In Germany they came
first for the Communists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a
Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because
I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I didn't
speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for the
Catholics, and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant. Then they
came for me, and by that time no one was left to speak up for.
-- Niemoeller. |
Yesterday's file about medical
sadism wasn't downloaded much, and I agree it is not for the faint-hearted.
Then again, I wrote and uploaded it because I think it is the bitter truth
and it is relevant if one wants to understand what happened and happens to
persons with ME/CFS, and indeed also what happened and happens in the world,
for the subjects of sadism and malice explain rather a lot quite well, as
explanations go, that cannot be explained as well, or at all, by other
assumptions.
Anyway... if you want to read or think about less unpleasant
things, I quite understand and mostly agree and today I have only some
remarks on various topics, though I will have to say some that touches on
sadism and is important for persons with ME/CFS living in the US.
Sections
1. About the site
2. ME/CFS and receiving benefits in the United States
3. Dutch National Commemoration of WW II
4. What there is to commemorate
1. About the site
These are just a few brief remarks for those who care about
the site (yes, there are some except me):
Yesterday's file got today a few
minor corrections and clarifications, and a few more links I had forgotten.
Also, I rectified a problem with the file of May 1, that I uploaded in the
first instance without the proper name (according to the schema I use). It
is here - and is the first file on medical sadism with that title on the
site - and now is correctly named.
Also, the folks who miss the assembly reference on my site,
and have arrived here: The explanation why I removed it is
here, and
included a link to a set of files by somebody else who gives a similar
reference, on a site that, unlike mine, is only about assembly.
2. ME/CFS and receiving benefits in the
United States
There is a useful commercial US site about ME/CFS and health
supplements called
ProHealth, that also has a forum (that I rarely visited and am not a
member of) and that also has at least one mailing list that I do receive,
and that sometimes has interesting and useful information about ME/CFS or
supplements related to it.
It also tries to sell you supplements, but - so far as I can
see - it does this in a nice way, while the firm is owned and run by a man
with ME/CFS, which are three reasons I have no problem with it, though I
never used it to buy supplements, which I can get easier in Holland.
Today I received the following
that seems to me of considerable importance for any US
citizen with ME/CFS and some form of disability allowance, and which starts
as follows:
The great news is, you are having a good day. You got out of
bed and went outside for the first time in weeks. The bad news is, you were
having a good day and went outside and walked right into the field of a
video camera being used by an investigator working for the disability
insurance company.
From the moment that you file a disability claim, information gathering
begins, from reviewing medical records and interviewing your neighbors to
videotaping your activities. They are gathering evidence in an effort to
deny your claim.
and which ends thus
• A disability insurance claim immediately opens the
possibility of surveillance and investigation.
• If your claim involves being unable to travel to get to work, you may be
videotaped if an investigator sees you driving or traveling.
• If you call the insurance company from a phone not located in your home,
Caller ID records can be used to prove that you are able to travel.
• Think like an adversary. BE CYNICAL and on the defense.
Your neighbors may be interviewed, family members may be called with
seemingly innocent questions.
Claimants must be mindful of their activities while in the claims process
and while benefits are being paid.
In summary, disability insurance companies will use investigation
techniques that present no-win situations, so it is important to know what
to expect.
Being prepared for the investigation that is likely to follow filing a claim
for a potentially disabling but ‘invisible’ condition like Chronic Fatigue
Syndrome (ME/CFS) or Fibromyalgia can be helpful.
For me, that is totally unethical, should be legally
forbidden (secret videotaping), and those who do it hereby receive my gratis
psychological diagnosis: Only sadists like to do these things.
So... if you live in the US and have ME/CFS and depend for
your survival or for the maintenance of what remains of your health on
disability benefits, you have been warned and should read the above link to
be informed about the risks you run.
3. Dutch National Commemoration of WW II
Today is the Dutch National Commemoration of WW II, that I
never attend, for reasons I explained in Dutch some years ago:
It's mostly A National Show Of Hypocrisy, but then again
many commemorations are, and there are also some who genuinely care, and not
just show off and show themselves to further their career and protect their
social status.
Last year there was a rather serious incident: Some insane
person started screaming; lots of people panicked (though not Queen Beatrix,
who behaved admirably); and tens of people got wounded in the panick, many
because they got caught with their feet in the metal barriers that were
surrected for crowd control - but got toppled easily in the panick, and then
caught many.
The Good Dutch News that reached me yesterday was that ...
this year the gaps in the barriers have been made wider.
4. What there is to commemorate
As I just said, and explained earlier in Dutch, most of the
commemoration is little else than a national exercise in Dutch Pride, which
is not very appropriate with regards to WW II, as six times as many Dutchmen
went into the S.S. as into the Resistance, and more than 1% of the
population was arrested and gassed, for reason of being of an inappropriate
race and because the others mostly collaborated.
Then again, not everybody collaborated, and not everybody
was exterminated, and in case you didn't see it, here is a reference that
won't make you feel better - it shouldn't - but quite well explained what
there is to commemorate
also because these days in Holland some 25% of the lesser
gifted tend to agree with the
artificially platina blond
Führer Wilders of the PVV aka "The Party for Freedom", whereas it in
fact it is neither a party but a group, or gang, with that Leader, nor for "Freedom" but,
as The Leader said repeatedly, "to put foreigners, especially muslims, in
camps, so as to be able to put them on transport".
Incidentally, the vast majority of my academic baby-boomer
generation - who made their university careers by pretending they were
marxist revolutionairies and I was "a fascist" because I committed the
public crime of saying that I was not a marxist (having marxist
parents and grandparents who belonged to the very few Dutchmen who were in
the real Dutch resistance) and that I considered
Peirce
(<-Wikipedia) a greater philosopher than
Marx (<-Wikipedia) - are these days
(having arrived, and a lot to loose) nearly to a man very bravely
VERY silent about Mr Wilders, who
loves
comparing muslims to fascists but hates it if others do the same to him, and
who has followers who are not beyond harassment and violence, and lawyers
who specialize, most profitably, in defending mafia grandees and him.
"So it goes...", in Holland. (*)
(*) "So it
goes..." is a
Kurt Vonnegut
quote, from
Slaughterhouse
Five
(<-Wikipedia)
which is - among
other things -
about the
Bombing of
Dresden in World
War II (and
Vonnegut's book
is science
fictional,
rather than
historically
accurate).
Ah yes... since
I am almost the
only to protest
the decline in
education and
the universities
in Holland,
and
almost the only
to protest the
way drugs are
'tolerated'
illegaly in
Holland, to
the vast benefit
of corrupt
mayors,
bureaucrats,
policemen and
the mafia (I
say, since 1969:
legalize,
legalize,
legalize
-
IF
you want to
protect the
civilian
population
rather than the
drugs mafia: It
is NOT legal,
THEREFORE very
profitable and
dangerous,
thanks to the
last 41 years of
Dutch
governments and
parliaments), I
must conclude
my
differences from
the rest of the
Dutch are
mostly genetical
- but then I
have been called
"a fascist" for
saying I thought
intelligence is
so as well, in
the University
of Amsterdam, by
those who made a
career in it.
"So it goes...",
in Holland.
P.S.
Corrections, if any are necessary, have to be made later.
