The Angry Exile: Delicious Irony

The Hangman

Into our town the Hangman came,
Smelling of gold and blood and flame.
And he paced our bricks with a diffident air,
And built his frame in the courthouse square.
The scaffold stood by the courthouse side,
Only as wide as the door was wide;
A frame as tall, or little more,
Than the capping sill of the courthouse door.
And we wondered, whenever we had the time,
Who the criminal, what the crime
That the Hangman judged with the yellow twist
of knotted hemp in his busy fist.
And innocent though we were, with dread,
We passed those eyes of buckshot lead --
Till one cried: "Hangman, who is he
For whom you raised the gallows-tree?"
Then a twinkle grew in the buckshot eye,
And he gave us a riddle instead of reply:
"He who serves me best," said he,
"Shall earn the rope of the gallows-tree."
And he stepped down, and laid his hand
On a man who came from another land.
And we breathed again, for another's grief
At the Hangman's hand was our relief
And the gallows-frame on the courthouse lawn
By tomorrow's sun would be struck and gone.
So we gave him way, and no one spoke,
Out of respect for his Hangman's cloak.
The next day's sun looked mildly down
On roof and street in our quiet town,
And stark and black in the morning air
Was the gallows-tree in the courthouse square.
And the Hangman stood at his usual stand
With the yellow hemp in his busy hand;
With his buckshot eye and his jaw like a pike
And his air so knowing and business-like.
And we cried, "Hangman, have you not done
Yesterday, with the foreign one?"
Then we fell silent, and stood amazed,
"Oh, not for him was the gallows raised."
He laughed a laugh as he looked at us:
"Did you think I'd gone to all this fuss
To hang one man? That's a thing I do
To stretch a rope when the rope is new."
Then one cried "Murder!" and one cried "Shame!"
And into our midst the Hangman came
To that man's place. "Do you hold," said he,
"with him that was meant for the gallows-tree?"
And he laid his hand on that one's arm.
And we shrank back in quick alarm!
And we gave him way, and no one spoke
Out of fear of his Hangman's cloak.
That night we saw with dread surprise
The Hangman's scaffold had grown in size.
Fed by the blood beneath the chute,
The gallows-tree had taken root;
Now as wide, or a little more,
Than the steps that led to the courthouse door,
As tall as the writing, or nearly as tall,
Halfway up on the courthouse wall.
The third he took -- we had all heard tell --
Was a usurer, and an infidel.
"What," said the Hangman "have you to do
With the gallows-bound, and he a Jew?"
And we cried out, "Is this one he
Who has served you well and faithfully?"
The Hangman smiled: "It's a clever scheme
to try the strength of the gallows-beam."
The fourth man's dark, accusing song
Had scratched our comfort hard and long;
"And what concern," he gave us back.
"Have you for the doomed -- the doomed and Black?"
The fifth. The sixth. And we cried again,
"Hangman, Hangman, is this the man?"
"It's a trick," he said. "that we hangmen know
For easing the trap when the trap springs slow."
And so we ceased, and asked no more,
As the Hangman tallied his bloody score.
And sun by sun, and night by night,
The gallows grew to monstrous height.
The wings of the scaffold opened wide
Till they covered the square from side to side;
And the monster cross-beam, looking down,
Cast its shadow across the town.
Then through the town the Hangman came,
Through the empty streets, and called my name --
And I looked at the gallows soaring tall,
And thought, "There is no one left at all
For hanging, and so he calls to me
To help pull down the gallows-tree."
So I went out with right good hope
To the Hangman's tree and the Hangman's rope.
He smiled at me as I came down
To the courthouse square through the silent town.
And supple and stretched in his busy hand
Was the yellow twist of the hempen strand.
And he whistled his tune as he tried the trap,
And it sprang down with a ready snap --
And then with a smile of awful command
He laid his hand upon my hand.
"You tricked me. Hangman!," I shouted then,
"That your scaffold was built for other men...
And I no henchman of yours," I cried,
"You lied to me, Hangman. Foully lied!"
Then a twinkle grew in the buckshot eye,
"Lied to you? Tricked you?" he said. "Not I.
For I answered straight and I told you true --
The scaffold was raised for none but you.
For who has served me more faithfully
Then you with your coward's hope?" said he,
"And where are the others who might have stood
Side by your side in the common good?"
"Dead," I whispered. And amiably
"Murdered," the Hangman corrected me:
"First the foreigner, then the Jew...
I did no more than you let me do."
Beneath the beam that blocked the sky
None had stood so alone as I.
The Hangman noosed me, and no voice there
Cried "Stop!" for me in the empty square.

Maurice Ogden

Thursday, 7 May 2009

Delicious Irony

H/T to Watt's Up With That for my laughs for this evening even though it's not really a laughing matter. Maybe they're a bunch of publicity seeking eco-pretenders but that doesn't mean they deserve to the misfortune of having a storm beat the shit out of their boat, and if they were plain old fashioned adventurer types (which they probably are even if they do use 'the cause' as a reason to go) or regular yachties I'd simply be glad they got out of the situation alive. But publicity seeking eco-pretenders being picked up by an oil tanker? Now that bit is funny. I'm still glad they're not being processed into fish shit but this is like the chief exec of a speed camera company being nicked for speeding... which has also happened.

And in case you're wondering why "publicity seeking eco-pretenders" it's because after Googling the names of the three men named in the article I found the website carbonneutralexpeditions.com, and having found the bit about the Greenland expedition I read that they have:

... four main objectives:

* To make the first carbon neutral, double crossing of Greenland by sailing across the North Atlantic and then completing a return ski traverse of the ice cap. (over 550 miles)
* To inspire young people to work towards their goals and develop their full potential.
* To raise awareness of climate change to over 25,000 pupils in partner schools around the UK and Jersey.
* To raise money for Teenage Cancer Trust.

Now they can inspire young people as much as they like and raise money for teenage cancer charities all day and night, but I'm going to nitpick about the other two aims.

First, as I've said about Earth Hour, anyone who needs this bullshit to "raise their awareness of climate change" has either been in a cave or a coma for the last 30 years, or is too fucking poor to make any difference even if every scare story about the issue for the last three decades is actually true. This is the principle reason why any green charity that wants my money had better come to my door armed to the fucking teeth if it wants a contribution out of me, because I won't give a cent to any mob who want to raise awareness of something that's in nearly every fucking paper every fucking week, and has been for longer than some of the twats have been alive. I'd love to give money to environmental charities, but I don't know of any that isn't constantly beating this fucking drum at the expense of doing something fucking useful with the money. We're all aware, okay? Now will you all kindly shut the cunting fuck up about it.

Secondly I noticed that in spite of being called Carbon Neutral Expeditions and their first, and presumably foremost, stated aim is to achieve the first carbon neutral crossing of Greenland they're not actually being carbon neutral. They admit that:

...there will be some direct emissions that just can’t be avoided (such as using the boat’s engine to get into harbour). From the Arctic to the other extreme CNE will be working with For Ethiopia, a highly effective local charity as an offset.

So there you go. Obviously the great explorers of the Age of Discovery didn't go anywhere without a fucking marine diesel to get them into harbour, and the poor fools weren't able to offset their emissions back then. Absolute world class bollocks. It's perfectly possible not to use the engine to get into harbour. Not easy perhaps, and probably relies a lot on conditions being right for it, but it can be done. I've seen it done when a yacht with engine failure sailed up to a jetty I was standing on. I don't know how and barely know the difference between one end of a boat and the other, but it's clear that it can be done. So Carbon Neutral Expeditions could have been a bit more fucking carbon neutral if they'd really wanted to, but offsetting is the easy way out (my main criticism of warming believers who offset is that they're not actually reducing their personal emissions - don't just talk the talk, walk the walk you fucking hypocrites).

But even if you accept that and the offset bullshit they go on to say that:

There are also carbon emissions associated with the manufacture and materials of the equipment that we will use on the expedition. These indirect emissions are fiendishly difficult to calculate and therefore we will not be trying to offset these. However, where possible we will try to source secondhand or recycled equipment.

Can't be arsed in other words. I'll give them credit for buying used kit, which does fit in with the warmist mantra - or at least as much as a luxuries like a yacht can fit in. But because the indirect emissions are "fiendishly difficult" they can't be bothered to even come up with a best guess back-of-an-envelope figure for the offset. The easy option is simply to ignore it and pretend it doesn't count, though at least they've got the balls to admit that's what they're doing. Even so, by their own admission Carbon Neutral Expeditions' trip to Greenland was never going to be genuinely carbon neutral. That and the predictable "raise awareness" aim make them, in my view, a bunch of publicity seeking eco-pretenders. Which is still a more favourable term than the one I'd use for Tom Riall, the speeding boss of the speed camera firm, who I'd call a loathsome and hypocritical cunt who deserves to have a speed gun jammed up his arse until the radar fries his kidneys.

For the last word I'll go back to Anthony Watts, who is wondering (not for the first time) if the abandoned yacht