The Angry Exile: And on the subject of crazy...

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, 24 February 2011

And on the subject of crazy...

... this:

A website that claims Christchurch's devastating earthquake was an act of God triggered by the tolerance of homosexual behaviour in the city has been denounced as ''despicable and appalling'' by New Zealand's gay and lesbian community.
The website ''Christchurch Quake'' - registered on September 20 to an address in Utah in the USA - suggests the destruction was a result of ''lesbians running loose on the South Island as if they own the place'' and general ''amoral'' behaviour.
Among other inflammatory accusations, the website alleges that the earlier September earthquake, which coincided with the start of Gay Ski Week in Queenstown, was a warning from God to ''End the Evil - or else!''.

Er, they do know that several churches have been very badly damaged and the cathedral hit so hard the spire was demolished and appears to have collapsed on some people, probably tourists. If a god did that it was pretty fucked up of him.

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sadbutmadlad 66p · 735 weeks ago

Without looking I bet it's from Westboro Baptist church. In which case everyone should be ignoring it. New Zealand's gay and lesbian community are helping the extremist church's publicity by mentioning it. Or are they using to publicise themselves? In which case they are just as bad as Westboro.
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1 reply · active 735 weeks ago

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Angry_Exile 90p · 735 weeks ago

I don't think it's Westboro as Oz and I think NZ too have their fair share of religious nutters, though if the site is registered to someone in Utah it seems likely to be an American crazy. Whoever it is and wherever they're from the thought processes certainly come from that end of the dial though.

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microdave 58p · 735 weeks ago

Any normal person (whether church goer, or not) would be appalled by this. However when fringe groups are concerned they act like the AGW mob - normal rules go out the window, and anything you care to mention can be justified as an "Act of God". I saw this first hand at my workplace some years ago with a bunch of Born Again Christians. Utterly brainwashed...

2 replies · active 735 weeks ago

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Angry_Exile 90p · 735 weeks ago

Yeah, the Born Agains can be like that, though I think it depends a bit on whether they're naturally tolerant people or not and whether whoever is pulling their mental reins is telling them to go and proselytise. I find they range from normal people who happen to have beliefs I don't share, through increasing degrees of odd, right the way up to annoying window lickers who just won't shut up.

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microdave 58p · 735 weeks ago

And beyond to include those who calmly dismiss the death, in a tragic accident, of a young apprentice by saying "Oh, it's OK, he's with God now"

Cnuts.....

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jimfryar 34p · 735 weeks ago

There are some really weird ideas about Religion going about, and this is not surprising unfortunately.

According to the conspiracy theorists, they have got it wrong however. Earthquakes are apparently caused by a secret US weapon.

1 reply · active 735 weeks ago

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Angry_Exile 90p · 735 weeks ago

I wonder what the Kiwis are supposed to have done to deserve it and whether the Bacofoil Brigade have something they think caused the flooding in QLD. I sometimes think that a kind of hubris is built into the human mind that makes people determined to believe in a human cause for just about everything. Shit never just happens, it's got to be the CIA or an angry god we've provoked or carbon dioxide we've made or something.

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Tony · 735 weeks ago

"Er, they do know that several churches have been very badly damaged and the cathedral hit so hard the spire was demolished and appears to have collapsed on some people, probably tourists. If a god did that it was pretty fucked up of him. "

Well, as far as that matter goes, NZ has come down pretty hard to the point of merciless on "the smokers" later, demoralizing them and treating them as criminals, including possibly making tobacco itself illegal contraband throughout the entire nation soon. And if that's not being discriminatory and hateful, I don't know what is.

So then, if it is an Act of God and punishment for doing social and moral wrong, the next question becomes, were any tobacco shops demolished in the earthquake. And if the answer is no, no tobacco shops were demolished, then if it is an Act of God, then that would say who it is God is wishing to punish, and it wouldn't be the homosexuals as it might be the anti-smokers He is trying to get a message to lighten up and stop harassing "the smokers", whom they have sinfully vilified and denormalised with hateful prejudice.

1 reply · active 735 weeks ago

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Angry_Exile 90p · 735 weeks ago

I'd love that to be true about the tobacconists and it'd be interesting to find out. I wonder how the religio-loons would take it if a different but equally plausible interpretation could be found for the 'divine wrath'. But still pretty fucked up to collapse a building on someone, even Dreadful Arnott.

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billsticker 51p · 735 weeks ago

God doesn't demolish churches does he? Over a bunch of wastrel shirtlifters and carpet munchers? Surely not. I'm sure he's got better things to do with his time.

1 reply · active 734 weeks ago

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Angry_Exile 90p · 734 weeks ago

Well, for starters he could have a word about workmanship and building for earthquakes with the guys who put it up 150 years ago.

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