Poll

-- from ♥ shhexycorin ♥ - (?)

Sorry, this is probably my first ever serious post and probably my only one. I would know nothing about this were it not for knowing someone involved and I think it's fucking disgusting. Please just take the time to read it and be informed... and if you happen to see Liam Byrne, please wank in his eye.

Thanks.

Last November the UK government changed the rules for the Highly Skilled Migrant Programme. The shitty thing they have done is to apply these rules retrospectively, suddenly putting many people who had made their homes here at risk of deportation.

One such a person is my close personal friend and favourite Uncle, Bill Tonghoek. He pretty much scored maximum points in the test, except for the fact that he doesn't have a university degree, leaving him 5 short of the requisite 75. If you were to spend more than 5 minutes with the man you'd realise that there's a very good reason for this. He's clearly the most educated person on the planet and able run intellectual circles around most cardigan-wearing professors.... no university would have him. To say our country will be a poorer place without this high-earning, tax-paying, big-spending individual is a massive understatement, and not for the reasons stated above.

I'll leave the rest to him, because it just gets worse.

"I'm getting kicked out.

I was waiting for Home Office to send me a form, which would have been a Refusal with Right of Appeal. Which means I was legally in this country while they took their 6 months working on it. It would have been a refusal since they changed the rules after I qualified and applied the rules retrospectively to people who are here already - you need a degree to qualify now. However, the right of appeal would have meant that I could take my case to a judge, while being legal in this country without prejudice to myself. Or even leave the country, without prejudice to myself.

Now, Home Office was whipped in the Tribunal Courts on the first people like myself - judges have all pretty much condemned what they're doing to us. So now Home Office is trying to save face by not letting us get to a judge in the first place. So now they are denying us the right to appeal on all sorts of spurious grounds.

So out of the blue four weeks ago, this letter arrives telling me I am refused with no right of appeal and I must report to the detention centre immediately. No warning, no "ok we don't want you here just leave in 2 months and everything will be fine". As of the date on that letter I am liable for detention. I had to report to the centre where they fingerprint you, metal-detect you, line you up like convicts. As is I am "lucky" not to be in "detention centre" - they don't call it prison to make themselves look better. I have to report there every Saturday, like I am on parole. I understand suicide rates are quite high in these places. No one really knows what goes on inside there, but like Guantanemo Bay, they operate outside of the normal sphere of correctional facilities. The very few reports available on these detention centres suggest that they have a very poor human rights records, over-crowding and the normal abuse.

Even if I want to leave right now I can't. They are holding my passport. They are processing me. They are throwing every legal trick at me to make me out to be a criminal detrimental to British society. So now I can only wait until they are finished with me and drive me to the airport - in the meantime I am technically not allowed to work or be here. They don't let you work, they don't give you money either, they don't let you leave immediately either. So the longer they take, the more they make me look like an illegal overstaying immigrant. Which is exactly what they want. Everything they are doing to me now will affect any future I have of entering any country, anywhere.

So, if they had wanted to be decent, they could have said "right we want you to leave the country, if you do so in two months we won't hold anything against you". Instead, they out of the blue turned me into a criminal.

I have a very very slim hope on EU Human Rights legislation - on the argument that the state is interfering disproportionately with my private and family life. This is the same EU Rights legislation that David Cameron and even a few "liberals" wanted to take away in favour for a new "British" Human Rights, which I can only assume would mean only the British have any rights in this country. (I would assume this would mean they can shoot Brazilians with even more impunity.)

Even so, this hope is slim to non-existent, as they are doing everything they can do prevent me from seeing a judge. There won't be any public outcry over this, since the voting british public view immigrants like myself as sub-human."

The change in law condemned by Human Rights committee
Summary on timeline
Mayor of London, Red Ken bitching about it

PS. If you happen to be a cardigan-wearing type with the power to magically bestow lovely people with university degrees, then mail me!

the gay train...

Let nothing disturb you

Let nothing disturb you
Originally uploaded by eeblet.

people are strange

people are strange
Originally uploaded by stasis88.

Robert Anton Wilson needs our help

"I'm not exaggerating one bit when I say Robert Anton Wilson is one of my heroes. His writing has had a profound influence on the way I view life, more so than any other writer. If I had not read his books, there would definitely be no Boing Boing.

My friend Douglas Rushkoff feels the same way about him, and I'm reposting his blog entry because Robert Anton Wilson needs our help now.

UPDATE: Note from Robert's friend, Denis Berry: Sadly, we have to report that wizard-author-intelligence increase agent is in trouble with his life, home and his finances. Robert is dying at his home from post polio syndrome. He has enough money for next months rent and after that, will be unable to pay. He cannot walk, has a hard time talking and swallowing, is extremely frail and needs full time care that is being provided by several friends-fans-volunteers and family. We appeal to you to help financially for the next few months to let him die at his home in peace.

200610021323Douglas Rushkoff: I hope people I've inspired with my work would band together to help me out in my later years if I needed it. Which is at least part of the reason why I'm sending what I can to support cosmic thinking patriarch Robert Anton Wilson, whose infirmity and depleted finances have put him in the precarious position of not being able to meet next month's rent.

In case the name doesn't immediately ring a bell, Bob is the guy who wrote Cosmic Trigger -- still the best narrative on how to enter and navigate the psycho-spiritual realm, and co-wrote the Illuminatus Trilogy, an epic work that pushes beyond conspiracy theory into conspiracy practice. Robert Anton Wilson will one day be remembered alongside such literary philosophers as Aldous Huxley and James Joyce.

But right now, Bob is a human being in a rather painful fleshsuit, who needs our help. I refuse for the history books to say he died alone and destitute, for I want future generations to know we appreciated Robert Anton Wilson while he was alive.

Let me add, on a personal note, that Bob is the only one of my heroes who I was not disappointed to actually meet in person. He was of tremendous support to me along my road, and I'm honored to have the opportunity to be of some support on his.

Note from Robert's friend, Denis Berry: Robert's writing has enlightened-educated many and if you can please commit to help pay a portion of his expenses until his passing which sadly won't be that long. Monthly contributions of $50.00 or more will be greatly appreciated. All monies will go directly to Robert and can be sent to his PayPal address olgaceline@gmail.com. You can also send a check to RAW c/o Futique Trust, P.O. Box 3561, Santa Cruz, Ca 95063"

(from boingboing)

BUSH

BUSH
Originally uploaded by aveeno.

silencio

silencio
Originally uploaded by Senator Joseph McCarthy.

'Fall'

'Fall'
Originally uploaded by doublevelvet.