Hello, this is the 'blog' page on my site. I will jot down thoughts, ideas and stories, not every day but on a variably frequent basis. Many of the entries will be about bodies (your physical reality?) or bodywork but some will be on a variety of other topics depending on what I am thinking about.
The Bhopal story continues; the disaster continues. I have composed my weeekly diaries into a book with pictures, thoughts, musings etc . You can read a little about it in the the 'Bhopal for Dummies (briefly)' entry, just a single click away. It is not a polemic about Dow Chemical, politics or law; it is about what is happening now to the people and what work is going on in Bhopal itself.
All purchases will help to fund the work supporting the people - not for politics.
The older topics are still there for debate, including my thoughts on Prostate HEALTH - it is not just cancer that affects this gland in men, nor is cancer the most common problem. I would love you to make your contribution whether you agree or disagree. It is good to discuss ideas openly on the basis that no-one will change their view unless another is opened for them. So, I will still enjoy your thoughts that differ from mine. And I may even post ideas that are contrary to my own - just to play the devil's advocate a bit.
I don't promise to respond to everything, after all I do have a life elsewhere but I will read everything that is posted.
I hope that what I write will stimulate a few people to new thoughts or investigations.
with much love
ian
“My Chiropracter”
I often hear people talking about “my chiropractor” or “my osteopath”. Or, maybe, when I am talking with them something like “I already have an osteopath who I see every month”.
It’s almost like this person belongs to them. Or somehow if they stopped going then it would be like breaking a long-term relationship.
A few days ago at a meeting I heard someone say it again, “well, of course”, she said, “I have my chiropractor who I go to see and he is very good. He always sorts me out.”
Now, most of us take our car to the garage every so many miles for a maintenance check and service. But if your car kept getting the same fault time and again after the mechanic had ‘fixed’ it, wouldn’t you be asking “why”? I doubt very much that you would return to the same garage again.
So why do people keep returning to “my chiropractor”? For every person I have spoken to it is always for the same problem.
This set me thinking.
Dow Chemical and the Olympic Movement by N. D. JAYAPRAKASH
(Published previously on www.counterpunc.com)
Despite Dow’s chequered history, an unwarranted controversy was created by the IOC and the LOCOG by inducting Dow as a partner of the Olympic Movement. For maintaining the spirit of the Olympic Movement and for upholding the sanctity of the Olympic Charter and the Code of Ethics, it is high time that the IOC and the LOCOG rescinded that decision.
In his reply dated 02.02.2012 to the letters of the Acting President of the Indian Olympics Association (IOA), Prof.V.K.Malhotra, dated 27.01.2012 and 18.12.2011, the President of the International Olympics Committee (IOC), Mr.Jacquos Rogge, had said as follows:
“The IOC and LOCOG were aware of the Bhopal Gas Tragedy when discussing the partnership with Dow. Dow had no connection with the Bhopal tragedy. Dow did not have any ownership stake in the Union Carbide until 16 years after the accident and 12 years after the $470 million compensation agreement was approved by the Indian Supreme Court. The court has upheld this settlement twice since then, in 1991 and 2007. We understand that this is being reviewed yet a third time by the Indian Supreme Court and we are aware of Dow’s position in this matter and of the sensitivities of all parties.” [1]
It is obvious that the IOC and the LOCOG (London Organizing Committee of the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games) have merely chosen to believe the half-truths and misinformation that the Dow Chemical Company, USA, has fed them in this regard. On the contrary, the facts of the case are actually as follows:
What Bhopal Started by P. SAINATH
(Published previously on www.counterpunch.com)
Over 20,000 killed. Over half a million victims maimed, disabled or otherwise affected. Compensation of around Rs. 12,414 per victim on average on the 1989 value of the rupee. $ 470 million total. And that divided between 574,367 victims.) Over a quarter of a century’s wait. To see seven former officials of Union Carbide Corporation’s Indian subsidiary sentenced to two years in prison and fined $2100. Not a single person from the far more responsible parent US company punished.
Yet, the notion that the main injustice to Bhopal is a failure to extradite then UCC chief Warren Anderson from America is mildly ridiculous. Trying to evade the lessons the 1984 Bhopal Gas disaster threw up on the tyranny of giant corporations is completely so. Well over two decades after its MIC gas slaughtered 20,000 (mostly very poor) human beings, Bhopal still pays the price of Carbide’s criminality. (Evident from the long-term impact on the health of the gas-affected and from the poisoned soil and water around the former Carbide plant.) While the Indian government’s appalling Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage Bill, if adopted, would give legal cover to such conduct across the country.
Bhopal marked the horrific beginning of a new era. One that signalled the collapse of restraint on corporate power. The ongoing BP spill in the Mexican Gulf – with estimates ranging from 30,000 to 80,000 barrels per day – tops off a quarter of a century where corporations could (and have) done anything in the pursuit of profit, at any human cost. Barack Obama’s ‘hard words’ on BP are mostly pre-November poll-rants. BP can take a lot of comfort from two US Supreme Court judgements in the past two years.