News of the Weird, February 14, 2010
Chuck Shepherd
by Chuck Shepherd
Copyright 2010 by Chuck Shepherd. All rights reserved.
Lead Story
* White People in Turmoil: (1) April Gaede, who four years ago
guided her teenage daughters, Lynx and Lamb (performing as
"Prussian Blue"), to a brief music career singing neo-Nazi songs,
announced a new project recently on the white nationalist website
Stormfront.org. She offers a no-fee matchmaking service to fertile
Aryans, hoping to encourage marriage and baby-making -- to help
white people keep up with rapidly procreating minorities. (2) Don
"Moose" Lewis announced plans in January for a 12-city pro
basketball league composed only of white players (natural-born
U.S. citizens, both of whose parents are Caucasian). Lewis denied
any "racism," explaining to the Augusta (Ga.) Chronicle that
whites simply like "fundamental" basketball and not "street ball"
("flipping you off or attacking you in the stands or grabbing their
crotch"). [Southern Poverty Law Center News, 1-25-10] [Augusta
Chronicle, 1-19-10]
Cultural Diversity
* Computer-obsessed Japanese nerds' latest fancy is Love Plus, a
Nintendo DS dating simulation that allows them a young,
attractive, mouthy, teenage digital "girlfriend" who begs for
attention. The touch-screen lover demands hand-holding, kissing,
and having sweet nothings whispered in her ear. How can men so
easily become addicted to such vicarious experiences? Said one
reluctant player, "Koh," to the BoingBoing blog,"[It] comes down
to the fact that men are simple." (In December, Reuters reported
that Japanese player SAL9000 had eloped to the Philippines with
his Love Plus girlfriend, had himself photographed with her at
romantic sites -- clutching the screen showing her image -- and
then took her through a marriage ceremony.) [LiveScience.com,
11-13-09; BoingBoing.net, 10-27-09] [Reuters, 12-20-09]
* As vultures approach extinction in South Africa, they grow in
value among local "traditional" communities for their magical
abilities. Specks of a vulture's brain, sprinkled on mud and
smoked, can supposedly ward off evil and bring winning lottery
numbers. One Johannesburg vendor told Agence France-Presse in
December that the specks even work when daubed on dogs' noses,
enabling them to extend their already-formidable scenting power.
[Agence France-Presse, 12-27-09]
Latest Religious Messages
* A Montana-based sect is fighting to remain viable, six months
after the death of its "Mother," the Jesus-channeling Elizabeth
Clare Prophet. Several aspirants have tried to claim her mantle,
but the sect's council of elders found them all to be charlatans, and
membership rolls have dwindled. The church was similarly
challenged in 1990, when Mother forecast nuclear doomsday and
financed the construction of large underground bunkers on a
mountainside north of Yellowstone National Park (which are still
available). The council is having trouble, especially, finding
volunteers to transcribe the 22,000 hours of video and audio in
which Mother set out the justifications for the sect. [Columbia
(Mo.) Daily Tribune-AP, 11-6-09]
* Televangelist Rod Parsley informed his flock in December that
he urgently needed several million dollars because of financial
problems attributed directly to Satan. According to a report in the
Columbus (Ohio) Dispatch, Parsley's World Harvest Church was
facing a $3 million deficit for the quarter ending in December after
earlier in the year paying $3.1 million to settle a lawsuit over its
daycare center's having too brutally spanked a boy. Wrote Parsley,
"Will you help me take back what the devil stole?" [Columbus
Dispatch, 12-16-09]
* Crimestopper: (1) In Frisco, Tex., in January, boutique owner
Marian Chadwick, who was about to be robbed at gunpoint by a
hooded intruder, pointed her finger at him and said, "In the name of
Jesus, you get out of my store. I bind you by the power of the Holy
Spirit." The man appeared stunned, then turned and walked out
empty-handed, cursing. (2) A 20-year veteran Houston, Tex., cop
who wears badge number 666 told the Houston Chronicle in a
December profile that once, 17 years ago, a dangerous perp who
had been defiant that he would not be captured suddenly dropped
to his knees and surrendered. He had glanced at the badge. Said
he, "I ain't fighting the devil." [Dallas Morning News, 1-14-10]
[Houston Chronicle, 12-7-09]
Questionable Judgments
* In Thailand, the endangered status of crocodiles and elephants is
largely ignored by the public, who are instead enthralled with the
giant pandas and their cub on loan from China. (There is even a
24-hour cable TV "panda channel.") At several of the country's
zoos, officials now regularly paint their crocodiles and elephants in
panda colors (with harmlessly washable paint) to call attention to
their plight. Even though the paint must be reapplied daily, "It's
impossible not to do it now," said one croc handler for a December
Wall Street Journal dispatch. "People expect it." [Wall Street
Journal, 12-5-09]
* Only four days after the January earthquake hit Port-au-Prince,
two Royal Caribbean cruise ships made a port call at a private
enclave about 60 miles up Haiti's coastline from ground zero,
turning loose hundreds of frolickers for "jet ski rides, parasailing,
and rum cocktails delivered to their hammocks," according to a
report in London's The Guardian. Haitian guards employed by the
cruise line manned the resort's 12-foot-high fences, but about a
third of the passengers still declined to leave the ships, too upset by
the unfolding disaster nearby to enjoy themselves. Royal
Caribbean said it had made a large donation to the rescue effort and
promised, also, to send proceeds from the port's thriving craft
stores. [The Guardian, 1-17-10]
* The Need for Parental Licensing: In January, as punishment for
her 12-year-old son's bad grade in school, a Warm Springs, Ga.,
mother allegedly forced the boy to club his pet hamster to death
with a hammer. Lynn Middlebrooks Geter, 38, was arrested after
the kid told his teacher, who called the state children's services
agency. [Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 1-22-10]
Obsessions
* Unless Stephen Gough, 50, changes his mind about wearing
pants, he risks spending the rest of his life behind bars, according
to a January ruling of Scotland's Perth Sheriff Court. Gough,
Britain's "naked rambler," is a freelance nudist who for years has
roamed the United Kingdom countryside, interrupted by numerous
jail stints for violating public decency. He was released from Perth
Prison in December after his latest stay, but seconds later shucked
his clothes and was re-arrested. (In his most recent trial, Gough
acted as his own lawyer and somehow persuaded an overly fair
judge to let him be naked in court.) [STV.tv (Edinburgh), 1-12-10]
Least Competent Criminals
* (1) Shane Williams-Allen, 19, was arrested in Tavares, Fla., in
January and charged with burglarizing an unmarked police car and
stealing several items, including handcuffs and a Taser gun.
Eventually, Williams-Allen called the police for help after he
accidentally cuffed himself, and officers believe he also
accidentally Tasered himself. (2) Police in Oakland, Calif., called
off their manhunt for fleeing home-invasion suspects in January
when officers encountered four of the men, wedged between two
buildings they had tried to squeeze through. [Orlando Sentinel, 1-
15-10] [KTVU (Oakland), 1-14-10]
Recurring Themes
* The Whole Truth and Nothing But: Last August, an applicant for
the police force in Montgomery, Ala., following directions to be
truthful during the job interview, admitted that he owned child
pornography. He was of course not hired, but arrested. In January
2010, 170 miles to the south in Pensacola, Fla., another law-
enforcement applicant, Clarence Burnette, 25, admitted to owning
child pornography -- during his interview to be a sheriff's deputy.
He also was not hired, but arrested. (The Montgomery applicant,
who also confessed to having sex with an underage girl, is now
serving 30 years in prison.) [Press-Register (Mobile), 1-6-10]
A News of the Weird Classic (October 1999)
* The death of a 49-year-old woman in Scotland in September
1999 brought to three the number of no-food, no-water,
"breatharian"-diet followers of Australian Ellen Greve who have
died of starvation in two years. Greve claims 5,000 disciples,
charges over $2,000 (U.S.) per ticket for her seminars, and sells her
only-sunlight-and-air philosophy ("liberation from the drudgery of
food and drink") to guilty Westerners in part as conferring
spirituality on third-world hunger. Nutritionists quoted by The
Times of London said, of course, that there is no scientific basis for
Greve's teachings. [Edmonton Journal-The Times (London), 9-26-
99]
Thanks Ths Week to Sam Gaines, Peter Smagorinsky, Scott
Huber, Steve Dunn, Gale Walters, and Sarah Del Collo, and to the
News of the Weird Board of Editorial Advisors.
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