Another great tla film: Latter Days

This is a truly amazing gay love story. 100% drama, 100% romantic and 100% gay and so so sweet.

Not only is this a wonderful tail of true love with a very well paced plot but it has a serious side.. it is easier to forget the insanity and sinister side of religion.

I'm not sure why gay and lesbians are attract to spiritual movements? However I will be staying clear of the Mormons:

Having grown up a Mormon and grappled with the church's bigotry towards Blacks (they were not allowed to hold the church's priesthood when I was a member) -- I wasn't aware of the organizations policy of excommunicating gay men and women until after I left the church in 1966 -- (I was 20.) I was stunned when I learned that friends who were gay were excommunicated even after serving on missions. LATTER DAYS exposes the Mormon's persecution of gay members. The film is LONG overdue. It does an excellent job of showing how the two lead males come to terms with one another, while managing to grow up and develop more fully as individuals. LATTER DAYS has great heart, wonderful original music and an added touch of class from Jacqueline Bisset. The film brilliantly tells the story of an individual who leaves behind the confines of organized religion and reclaims his very soul.

62 out of 75 people found the following review useful:
Heartwarming Story; Long Overdue, 22 November 2004

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0345551/usercomments

Usability - a very clear graphic for a complex subject (BMI)

I a big fan of usability and making messages clear and simple.

One of the problems with Body Mass Index is that the calculation is fiddly, not terribly intuitive and easy is to get wrong.

The attached graph is great - it is clear and simple that my weight is OK - a couple of years ago I was probably a bit over-weight but now I'm OK :)

usability (noun) ease of use, user-friendliness, accessibility, convenience, intuitiveness

win-win: the doctor says a low carbon lifestyle can be good for you!

It is good to hear a high profile doctor (Consultant paediatrician and chair of the Advocacy Committee, Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health) extolling the benefits of moving to a "low carbon lifestyle".

I think if we took more time for the simple pleasures, things would be better. As the doctor points out, switching to a more balanced diet (e.g. less meat) is one fairly easy step and this could make many people healthier and happier :)

Another thing I would advocate is trying to buy more local produce, if you buy in season local veg; they taste great, are cheap and have a much lower carbon footprint!

My favourite supermarket has started doing bags of local veg in the summer which was great! Even better, when I get time to visit my local greengrocer there are some absolute bargains.

As well as Dr Tony Waterson's interesting piece on the BBC:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/8533937.stm

I also found the following blog article very interesting:

http://blogs.bmj.com/bmj/2009/05/14/tony-waterston-on-climate-change-talks-at-the-commons/

Sir John Mortimer on Private Passions

Listening to on old recording (1995) of Sir John Mortimer on Private Passions. I was a bit stunned that this incredibly successful barrister should emphasise that the key for a defence lawyer is to get the jury to laugh.

Sir John Mortimer, barrister, playwright and creator of 'Rumpole of the Bailey', died last year. He was one of the very early guests on 'Private Passions', and this edition, recorded at his Buckinghamshire home and first broadcast in 1995, offers another chance to hear him talking about one of his greatest passions, music.

The more I think about the law and politics, the more dubious they seem. There is so much scope for powerful people to abuse charm, good looks, fashion, humour to sway political debate and the legal system.

As I get older, I fear that I am becoming more cynical, we appear to becoming increasingly short-sighted and dummying down?

However on the flip side, I think great progress has been made (especially in 60s and 70s) on civil liberties and the UK schools, prisons and policing becoming more humane. LGBT rights have made huge progress and we are making good progress in the UK (e.g. in the workplace taunting-gay men is now increasingly unacceptable - it happened all the time only 10 years ago)

Furthermore we are making great technological progress and hopefully we can use this knowledge to live in a more efficient way? However the 21st is going to present huge challenges. I hope our leaders will have the intelligence and integrity and reject the current trend for winning arguments in the short-term by skewing statistics, mockery, smart suits... yes this has always been there but I fear we are dummying-down and loosing out humanity.

humane |(h)yoōˈmān|

adjective

1 having or showing compassion or benevolence : regulations ensuring the humane treatment of animals.

• inflicting the minimum of pain : humane methods of killing.

2 formal (of a branch of learning) intended to have a civilizing or refining effect on people : the center emphasizes economics as a humane discipline.

DERIVATIVES

humanely |(h)juˈmeɪnli| adverb

humaneness |(h)juˈmeɪn(n)1s| noun

ORIGIN late Middle English : the earlier form of human , restricted to the senses above in the 18th cent.

Behind Van Gogh - letters and sketchs

The Van Gogh exhibition at the Royal Academy is fantastic. The focus on his sketches and drawings, gave me a feeling for the private life of this brilliant talent. Even as a small boy when I was generally bored by my parents terminally long trips around various Europe's finest art galleries and museums, I loved the Van Gogh's and could loose myself in these paintings for long periods. I didn't realise who hard he worked as an artists - years of hard study and solid technical training, like Picasso he has done some beautiful line drawings. His style and unique technical skills clearly developed over many years.

Anyway the highlight of this exhibit was his sketches and his letters, which gives masses of colourful background into his life, what he read, what he thought, his passions...

It is also just nice to see the rough sketches behind some of his most famous painting.

Mon cher Theo,

Merci de ta lettre et du billet de 50 fr. qu’elle contenait. Merci de m’avoir encore écrit sur le tableau de ces artistes Hollandais.1

J’ai fait mettre le gaz dans l’atelier et dans la cuisine, ce qui me coûte 25 francs d’installation.2 Si Gauguin et moi travaillons une quinzaine tous les soirs ne les regagnerons nous pas? Seulement comme d’ailleurs G. peut maintenant venir de jour en jour j’aurai absolument absolument encore besoin de 50 francs au moins...

http://vangoghletters.org/vg/letters/let709/letter.html

White heat - Meng Yang Pan

I recently spent a very pleasant short break in London with my mother.

The lunch time piano concert by the superbly talented Meng Yang Pan, she played with breath taking fluency and passion. It was incredible to see such a perfect and skilled performance. 

The music: Scarlatti, Haydn, Poulence and Liszt was varied from the gentle and melodic to the crashing complex cords of Liszt. My mother commented that she didn't look heavy enough to have played this last piece. Her whole body and in particular were very expressive as she throw herself into this work body and soul.

I really was quite breath-taking to see such a powerful young talent perform at her very peak. 

Watching her perform, I was reminded about a recent article about measuring brain activity in an MRI scanning. The article compared popular past times and activities like go to the gym, having a drink, ... not surprisingly top of this "pop chart" was sex.. However watching this incredibly intense performance I couldn't help feel that her level of engagement was off the scale and it made wonder if the "white heat" generated by a top perform must be hard to rival in their person relationships. I could help wondering if being "better than sex" might also be a bit of a burden?

The setting - St James Church Piccadilly is a beautiful old church with lovely stained glass windows and fine carvings and fittings. According to Mum, it was a "Wren Church".

Feel the pain (Empathie extrême?)

This is an interesting story about MRI scans demonstrating that some of us really do "feel the pain"

Deux chercheurs britanniques, Jody Osborn et Stuart Derbyshire, de l'École de psychologie de l'Université de Birmingham, pensent maintenant l'avoir vérifié scientifiquement.

Ils ont exposé 108 participants à une série d'images de situations douloureuses, comme des athlètes blessés ou des patients recevant une injection. Ils ont utilisé la technique d'imagerie à résonance magnétique qui permet d'étudier le fonctionnement du cerveau en observant les régions cérébrales activées lors d'une tâche ou d'une émotion.

Environ le tiers des sujets ont dit avoir non seulement ressenti une émotion au moins sur une image, mais aussi avoir vite ressenti une douleur à l'endroit exact de la blessure.

Watching horror movies makes me quite sick... "Antichrist" (Lars von Trier) was truly terrible (except I liked the idea that the woman was the evil character and the man/husband was the victim).

empathie

nom féminin
(calque de l'allemand Einfühlung)

• Faculté intuitive de se mettre à la place d'autrui, de percevoir ce qu'il ressent.

Jesus Camp - the dangers of religion and indoctrination

I've just watched Jesus Camp, a film/documentary about the upbringing of children by extreme christains in America, quite scary really: Harry Potter is the devil and must die... but George Bush is the best. They are very powerful and very scary. The trailer gives a feel for the film (although the film has a slower more measured paced)

Fischer is shown preaching a sermon where she mentions the Harry Potter character and claims that had he existed in biblical times, he "would have been put to death". Fischer admonishes the children—many whom are in tears—to "clean up your act" and not be hypocritical in their actions. As several tearful children gather around her, she pours water on their hands to be "washed in the water of [God's] word." ...

There is also a scene at New Life Church in Colorado Springs, Colorado, where Levi and his family go on vacation to hear its now-disgraced pastor, Ted Haggard. Levi highly admires Haggard, and is thrilled to meet him. He informs Haggard that he too wants to be a pastor and has already preached sermons. Afterward, Levi, Rachael, Tory, their families and several other children take part in a Justice House of Prayer rally held by Engle in front of the U.S. Supreme Court.

Additionally, there is a debate between Fischer and Mike Papantonio, an attorney and a radio talk-show host for Air America Radio's Ring of Fire. Papantonio questions Fischer's motives for focusing her ministry efforts on children. Fischer explains that she does not believe that people have the freedom to choose their belief system once they pass childhood, and that it is important that they be immersed in evangelical Christian values from a young age.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus_Camp

Here are a just few frightening quotes from the film:

Levi: At five I got saved...
Becky Fischer: Yeah?
Levi: ...because I just wanted more of life.

---

Rachel: [preaching to a group of guys sitting in a park] If you were to die right now in this moment, where do you think you'd go?
guy in the park: Heaven
Rachel: [subdued] Really?
guy in the park: Yeah. Sure.
Rachel: Oh... okay. Have a nice day!
[runs back to her friends]
Rachel: I think they were Muslims!

---

Home-schooled kids: I pledge allegiance to the Christian flag...

---

Levi's Mom: Did you get to the part yet where they say that science hasn't proven anything?

---

Becky Fischer: It's no wonder, with that kind of intense training and discipling, that those young people are ready to kill themselves for the cause of Islam. I wanna see young people who are as committed to the cause of Jesus Christ as the young people are to the cause of Islam. I wanna see them as radically laying down their lives for the Gospel as they are over in Pakistan and Israel and Palestine and all those different places, you know, because we have... excuse me, but we have the truth!

---

Becky Fischer: I can go into a playground of kids that don't know anything about Christianity, lead them to the Lord in a matter of, just no time at all, and just moments later they can be seeing visions and hearing the voice of God, because they're so open. They are so usable in Christianity.

---

Becky Fischer: [Referring to President George W. Bush] He has really brought some real credibility, um, to the Christian faith.

---

Ted Haggard: If the Evangelicals vote, they determine the election.

---

Levi's Mom: We believe that there's two kinds of people in this world: people who love Jesus and people who don't.

---

Rachel: There are certain churches, they're called "dead churches," and the people there, they sit there, like this
[blank stare monotone]
Rachel: - "We worship you God, we worship you God."... The churches that God likes to go to, are churches where they're jumping up and down, shouting his name, and just praising him, they're not acting - they're not quiet
[pious frown monotone]
Rachel: "We worship you... ," they're
[exuberant jumping]
Rachel: "Hallelujah God!" And depending on how they invite him, he'll be there, or not.

---

Ted Haggard: We've decided the Bible is the word of God. We don't have to have a General Assembly about what we believe. It's written in the Bible. Alright, so we don't have to debate what we think about homosexual activity. It's written in the Bible.
[pointing and looking into the camera]
Ted Haggard: I think I know what you did last night.
[audience laughs]
Ted Haggard: If you send me a thousand dollars, I won't tell your wife.
[audience and Haggard laughs]
Ted Haggard: If you use any of this, I'll sue you.

---

Becky Fischer: And while I'm on the subject, let me say something about Harry Potter. Warlocks are the enemies of God! And I don't care what kind of hero they are, they're an enemy of God and had it been in the Old Testament, Harry Potter would have been put to death!
Crowd: Amen!
Becky Fischer: You don't make heroes out of warlocks!

---

Becky Fischer: It's almost like being on the cover of "Rolling Stones"!

---

Levi: I think Galileo made the right choice by giving up science for Christ.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0486358/quotes

Actually the parts which probably shocked me the most were Becky Fischers clear contempt for democracy and that indocrination of children is good!!

It all made think of that great Al Gore quote:

Al Gore [quoting Mark Twain] "What gets us into trouble is not what we don't know. It's what we know for sure that just ain't so."

I also liked this forum post from imdb:

Jesus Camp is serious business., 14 September 2006

Author: mmckelley from United States

This film intrigued me for several reasons: First it is filmed in my home state of Missouri, not the deep south as so many people think, in fact it is filmed near Kansas City.

The film is a well-presented view from the perspective of the ultra conservative, Evangelical movement. It is honest in its intent. Minister, Becky Fischer, is honest in her goals for the camp and its attendees.

I did find that the film seemed to play fast and loose with numbers. For example it is stated that 75% of all home schooled children are evangelical. I come from a liberal background and have many well-educated friends who home school and none of them are evangelical so I am skeptical about their claim.

As one might expect, statements are made such as "there is no such thing as global warming" and that "all homosexuals are going to hell." That doesn't surprise me. The fact that not one of the adults or children questions any of these statements or offers to provide proof or seek an alternative explanation is the elephant in the room.

However; the film is filled with passion and filmmakers present the information honestly. The sad issue is that the evangelical movement seems not to have learned anything from the War in Iraq. Our presence there will only result in civil war. This was predicted long before the war started, now, four years later, if the U.S. were to leave, full blown civil war would certainly result. Why, because the church and state in Iraq are inseparable.

I will eagerly await the sequel five years from now when the filmmakers return to Jesus Camp and reinterview these children. On second thought, perhaps they had ought to wait ten years.

I also feel sorry for more moderate christains:

"It shows the Midwest evangelicals are comparative to Muslim camps in the Middle East as if we're training up warriors to battle the world," said Andy Braner, director of the Christian camp Kanakuk Colorado. "It gives people a bad taste of what camps are all about."

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2006/novemberweb-only/146-12.0.html

But I also think Andy Braner is possibly missing the point about the dangerous cocktail of the church taking over the state (government/corporate&miltary power) in America?

I hope common sense and moderation wins-out in the worlds biggest super-power!

indoctrinate |inˈdäktrəˌnāt|

verb [ trans. ]

teach (a person or group) to accept a set of beliefs uncritically : broadcasting was a vehicle for indoctrinating the masses.

• archaic teach or instruct (someone) : he indoctrinated them in systematic theology.

ORIGIN early 17th cent.(formerly also as endoctrinate): from en- ¹ , in- ² [into] + doctrine + -ate ³ , or from obsolete indoctrine (verb), from French endoctriner, based on doctrine ‘doctrine.’

Jeremy Clarkson: "alpha male" or "alpha tw*t"

I don't like Jeremy Clarkson and every time I hear his "toxic views" forced upon me in the name of humour, I think he is a sad and selfish macho man. Here are a few of things I find so upsetting about Mr Clarkson...

Clarkson scaled Ben Tongue in Sutherland in a new Land Rover Discovery for the BBC2 show, reportedly churning up fragile peat bogs and heather as he went.

The damage done will be lasting, according to the Mountaineering Council of Scotland, which says the stunt was irresponsible and likely to encourage similar destructive behaviour on other private estates.

"The virgin land Clarkson has chewed up will now take hundreds of years to be regenerated," said the council's president, John Mackenzie, the Earl of Cromartie.

"There's no excuse for this, no matter how good the Land Rover might have been. This sets a precedent and it is going to encourage even less disciplined individuals to act irresponsibly."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2004/nov/16/environment.broadcasting

His response to this criticism was totally un-apologetic - no surprise.

I think he is very toxic:

• Clarkson has long been noted for his pro-smoking viewpoint, with him even publicly smoking as much as possible on National No Smoking Day.
• On the environment, Clarkson is not sympathetic to the green agenda. He once said: "I do have a disregard for the environment. I think the world can look after itself and we should enjoy it as best as we can".
• He has little respect for groups such as Greenpeace, and believes that the "eco-mentalists" are a by-product of the "old trade unionists and CND lesbians" that hadn't gone away but merely found a new cause.
• Clarkson is not however a climate change denier, commenting on the effects of global warming - "let's just stop and think for a moment what the consequences might be. Switzerland loses its skiing resorts? The beach in Miami is washed away? North Carolina gets knocked over by a hurricane? Anything bothering you yet?"

Unfortunately I also think he is very influencial:

• Clarkson has been described as a "skilful propagandist for the motoring lobby" by The Economist

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeremy_Clarkson

IQ and Politics: Childhood intelligence predicts voter turnout, voting preferences, and political involvement in adulthood: The 1970 British Cohort St

This fascinating story, obviously as an active member of the green party (who has previously voted lib dem) it is rather flattering.

Based on matching IQ data to voting patterns, at top at around 108 are the Greens and Lib Dems. Next at around 103/4 are the conservatives and labour and lastly at the both of the heap are UKIP and the BNP 98.

Monday 3 November 2008

Childhood intelligence is linked to voting preferences and political involvement in adulthood according to a recent study.

People with a higher intelligence in childhood were more likely to vote as adults, and were more likely to vote for the Green Party and Liberal Democrats in a general election, researchers have found.

The study, funded by the UK Medical Research Council, suggests that childhood general intelligence is associated with a person’s political allegiance as much as social class – which has been studied previously as a marker of British voting habits...

http://www.mrc.ac.uk/Newspublications/News/MRC005139

and from a The Guardian commentator:

If the results of general elections are anything to go by, voting Green or Liberal Democrat must be a thankless task. But now the supporters of these parties can console themselves with the knowledge that, although they may not elect a prime minister, there's a good chance that they are cleverer than the people who do.

Academic research published in the journal Intelligence compares the way people voted in the 2001 election with their IQ at the age of 10 (using data from the 1970 British cohort study). The results are fascinating.

On a party-by-party basis, the average (childhood) IQ scores for 2001 voters were:

Green - 108.3

Liberal Democrat - 108.2

Conservative - 103.7

Labour – 103

Plaid Cymru - 102.5

Scottish National - 102.2

UK Independence - 101.1

British National - 98.4

Did not vote/None of the above - 99.7

The research was based on a survey involving 6,000 people, so it's obviously pretty authoritative...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/blog/2008/nov/03/greenpolitics-liberaldemocrats

The scientist behind this study seem to come from very reputable institutions:

Childhood intelligence predicts voter turnout, voting preferences, and political involvement in adulthood: The 1970 British Cohort St

Ian J. Deary^a,, G. David Batty^{a, b} and Catharine R. Gale^c

^aMedical Research Council Centre for Cognitive Ageing and Cognitive Epidemiology, Department of Psychology, University of Edinburgh, 7 George Square, Edinburgh EH8 9JZ, UK

^bMedical Research Council Social and Public Health Sciences Unit, University of Glasgow, Glasgow, 4 Lilybank Gardens, Glasgow G12 8RZ, UK

^cMedical Research Council Epidemiology Resource Centre, University of Southampton, Southampton General Hospital, Southampton SO16 6YD, UK

Ian J. Deary BSc, MB, ChB, PhD (Edin), FRCPsych, FRCPE, FBA, FRSE, FMedSci Professor

G David Batty , lecturer in epidemiology. Epidemiology Unit, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, London WC1E 7HT

Dr Catherine Gale PhD

Principal Research Fellow

After studying Classics at the University of Cambridge, Catharine Gale worked in archaeological research. She then studied Population Sciences at the University of Southampton and joined the MRC Environmental Epidemiology Unit in 1994. She obtained a PhD in 1998 for a thesis on the role of antioxidant vitamins in determining risk of cerebrovascular disease and cognitive decline in elderly people.

humour: The Elfish Gene

I really enjoyed this memoir, Mark Barrowcliffe is a great story teller and comedian. 

This was a great trip back into the wrold of RPGs. It's loaded with subtle humor and details the life that many wargamers knew growing up. 

I recommend this book to anyone who has had an interest in RPGs or anyone who has known a gamer

(www.amazon.com Customer Review)

Not only is very funny (I was in tears at a couple of points), but he also paints a interesting picture of a rather grey childhood grow up in a comprehensive school in the 1970s Coventry. However his parents sounded great.

I choose this memoir as:

• I need more laughs 
  
• My boyfriend is a big fan  of RPG (Role Playing Games)
  
• Mark now lives in Brighton
  

memoirnoun1 a touching memoir of her childhood account, history, record,chronicle, narrative, story, portrayal, depiction, sketch, portrait,profile, biography, monograph.2 (memoirs) : he published his memoirs in 1955 autobiography, life story, memories, recollections, reminiscences; journal, diary.

librarians and stress

This story has always stuck in my mind, my image of being a librarian was not a high-stress job, libraries are normally very calm and peaceful places and just how much stress and responsibility could looking after books be.

However these were opinions were not based an really detailed analysis, just my gut feelings. More careful research has found that possibly counter-intuitively that being a librarian is a very high-stress job:

Delegates at a conference of the British Psychological Society in Glasgow today will hear the results of a research project which suggests that being a librarian induces more stress than working for the emergency services, driving a 125mph express, or teaching a class of ill-behaved children.

One obvious problem is a degree of repetition and going stir-crazy:

Librarians, he found, were more significantly unhappy with their workplace than anyone else. “It seems they are sick of being stuck between the same shelves of books all day. They also found their work repetitive and unchallenging, and overall had very little job satisfaction.

One interesting idea I heard at the time was that librarian are regularly harangued by aggresive and impatient people, a key part of the problem is that they are often juggling a long list of unfinished tasks?

harangue |həˈra ng |nouna lengthy and aggressive speech.verb [ trans. ]lecture (someone) at length in an aggressive and critical manner : the kind of guy who harangued total strangers about PCB levels in whitefish.

Stonewall - a tribute

This was a fascinating program, talking about the gay rights campaigning group Stonewall. The more I learn about Stonewall the more impressed I become.

Listening to me made quite angry at times, in particular when right wing started banging on about as homosexual as a bunch of sodomites try to pervert young boys... or how they hoped and expected us to be wiped out by AIDS. These moments in the program made me very angry and sad.

Sue brings together the men and women who founded the gay rights campaign group, Stonewall. She is joined by Sir Ian McKellen, Matthew Parris, Lisa Power, Michael Cashman and Olivette Cole-Wilson.

In 1989 a small group joined forces in a campaign against a law now known as Section 28. This law banned councils from 'promoting homosexuality' or 'promoting the teaching in any maintained school of the acceptability of homosexuality as a pretended family relationship'.

The gay rights scene at the time was radical and activist and there were no campaign groups engaging both gay men and lesbians together. Stonewall aimed to create a professional lobbying group that would fight against the discrimination of lesbians, gay men and bisexuals. Dubbed Stonewall to signal doggedness and to commemorate the New York riots in which gay protestors had fought back against police brutality two decades before, it called for full legal rights, which still seemed a loony-left pipe dream.

Stonewall's moderate tone attracted criticism from more radical veterans of the gay rights movement, but also lent its advocates greater media respectability and a hearing from government ministers.

Since its inception, Stonewall has led the way with an impressive number of reforms, pressing ministers and taking test cases to court. These reforms include the repeal of Section 28, equalising the age of consent, permitting civil partnerships and overturning the ban on gays in the military. Another legacy has been to allow gay and lesbian politicians into the mainstream - not just demanding equal rights, but as representatives of the wider community.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00mpmm4

To me Stonewall represents the intelligence and tolerant side of the English culture. Whilst I understand the frustration of the more militant elements of gay-right campaigners, Stonewall is highly effective and is building bridges so that the LGBT community is not perceived as "sick minority" (pitied but tolerated/decriminalised), no we are a colourful-jewel of modern society :)

My favourite moment was when the Stonewall paid homage to Peter Thatchel as an A* ground-breaking political activist. There was a good comparison with the more radical elements of the "suffragette movement". We need campaigner's like Peter, in the last couple of years I have been particularly impressed with (1) his campaign against "murder music" (a British Consular in Jamaica was killed last month... the police found the words "batty boy" scribbled beside his bed) and (2) within the UK legal system (a) religious beliefs are in some way mitigation against

and discrimination on grounds of sexuality and (b) apposed new legalisation in the UK where discrimination on grounds of sexuality is not treated in the same way as other types of discrimination... these are hard problems and if we don't fight our corner we will slip back...

suffragette |ˌsəfrəˈjet|

noun historical

a woman seeking the right to vote through organized protest.

psychology and power of arms (AK-47)

The following tells so much about the terrible power of the arms trade and the military.

Natasha Mitchell: The SPLA told you, there's a line in the book "always remember the gun is your mother and father now". Tell me about the relationship that you had as a boy to the AK-47 you were given. It was taller than you when you first got it.

Emmanuel Jal: An AK-47 gives you so much power when you hold it in your hand. With this thing I can shoot an elephant down. With this thing I'm equal as an adult, I can make an adult scream and beg for mercy. And the way it was brought to us was we were told: "this is your father and this is your mother". And it kind of makes sense. When you have an AK-47 you will not go hungry, you eat anywhere you pass, any village that you go to - you just sit under the tree and people will bring you food. That's the power it had. When you don't have it you become like a child again, you become vulnerable. And also the way we are trained with the movement is, it's like we idolise it, it's more important than your family members. If my father was against me I would fight my father, that's how we took it.

Emmanuel Jal is now a rapper, a powerful voice, rapping about his terrible experiences as a child soldier in the Sudanese Civil War.

This program is shocking a living hell in our time, but Emmanuel is able to communicate these living horrors with a great sense of humanity.

Normally I don't like rap but hear it works well.

Emmanuel Jal: Emma is my angel because she came at the right moment and she smuggled me, she risked her life smuggling me into Kenya.

Natasha Mitchell: I guess you wondered if she picked you or you picked her?

Natasha Mitchell: She decided to pick me, I don't know why me? Why did she pick me? I don't understand, I have no answer.

This one goes to Emma McCune
Angel to the rescue one afternoon
I'm here because you rescued me
I'm proud to carry your legacy
Thank you
Bless you
R I Peace

What would I be if Emma never rescued me?
What would I be?
What would I be, another starving refugee?
What would I be?
What would I be if Emma never rescued me?
Yeah e yeah yeah e yeah