned it was a malignant, aggressive and incurable brain tumor beside my hippocampus. Told me then I most likely got 1 to 2 years left to live. Time since then has been focused on settling my affairs. :) Now trying to adapt to reduced cognitive and balance abilities. And of course doing suggested treatment, but it can in best case postpone it. Despite EVERYTHING, I am among the luckiest people in the world! :) <3 I’m happy and content. Love the privileged life I have lived!!!!!!!!!!

Cancelled by Facebook

Anybody with half a braincell operational remembers in 2020 when then insane American president Trump (at a press conference!) claimed light and injecting disinfectants (!!!) in your body could cure Covid.

Facebook was obviousely not awake at the time and seems to be operated by MAGA people now. At the time I posted an image similar to this on Facebook:

I later also posted this image on Facebook as a comment and reaction to the insanity of the many crazy things Trump was saying and doing:

Pretty obviousely memes, right? Anybody likely to suspect me of suggesting people to drink bleach? One year after the first image Facebook disabled my account claiming it was against their community standards and suggested I seek help if I considered taking my life... Sigh! This year, two years after the fake pill box meme image, they took that down and disabled my account again. As of May 15th 2022 my account on Facebook is still disabled and I get no replies from them.

“Censorship, like charity, should begin at home; but unlike charity, it should end there.” ―-Clare Boothe Luce

SHAME ON RUSSIA!

Interviewed by Leah Remini and Mike Rinder on their Scientology: Fairgame podcast.

Fairgame Postcad #73 - Operation Clambake Founder Andreas Heldal-Lund

“If we value the pursuit of knowledge, we must be free to follow wherever that search may lead us. The free mind is no barking dog to be tethered on a ten-foot chain.” ―Adlai E. Stevenson

My thoughts on civil disobedience

If you live in a society that upholds and respect the UN declaration of Human Rights you should follow the laws of the land.

The exception for me is when you have serious personal and/or ethical problems following them. E.g. performing compulsory military service. My only requirement for civil disobedience is that you do it in the open. You do it because you must and because you believe it must change.

It is e.g. not considered civil disobedience to smuggle goods for personal pleasure or gain just because you oppose the customs laws. Or break the speed limit because you disagree with them.

If you try to hide your 'civil disobedience' it is most like not.

“And our topic is topsy-turvy: civil disobedience. As soon as you say the topic is civil disobedience, you are saying our problem is civil disobedience. That is not our problem.... Our problem is civil obedience. Our problem is the numbers of people all over the world who have obeyed the dictates of the leaders of their government and have gone to war, and millions have been killed because of this obedience. And our problem is that scene in All Quiet on the Western Front where the schoolboys march off dutifully in a line to war. Our problem is that people are obedient all over the world, in the face of poverty and starvation and stupidity, and war and cruelty. Our problem is that people are obedient while the jails are full of petty thieves, and all the while the grand thieves are running the country. That's our problem.” ― Howard Zinn, The Zinn Reader: Writings on Disobedience and Democracy

Realistic optimism...

I am tired by my very positive belief in humanity being so challenged lately. I have no solution for this, beside striving to be positive. The struggle is that while I believe good will prevail in the long run, many I care for now will not. But you 'soldier on' (which is a bad metaphor used by me) and try to see the long-term gains.

I really struggle with the situation in U.S.A today. The world and Americans deserve so much better. I know what brought us here, and that is what disappoints me so much. Trump as an American president was initially just a crazy media stunt idea, him being president is now documented to be pure insanity.

But I am still an optimist, living in a country shielded from most of the challenges most humans have. 

Most on this pale blue dot would probably call me naïve….

Just do it

Nobody can save the world alone, and very few of us make big enough waves to author positive annotations in the history books of humanity. But what we do know is that if you do nothing, you change nothing and you have no impact. The lazy who are silent support whoever are the most influential at any time.

However, if enough individuals do a little, like giving what they can when they can and publicly support what is important, we know now that the sum of many can create bigger changes than anybody could foresee. It's about having personal values and strive to be informed.

No great historical human would manage what they did without supporters - and none of the good ones ever expected that what they did would have such a big impact.

Unicef helps and saves children in larger numbers than you and I can visualize. They can only help because people like us assist financially.

Read up on the malnutrition challenge and some solutions here.

It can be as simple as making it possible for the front lines to be able to offer a small package of critical nutrition at the right time. Be a solution, not the problem. Give now that you can, don't only complain when you are on top. You are most likely better off now than whatever situation most would be when they would wish to help you!

"When you kill one enemy, you then must plan for the one hundred enemies you have now created. No enemy ever stands alone. He comes with a mother and father, brothers and sisters. He has a wife and children, friends and neighbors. When you kill this enemy, you must be ready to face the angry revenge that comes from the grief of this loss for all the people who knew and loved this man. The only way to stop this endless chain of enemy killing enemy is to forgive it. And in doing so, teach each one that life is the most important, precious and valuable thing." [Anwarshah Anwary, Freedom-A Journey Through Afghanistan-The Anwarshah Anwary Story]

A Very Exciting Year

An interesting year has passed. After 25 years in Iron Mountain (previously Rockall and Hays Information Management) I took a new professional path in the same hunting grounds and also used this opportunity to challenge myself.

 I believed what we did could be done a lot better and started iO Data to offer newer and innovative records and information management services to a market I by now knew inside out. I was lucky and a fantastic team of people, that I have worked very closely with for many years, knocked on my door and asked if they could join me on this journey. A little over one year in and we have developed some amazing solutions and received a lot of praise.

 The other journey was to challenge if I still got the stuff in me after being so long at one place. I had evolved there from a junior database coordinator, through IT manager and the last 15 years as the Country Manager. I had been offered (or fought for) some great professional challenges and development opportunities there. Never a boring day, but you can’t help wondering if you still got what it takes. So, the last 1,5 years have also been about challenging and developing myself. Looking back today I am amazed.

Looking at my colleagues and what we have achieved makes me smile a little at the worries I sometimes felt around the time I took the big jump. There are obviously many though challenges and a lot of hard work ahead, but anything else would for sure be boring and have reduced me.

 And looking at what else has happened in the world over the last year it probably was good that I had these (for me) big distractions to occupy me…

"Secular Humanism is about greatness in the little human, about freedom, about knowledge, about responsibility - all describing our journey through life." [AHL]

Public debate on circumcision of boys

Is it culture or abuse? Come listen to me and join in.

"When slavery was a custom,every right minded person supported it. Nothing is as powerful a legitimizer as social custom,even more powerful than law. I believe the time has come to acknowledge that the practice of routine neonatal circumcision rests on the absurd premise that the only mammal in creation born in a condition that requires immediate surgical correction is the human male. If the penile foreskin is not merely non functional but a biological disadvantage so severe as to justify its immediate surgical ablation, then surely, it must have atrophied by now." [Thomas Szasz]

Male genital mutilation

Female genitalmutilation (FGM) is defined by the World Health Organization (WHO) as "all procedures that involve partial or total removal of the external female genitalia, or other injury to the female genital organs for non-medical reasons."

It is ironic and scary that religious and ritually motivated mutilation of genitals on young baby boys is only called circumcision. And in Norway, we are in full seriousness debating if the state is to do and pay for male genital mutilation - in the year of 2011.

Male genital mutilation removes the ridged band at the end of the foreskin on the penis. One can debate how many corpuscles (a kind of nerve ending that is concentrated in areas of greatest sensitivity) the ridged band has, or if it has sexually sensitive and plays a role in normal sexual function, etc. While these questions might always be debated even by science, it will surely also be individual differences that we can't measure. The only important points here are that we don't know what we remove, but we know there is no immediate medical reason to do it. This operation is irreversible and it also adds potential post operation complications.

No actions, especially the controversial ones, can build its support only on tradition. As a matter of fact, the longer ago it was started the more we should question if the reasons for it is well founded or rational.

The argument that ignorant or bad parents will do it illegally anyway has no merit as it then should also apply to all other bad traditions we have gotten rid of. Do some still hit or harm their children? Yes, but it is not accepted in our society now because we created that change. Children are treated better today and more abuse is being stopped because we don't accept the argument that we should allow something just because we expect someone might break the law.

One of very many perspectives here is this: Type IV of FMG includes the traditional practice of pricking the clitoral hood or clitoris of a baby girl to get a drop of blood. While it isn't close to physically cutting of foreskin on a baby boy, you hear no politicians or religious leaders publicly advocating for pricking being legalized or paid for by the state. All agree that all forms of FMG should be illegal. I claim the reason for this double standard is ignorance and/or misplaced tolerance.

Most of us agree that the very harmful and more known forms of FMG are absolutely terrible and we can't have any tolerance for it today. Still we are seriously, in this modern society, asked to tolerate genital mutilation of baby boys, for absolutely no medical reason, because it is a very old tradition.

I vote for the little baby boy. What he decides to do with himself and his body when he turns 18 is none of my business, but until he is of an age where he is capable of making adult decisions, adults have an obligation to protect him. First and foremost that is supposed to be his parents, but when they fail, it is the responsibility of society to put the human child before any human traditions.

As none of us accept any type of female genital mutilation today (irreversible or not), so do I predict none will accept male genital mutilation in the near future.  

When history one day looks back, how do you want to be judged?

Pet owner: -What would you say if I wanted to get my dog circumcised? Vet (after a silence): -I'd have to report you to the ASPCA for cruelty.