Self-proclaimed logician, tireless defender of racism and bard (Dr) John “Tingtong” Ray has taken GrodsCorp to task* over this post, which he incorrectly describes as an “attack”:

And note that they attacked ME, not any of the facts and arguments that I have put forward. What they have written is, in short, a confession of complete intellectual failure. They hate the truths that I have highlighted but they were so unable to refute those truths that all they could manage was an attempt to shoot the messenger.

My post was, in fact, ridiculing the messenger — or, more precisely, linking to some writings of his that took care of that task more than sufficiently.

In any case, it’s hard to identify the “facts”, “arguments” and “truths” Ray claims to have highlighted in his unintentionally uproarious post, Stray thoughts about my life**, so refuting them is doubly difficult. But since he asked so nicely, I’ll humour him:

1. Being “so pro-Indian that my house is full of them” is no refutation of the multitudinous claims that you are a racist.
2. Your son is indeed a lucky man, bequeathed as he has been with your secret to stockmarket success — I’ll keep an eye out for his name in BRW’s Rich List. But comparing yourself to a “certain wise Jew”? You’re not remotely Christ-like, Tingtong, and it’s fair to say Jesus would be convulsing in his tomb Heaven if he were silly enough to read your blogs.
3. Begging for food or money requires a certain abandonment of dignity, which can be justified in many cases by necessity. Begging shamelessly for an honorary degree is among the most pathetic things I’ve ever witnessed a grown man do.

As for this:

And it is therefore MOST amusing that one of my recent Leftist critics had obviously trawled at great length through my autobiographical data looking for “dirt” and was able to come up with? Can you guess? Can you guess what he found to criticize? He criticized my POETRY!!

The link to Ray’s treasure-trove of poetry is displayed prominently in the sidebar of this website, which is named (ironically, one would assume) “John Ray’s academic writings”.

Finally, we have this declaration:

So you might see why I don’t take attacks on me personally very seriously.

And this cavalier shrug-of-the-shoulders is found floating in a swamp of how many words? Two-thousand one-hundred and forty-four***.

.

This post, by pseudo-academic, racist wingnut and man-of-a-thousand-insane-blogs “Dr” John Ray, is the most unintentionally hilarious thing I’ve read in years.

Ricky Gervais, eat your heart out.

UPDATE: I take it back. His poetry is even funnier. Here’s a taste:

SWEET MUSIC
Ting tong, tingtong
The air melts in song
The song of sad happiness
The song of old sadness

Slow, fast, slowfast
The word of the last
Man on earth singing
A song heavenwards winging.

Vogons the universe over are writhing in disgust.

Further reading: The Happy Revolutionary demolished John Ray in this post last year — still a terrific (and amusing) read for those who haven’t seen it.

Batten down the hatches!

GrodsCorp favourite and Australian Hero John Ray has posted some shocking statistics about Muslim populations in Europe:

Marseilles - 25 percent (200,000 of 800,000)
Malmo - ~25 percent (67,000 of 270,000)
Amsterdam - 24 percent (180,000 of 750,000)
Stockholm - 20 percent (>155,000 of 771,038)
Brussels - ~20 percent (some say 33 percent)
Moscow - 16 percent-20 percent (2 million of 10-12 milllion)
London - 17 percent (1.3 million of 7.5 million)
Luton - 14.6 percent (26,963)
Birmingham 14.3 percent (139,771)
The Hague - 14.2 percent ( 67,896 of 475,580)
Utrecht - 13.2 percent (38,300 of 289,000)
Rotterdam - 13 percent (80,000 of 600,000)
Copenhagen - 12.6 percent (63,000 of 500,000)
Leicester - 11 percent (>30,000 of 280,000)
Aarhus - ~10 percent
Zaan district (Netherlands) - 8.8 percent
Paris - 7.38 percent (155,000 of 2.1 million)
Antwerp- 6.7 percent (>30,000 of >450,000)
Hamburg - 6.4 percent (>110,000 of 1.73 million)
Berlin - 5.9 percent (~200,000 of 3.40 million)

According to Prof. Moron “You can’t even escape them in Russia, it seems.”

James Ozark sez “Bottom line is, if you think this doesn’t reflect what will eventually become a fundamental shift in European culture, or that that isn’t important, or that it won’t affect you (or your children, if you ever decide to have them), then you should think again.

The writing is very much on the wall.”

Unfortunately, it doesn’t count when someone like John Ray puts it there:

Let’s not forget that according to AWH David Hicks is, get this, a “child raper”. Our fan club is very disappointed.

Update: As many of you know, the bloggers at AWH like to make empty threats. I’ve previously commented on their lack of follow-through on the threats. That is, lack of follow-through until now.

First they shot me right in the heart by, get this, adding in pointless comments to my comment with square brackets!

You know, maybe I don’t pay enough attention [no - you're just seriously stupid] but I wasn’t aware that Hicks was a “child raper” [Really? Thanks for that - hadn't heard that one before now]. If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were making it up! [Nope - that was you] Every time I hear you say something, I am amazed at your stupidity, you seem to get dumber every time.

OH, SEE WHAT I DID! ZING!

[Yes - you demonstrated what a complete moron you are. Keep it up.]

The blog that claims David Hicks is a child rapist, yes, read that again, child rapist, is calling me a moron! How will I ever live with myself?

You’re an idiotic troll, Surname, and you’re about to find out happens to them.

Nothing, apparently.

Surname’s getting out of hand is he, oh my what a shock a leftist moron with a surname called, well, surname, can’t behave himself around these parts.

Go back to your stupid random blog you consistent buffoon.

…What?

By the way John Tosser, they just found your ex-booooyfriend Hicksie, maybe you could head on over and maybe shake it for him or whatever you alternate types get up to.

You read correctly. There are still people in the world who think implying that someone is gay is a valid putdown.

You can watch in horror as Australia’s foremost intellectuals take me to task here.

Update #2:

It’s official - AWH is the most pissweak blog on the internet. Yet again their “tough man” threats have come to nothing. Nothing!

Hello to all the righties who read this blog. I don’t know how many of you there are, and frankly, I don’t want to know.

But maybe I’m a bit harsh sometimes. I feel that after my “truths of the left” revelation, I should do another post to help you out. You need all the help you can get. Look at you. Are you licking the oil out of a sardine tin as you read this? Yes? Well, then listen up.

Many of you probably read right-wing blogs (like Bolt, Blair, AWH, RWDB, and Landeryou) and ask yourselves “How can I write a blog like that? And just why does this tin keep cutting my tounge?”. Well, I am here to answer one of those questions. The blog one. The tin one you’ll have to answer on your own.

Using examples from some of Australia’s most popular right-wing blogs, I intend to demonstrate how to write a self-serving, dishonest post with lots of blaming, leftie bashing, context changing and quote misuse.

1. Blame the left

For God’s sake, blame everything on the left. Right-wing bloggers blame everything on the left. From the War going badly, to David Hick’s lengthy incarceration, nothing is their fault. The idea that the left might have always been right on these issues is a scary one, so they merely turn to blaming when the heat is on.

2. Dishonesty

When quoting make sure you take it out of context entirely. Very rarely do the readers of Tim Blair actually click on the link and read the entire articles for themselves.
For example:

Fairfax blogger (and pal) Jack Marx:

“I think I’m losing my patience with the stupid … I’ve worked at some of the most allegedly foolish periodicals in the nation - The Truth, Ralph, The Picture - but it’s only at Fairfax that I’ve received such stupid correspondence from readers.”

There Blair ended the post, without even commenting on it, allowing for the false insinuation that Jack Marx thought Fairfax readers were of low intelligence. Had they clicked on the link themselves, they would have found Marx’s follow-on:

“I don’t think one can assume from this that the Fairfax readership is dim, but simply that it has a longer reach than the others.”

Bolt and Blair are especially notorious for this kind of dishonesty. When you are a true right-wing blogger, you will think nothing of twisting comments, quotes and contexts to create your own truths. Both of them are so convinced they are right, that they think nothing of this kind of behaviour as long as their original intention gets through - in Blair’s case, that Fairfax readers are stupid. Right-wing blog readers don’t question this kind of blogging as they want to believe it.

Another good example is a recent post on global warming by Bolt:

More than two dozen demonstrators braved cold, wet weather Saturday in Reno to attend a rally designed to draw attention to global warming.

You’d have to be puffin’ muffins, cuddling cactus and an absolute dingleberry to believe that any downward change in the weather cancels out global warming. Bolt knows this, but still writes dishonest posts like this in the (very likely) chance that people will read this and believe it. Again, he is so convinced he is right that he is more than willing to trick people into his point of view through dishonest methods.

3. Hate The Age

Australia’s best daily, The Age, attracts much scorn from most right wing blogs. Why? Because it’s left-wing, and there is no comparable right-wing paper. The Herald Sun is a joke. The Age has superior news coverage, a fact reflected in the right-wing blogs linkage to their website. In the case of Andrew Landeryou, however, the agenda is slightly murkier.

You see, Landeryou’s company IQ (which eventually went broke) was contracted to deliver sports statistics to The Age. They didn’t deliver, and The Age went elsewhere. Subsequently, Landeryou spends his life trying to pick fights with Age writers, claiming it’s a “vile, leftist rag” when in reality, his beef lies with the fact they fired him and his company.

Does he disclose any of this? No.

Gerard Henderson claims that The Age should move to the centre. He’d love that, as it would leave no major left-wing daily in Australia. Like many on the right (AWH, I’m looking at you) he spends his time extolling the virtues of free-speech, meanwhile speaking out against anyone who doesn’t share his view, demanding they should change (MediaWatch, for example).

4. Make false accusations about “The Left”.

Make sure you make those with left wing views sound like a monster that is about to tear down the city, and ruin your life and the lives of everyone you care about. Don’t refer to them as people, refer to them as “The Left”. Example, claim the left are “hateful”.

According to good ol’ Jonny Ray:

Leftists are great haters and to cover up their own hatreds — of America, the rich, WASPS, the bourgeoisie and anyone who is happily doing well for themselves.

Not true, of course, as many lefties live in America, drive BMW’s, are white and hell, some of us even work (unlike a popular right-wing blogger).

Of course, the right only hate people like minorities, atheists, anyone of colour, and lefties which is okay, as evidenced in this regrettable post by one Tiberius on AWH:

“The filth of the treasonous left has been allowed to fester for too long, and it has now become so bad that the wound can no longer simply be drained of pus. The whole limb must be excised.”

Not hateful at all. Now, please notice that all comments on that post have been removed.

Free speech, anyone?

5. Groupthink

Think only the left groupthink? Wrong. Spend your time linking to other right-wing blogs that share your point of view (but don’t actually explain why they have that point of view, like Blair), and all your little anonymous righty friends will post vauge attacks on the left on your blog.

So anyway, I hope this has been a help to any wannabe right-wing bloggers out there. If you have anymore to add, don’t forget to in the comments.

__________

The Editor Updates (17 April): Andrew Landeryou has emailed Lachlan Connor who has, in turn, forwarded the message to me. It reads in part:

Whoever is telling you that Fairfax didn’t want my little company providing footy stats when we pulled the plug on them is pulling your chain.

The simple truth is that we walked away from the contract, forcing them to negotiate with the wolves of News Limited who were their only other source at the time. And from memory, they were rather ruthlessly screwed by them on it. Apparently the Fairfaxistas came back to us several times but by then we’d moved on from the whole very labour intensive and not particularly prospective activity to focus on other ultimately not particularly profitable activities.

In the few years IQ dealt with them, the provision of footy stats being a pretty small part of the business and my contempt for The Age being much the same then as it now is, I never actually met with anyone from Fairfax. So your “explanation” of my dislike of them is in fact utterly bullshit. As is your claim that I hadn’t “disclosed” the fact that IQ had done business with them. It’s no secret, mentioned on my blog and in at least one Age story I can recall.

The email threatened that if a correction wasn’t published then Lachlan “must surely know what happens next.” I don’t know for sure but I suspect it has something to do with photoshopping a photo of Lachlan Connor into a compromising image of a man and a sheep. You know, the standard kind of thing that goes on over at Landeryou’s website. Lachlan tells me he’s suffering in his jocks.

GrodsCorp has always given right of reply to those who are featured in blog posts and Landeryou has now been afforded the same opportunity as everybody else. As Landeryou himself is so fond of saying: “we report, you decide.”

Those hardcore and rabid righties over at A Western Heart have spoken out against the much publicised blogging code of conduct, saying that “blogs are the only place where free speech is alive and well and capable of reaching a wide audience. And this code of conduct, my friends, is most certainly the thin end of the regulatory wedge.” They practice this blogging free speech by altering the details of commenters who disagree with them. For instance, changing “The Editor” to “Wanker”. I mean, it’s really high-level comedy they’ve got going on over there.

But I digress.

Regular AWH contributor John Ray — who runs a number of blogs such as Greenie Watch, Political Correctness Watch, and Dissecting Leftism — has linked to a blog citing “research” that being gay and getting married shortens your lifespan by 24 years! And John’s incensed that the blog’s author, Kenn Gividen, has been called a few names:

Unsurprisingly, that little bit of truth-telling got Ken (sic) condemned as “homophobic”. Yet again, the truth is “hate speech”. Anyway, Ken’s (sic) blog got removed from various blogrolls because of his truth-telling so pay him a visit to show that such censorship does no good. Ken (sic) recycles a lot of my posts so he is obviously a good guy!

You couldn’t make this stuff up.