Mood:
a-okTopic: human rights
Apparently in Chinese culture the number 8 is said to be lucky. And today 8th April 2008 is a great lucky day for Chinese democracy if one takes a sophisticated view of the outpourings of free speech at the parade of the Beijing global tour of the Olympic Torch. This is indeed what engagement with the rest of the world is actually about. Wikipedia explains lucky eight as follows:
Eight
The word for "eight" in Chinese (Pinyin: b?) sounds similar to the word which means "prosper" or "wealth" (?amp;#8216; - short for "?amp;#8216;e'?", Pinyin: f?). In regional dialects the words for "eight" and "fortune" are also similar, eg Cantonese "baat" and "faat".
There is also a resemblance between two digits, "88", and the shuang xi ('double joy'), a popular decorative design composed of two stylized characters ?mp;#8211;œ (xi, 'joy', 'happiness').
Telephone number 8888-8888 was sold for USD$270,723 in Chengdu, China.
The Summer Olympics in Beijing are scheduled to open on 8/8/08 at 8:08:08 p.m.[2]
A man in Hangzhou offered to sell his license plate reading A88888 for 1.12 million yuan.[2]
Dragon Fish Industry in Singapore, a breeder of rare Asian Arowanas (which are "lucky fish" themselves, and, being a rare species, are required to be microchipped), makes sure to use numbers with plenty of eights in their microchip tag numbers, and appears to reserve particularly numbers especially rich in eights and sixes (e.g. 702088880006688) for particularly valuable specimens
We wrote recently about how Sydney 2000 Olympics was a very robust Big and Little Media dynamic evidenced by a good 15 cm of clippings 8 years ago, searching out every wart and human flaw in the now global big business circus that is modern elite sport:
26 March 2008 Retrospective Sydney 2000 Olympic racket: Bribes, drugs, lies, arrogance
Mood:irritated
Topic: human rights
This in truth is the world we really live in including China who should and must engage and interact. It's global conversation grassroots style.
Here is some other press coverage today on lucky 8th April 2008 here in Sydney while keeping in mind it's not so much about picking on China, or the Chinese culture, but on democracy and human rights for all (not least the Chinese too), which is why the IOC/AOC are on a hiding to stand against such outpouring, which they seem to accept in recent utterances now:
But notice the Big Business subtext rolls on, because money talks loudest of all including in the 'democratic' West:
............
And significantly local bank ANZ is right into the Olympic $ trough as per the advert above which has some major global environmental obligations to address regarding finance (or not) of Tasmanian pulp mill to destroy huge areas of world heritage quality forest:
19th March 2008
Click here for larger imageThe Wilderness Society is encouraging shareholders of Gunns Ltd’s banker, ANZ Bank, to get in touch and form a syndicate of concerned shareholders who have the power to call an Extraordinary General Meeting (EGM) should ANZ fund Gunns’ pulp mill in Tasmania.
Click here for an open letter to ANZ shareholders seeking their support to hold the EGM.
If ANZ funds or organises finance for the pulp mill project, it will demonstrate serious systemic failures in the bank’s environmental, social and economic investment policies. They will then have serious questions to answer from shareholders who expect the bank to act on environmental and social responsibility, and not just use it as greenwash.
Australia’s Corporations Act 2001 has provisions aimed at ensuring that the will of shareholders is reflected in the running of their company. EGMs give shareholders the opportunity to express their will and to obtain critical information. To force an EGM, the commitment of 100 shareholders is needed.
Polls have consistently shown that the majority of the Australian public are opposed to Gunns’ forest-hungry pulp mill because of its predicted environmental, social and economic impacts.
Similarly, it is likely that the majority of people who own shares in ANZ would hold major concerns about the pulp mill project, both from an economic risk point of view, and the impact ANZ’s support for the project could have on their investment.
If you own shares in ANZ, you have a critical role to play in deciding on the future of our forests, climate and economy.
For more information about the pulp mill project or the EGM, please contact The Wilderness Society Tasmania on (03) 6224 1550, or email pulpmill@wilderness.org.au
Click here to download the open letter to ANZ shareholders.
Regardless of whether you are an ANZ shareholder or not, you are encouraged to take action and sign the Pulp Mill Pledge. The Pledge was launched at Hobart's massive rally attended by 15,000 people in November 2007, and around 7000 people have signed it since.
For more information, please contact:
Vica Bayley
Tasmanian Forest Campaigner
Email Vica BayleyCreated: 19 Mar 2008
A very bad look Mr ANZ suffering a credit crunch here in the press today:
