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|Home ¬ Previous Page ¬ The Worship of the Virgin Mary
There seems to be on the part of fallen man an inherent sense of his need of a man-God. The patriarch of Uz gave expression to this feeling, when he intimated his wish for a "days-man," who "might lay his hand upon us both." Our intellectual facilities and our moral affections are unable to traverse the mighty void between ourselves and the Infinite, and both unite in seeking a resting-place midway in One combining in himself both natures. The spirituality of God places Him beyond our grasp, and removes Him, in a manner, from the sphere of our sympathy. We are dazzled by his majesty and glory; his holiness overawes us; his greatness, seen from afar, and incomprehensible by us, seems to repel rather than invite confidence, and to chill the heart rather than expand it into love. "Is there no resting-place for our affections and sympathies," we instinctively ask, "nearer than the august throne of the Infinite?" We need to have the divine attributes reduced to a scale, so to speak, which corresponds more nearly with our intellectual and moral range, and exhibited in One who to the nature of God adds that of man. This feeling has received numerous and varied manifestations; and the effort to meet it has formed a prominent feature in every one of the great systems of idolatry which have arisen in the earth. The nations of antiquity had their race of demi-gods or deified men. In the modern idolatries it has operated not less powerfully. The Mahommedans have their PROPHET, and the Roman Catholics have their VIRGIN. "Here," says Popery, "is a being who may be expected to be more indulgent to your failings than Deity can be,--who will be more easily moved to answer your prayers,--and whom you may approach without any overwhelming awe;" and thus the false is substituted for the true Mediator. It is in the religion of the Bible alone that this instinct of our nature has received its full gratification. The wish breathed of old by the patriarch, and expressed with singular emphasis in all the idolatries that successively arose on the earth, is adequately met only in the "mystery of godliness,--God manifest in the flesh." But what we are here to speak of is the abuse of this principle, in the idolatrous worship of the Virgin.
Papists may make a shift to prove that it is a mitigated worship which they offer to the saints,--that they allow them no rank but that of mediators, and no function but that of intercession,--though even this worship, both in its principles and in its forms, the Bible denominates idolatry. But the worship of the Virgin is capable of no such defence;--it is direct, undisguised, rank idolatry. Roman Catholics give the same titles, perform the same acts, and ascribe the same powers, to Mary as to Christ; and in doing so they make her equal with God.
To Mary are given names and titles which can be lawfully given to no one but God. She is styled "Mother of God;" "Queen of Seraphim, of Saints, and of Prophets;" "Advocate of Sinners;" "Refuge of Sinners;" "Gate of Heaven;" "Morning Star;" "Queen of Heaven." In Roman Catholic countries she is commonly addressed as the "Most Holy Mary." She is often styled the "Most Faithful," and the "Most Merciful." In what other terms could Christ himself be addressed? The Papist alleges that he still regards her as but a creature; nevertheless he addresses her in terms which imply that she possesses divine perfections, power, and glory. The whole psalter of David has been transformed by Bonaventura to the invocation of Mary, by erasing the name of Jehovah, and substituting that of the Virgin. We give an example of the work:--"In thee, O Lady, have I put my trust: let me never be ashamed: in thy grace uphold me." "Unto thee have I cried, O Mary, when my heart was in heaviness; and thou hast heard me from the top of the everlasting hills." "Come unto Mary, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and she shall refresh your souls."
In the second place, the same worship is rendered to Mary as to Christ. Churches are built to her honour; her shrines are crowded with devotees, enriched with their gifts, and adorned with their votive offerings. To her prayers are offered as to a divine being, and blessings are asked as from one who has power to bestow them. Her votaries are taught to pray, "Spare us, good Lady," and "From all evil, good Lady, deliver us."1 Five annual festivals celebrate her greatness, and keep alive the devotion of her worshippers. In Roman Catholic countries the dawn is ushered in with hymns to her honour; her praises are again chanted at noon; and the day is closed with an Ave Maria sung to the lady of heaven. Her name is the first which the infant is taught to lisp; and the dying are directed to entrust their departing spirits into the hands of the Virgin. In health and in sickness, in business and in pleasure, at home or abroad, the Virgin is ever first in the thoughts, the affections, and the devotions of the Roman Catholic. The soldier fights under her banner, and the bandit plunders under her protection.2 Her deliverances are commemorated by public monuments erected to her by cities and provinces. In 1832, the cholera desolated the country around Lyons, but did not enter the city. A pillar, erected in the suburbs, commemorates the event, and ascribes it to the interposition of the Virgin. When the pontiffs would bless with special emphasis, it is in the name of Mary; and when they threaten most terribly, it is her vengeance which they denounce against their enemies.3 In short, the Roman Catholic is taught that none are so miserable but she can succour them, none so criminal but she will pardon them, and none so polluted but she can cleanse them.
There is scarce an act which it is lawful to perform towards God which the Roman Catholic is not taught to perform towards the Virgin. One of the most solemn acts of worship a creature can perform is to give himself in covenant to God,--to make over himself to Jehovah,--for time and for eternity. The Papist is taught to make this solemn surrender of himself to the Virgin. "Entering into a solemn covenant with holy Mary, to be for ever her servant, client, and devotee, under some special rule, society, or form of life, and thereby dedicating our persons, concerns, actions, and all the moments and events of our life, to Jesus, under the protection of his divine mother; choosing her to be our adoptive mother, patroness, and advocate; and entrusting her with what we are, have, do, or hope, in life, death, or through eternity."4 Some of the most sublime and devotional passages of the Bible are applied to the Virgin Mary. From the work quoted above we may give the following illustrations, in which a strain of mingled prayer and praise suitable to be offered only to God, is addressed to the Virgin:5
"Vers. Open my lips, O mother of Jesus.
Resp. And my soul shall speak forth thy praise.
Vers. Divine lady, be intent to my aid.
Resp. Graciously make haste to help me.
Vers. Glory be to Jesus and Mary.
Resp. As it was, is, and ever shall be."
To the Virgin Mary is likewise applied the eighth Psalm thus:--
"Mary, mother of Jesus, how wonderful is thy name, even unto the ends of the
"All magnificence be given to Mary; and let her be exalted above the stars and angels.
"Reign on high as queen of seraphims and saints; and be then crowned with honour and glory," &c.
"Glory be to Jesus and Mary," &c.
It is true, the theologians of the Church of Rome profess to distinguish between the worship offered to Mary and the worship offered to Christ. The saints are to be worshipped with dulia, the Virgin with hyperdulia, and God with latria.6 But this is a distinction which has never yet been clearly defined: in practice it is utterly disregarded; it seems to have been invented solely to meet the Protestant charge of idolatry; and the mass of the common people are incapable of either understanding it or acting upon it. We not unfrequently find them praying in the very same words to God, to the Virgin, and to the saints. We may instance the well-known prayer to which, in 1817, an indulgence of three hundred days was annexed. It is as follows:--
"Jesus, Joseph, Mary, I give you my heart and soul;
Jesus, Joseph, Mary, assist me in my last agony;
Jesus, Joseph, Mary, I breathe my soul to you in peace."
According to the theory of lower and higher degrees of worship, three kinds of worship ought to have been here employed,--latria for God, hyperdulia for Mary, and dulia for Joseph; but all three, without the least distinction, or the smallest alteration in the words or in the form, are worshipped alike.
In the third place, the same works are ascribed to Mary as to Christ. She hears prayer, intercedes with God for sinners, guides, defends, and blesses them in life, succours them when dying, and receives their departing spirits into paradise. But passing over these things, the great work of Redemption, the peculiar glory of the Saviour, and the chief of God's ways, is now by Roman Catholics, plainly and without reserve, applied to Mary. The Father who devised, the Son who purchased, and the Spirit who applies, the salvation of the sinner, must all give place to the Virgin. It was her coming which prophets announced;7 it is her victory which the Church celebrates. Angels and the redeemed of heaven ascribe unto her the glory and honour of saving men. She rose from the dead on the third day; she ascended to heaven; she has been re-united to her Son; and she now shares with Him power, glory, and dominion. "The eternal gates of heaven rolled back; the king's mother entered, and was conducted to the steps of his royal throne. Upon it sat her Son. . . . . 'A throne was set for the king's mother, and she sat upon his right hand.' And upon her brow he placed the crown of universal dominion; and the countless multitude of the heavenly hosts saluted her as the queen of heaven and earth."8 All this Romanists ascribe to a poor fallen creature, whose bones have been mouldering in the dust for eighteen hundred years. We impute nothing to the Church of Rome, in this respect, which her living theologians do not teach. Instead of being ashamed of their Mariolatry, they glory in it, and boast that their Church is becoming every day more devoted to the service and adoration of the Virgin. The argument by which the work of redemption is ascribed to Mary we find briefly stated by Father Ventura, in a conversation with M. Roussel of Paris, then travelling in Italy.
"The Bible tells us but a few words about her" [the Virgin Mary], said M. Roussel to the Padre, "and those few words are not of a character to exalt her."
"Yes," replied Father Ventura, "but those few words express every thing! Admire this allusion: Christ on the cross addressed his mother as woman; God in Eden declared that the woman should crush the serpent's head; the woman designated in Genesis must therefore be the woman pointed out by Jesus Christ; and it is she who is the Church, in which the family of man is to be saved."
"But that is a mere agreement of words, and not of things," responded the Protestant minister.
"That is sufficient," said Father Ventura.9
Not less decisive is the testimony of Mr. Seymour, as regards the sentiments of the leading priests at Rome, and the predominating character of the worship of Italy. The following instructive conversation passed one day between him and one of the Jesuits, on the subject of the worship of the Virgin.
"My clerical friend," says Mr. Seymour, "resumed the conversation, and said, that the worship of the Virgin Mary was a growing worship in Rome,--that it was increasing in depth and intenseness of devotion,--and that there were now many of their divines--and he spoke of himself as agreeing with them in sentiment--who were teaching, that as a woman brought in death, so a woman was to bring in life,--that as a woman brought in sin, so a woman was to bring in holiness,--that as Eve brought in damnation, so Mary was to bring in salvation,--and that the effect of this opinion was largely to increase the reverence and worship given to the Virgin Mary."
"To prevent any mistake as to his views," says Mr. Seymour, "I asked whether I was to understand him as implying, that as we regard Eve as the first sinner, so we are to regard Mary as the first Saviour,--the one as the author of sin, and the other as the author of the remedy."
"He replied that such was precisely the view he wished to express; and he added, that it was taught by St. Alphonso de Liguori, and was a growing opinion."10
But we can adduce still higher authority in proof of the charge that Rome now knows no other God than Mary, and worships no other Saviour than the Virgin. In the Encyclical Letter of Pius IX., issued on the 2d of February 1849, soliciting the suffrages of the Roman Catholic Church, preparatory to the decree of the pontiff on the doctrine of the immaculate conception, terms are applied to the Virgin Mary which plainly imply that she is possessed of divine fulness and perfection, and that she discharges the office of Redeemer to the Church, "The most illustrious prelates, the most venerable canonical chapters, and the religious congregations," says the Pope, "rival each other in soliciting that permission should be granted to add and pronounce aloud and publicly, in the sacred Liturgy, and in the preface of the mass to the blessed Virgin Mary, the word 'immaculate;' and to define it as a doctrine of the Catholic Church, that the conception of the blessed Virgin Mary was entirely immaculate, and absolutely exempt from all stain of original sin." The document then rises into a strain of commingled blasphemy and idolatry, in which the perfections of God and the work of Christ are ascribed to the Virgin, who "is raised, by the greatness of her merits, above all the choirs of angels, up to the throne of God; who has crushed under the foot of her virtues the head of the old serpent.11 The foundation of our confidence is in the Most Holy Virgin, since it is in her that God has placed the plenitude of all good, in such sort, that if there be in us any hope,--if there be any spiritual health,--we know that it is from her that we receive it,--because it is the will of Him who hath willed that we should have all by the instrumentality of Mary." We need no other evidence of Rome's idolatry. The document, it is true, is not a formal deed of the Church; but the difference is one of form only; for the pontiff assures us that the sentiments it contains are not his own only, but those of "the most illustrious prelates, venerable canonical chapters, and religious congregations;" and of course the sentiments are shared in by a vast majority of the members of the Church. The document fully installs Mary in the office of Saviour, and exalts her to the throne of God; for, in the first place, it expressly applies to her the prophecy in Eden, and ascribes to her the work then foretold,--crushing the head of the serpent; and, in the second place, it applies to Mary the ascription of Paul to Christ,--"In him dwells all the fulness of the Godhead bodily," and in doing so, exalts her to the throne of mediatorial power and blessing. The pontifical decree on the subject of the immaculate conception may after this be spared. Already Rome has consummated her idolatry, and its evidence is complete. That Church has installed Mary in the office of Redeemer, and exalted her to the throne of Deity.
To raise Mary to an equality with God, is virtually to place her above Him; for God can have no rival. But Roman Catholic writers teach, in express terms, that she is superior. In invoking her, they hold it warrantable to ask her to lay her commands upon her Son, which implies her superiority in power to Him to whom, the Bible teaches, "all power in heaven and in earth has been committed." And, second, they teach that she is superior in mercy, and that she hears prayer, and pities and delivers the sinner, when Christ will not.12 This doctrine has not only been taught in words, but has been exhibited in symbol, and that in so grotesque a way, that for the moment we forget its blasphemy. In the dream of St. Bernard,--which forms the subject of an altar-piece in a church at Milan,--two ladders were seen reaching from earth to heaven. At the top of one of the ladders stood Christ, and at the top of the other stood Mary. Of those who attempted to enter heaven by the ladder of Christ, not one succeeded,--all fell back. Of those who ascended by the ladder of Mary, not one failed. The Virgin, prompt to succour, stretched out her hand; and, thus aided, the aspirants ascended with ease.13
1 Stillingfleet's Popery, by Dr. Cunningham, pp. 92, 93.
2 The brigands in some parts of Italy and Spain wear a picture of the Madonna, suspended round the neck by a red ribbon. If overtaken unexpectedly by death, they kiss the image, and die in peace.
3 When the present Pope fled from Rome, he threatened the Romans with the vengeance of the Virgin. Finding her not so ready to espouse his quarrel as he expected, he solicited and obtained 40,000 soldiers from France.
4 Contemplations on the Life and Glory of Holy Mary, A.D. 1685, [quoted from Dr. Cunningham's "StilIingfleet."]
5 Quoted from Dr. Cunningham's "Stilliiigfleet," pp. 96-97.
6 Mornings among the Jesuits at Rome, p. 52.
7 Keenan's Catechism, pp. 106-107.
8 The Glory of Mary, by J. A. Stothert, Missionary Apostolic in Scotland, pp. 145,146; London, 1851.
9 New York Evangelist, Jan. 3, 1850.
10 Mornings among the Jesuits at Rome, pp. 43-45.
11 The doctrine of the pontifical bull we find re-echoed in the sermons and tracts of inferior priests. "It was sin that cost Mary all her sorrow; not her own, but ours. For our disobedience she painfully obeyed." (The Glory of Mary, by James Augustine Stothert, p. 130.)
12 See Seymour's Mornings among the Jesuits, pp. 46-56.
13 Mornings among the Jesuits, p. 56.
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subset: commoncrawl


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Provided by: coreutils_8.32-4.1ubuntu1_amd64
join - join lines of two files on a common field
join [OPTION]... FILE1 FILE2
For each pair of input lines with identical join fields, write a line to standard output. The default join field is the first, delimited by blanks. When FILE1 or FILE2 (not both) is -, read standard input. -a FILENUM also print unpairable lines from file FILENUM, where FILENUM is 1 or 2, corresponding to FILE1 or FILE2 -e EMPTY replace missing input fields with EMPTY -i, --ignore-case ignore differences in case when comparing fields -j FIELD equivalent to '-1 FIELD -2 FIELD' -o FORMAT obey FORMAT while constructing output line -t CHAR use CHAR as input and output field separator -v FILENUM like -a FILENUM, but suppress joined output lines -1 FIELD join on this FIELD of file 1 -2 FIELD join on this FIELD of file 2 --check-order check that the input is correctly sorted, even if all input lines are pairable --nocheck-order do not check that the input is correctly sorted --header treat the first line in each file as field headers, print them without trying to pair them -z, --zero-terminated line delimiter is NUL, not newline --help display this help and exit --version output version information and exit Unless -t CHAR is given, leading blanks separate fields and are ignored, else fields are separated by CHAR. Any FIELD is a field number counted from 1. FORMAT is one or more comma or blank separated specifications, each being 'FILENUM.FIELD' or '0'. Default FORMAT outputs the join field, the remaining fields from FILE1, the remaining fields from FILE2, all separated by CHAR. If FORMAT is the keyword 'auto', then the first line of each file determines the number of fields output for each line. Important: FILE1 and FILE2 must be sorted on the join fields. E.g., use "sort -k 1b,1" if 'join' has no options, or use "join -t ''" if 'sort' has no options. Note, comparisons honor the rules specified by 'LC_COLLATE'. If the input is not sorted and some lines cannot be joined, a warning message will be given.
Written by Mike Haertel.
GNU coreutils online help: <https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/> Report any translation bugs to <https://translationproject.org/team/>
Copyright © 2020 Free Software Foundation, Inc. License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later <https://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>. This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it. There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.
comm(1), uniq(1) Full documentation <https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/join> or available locally via: info '(coreutils) join invocation'


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On Oct. 19, Lebanese Brig. Gen. Wissam al-Hassan was assassinated on a narrow side street near Sassine Square in downtown Beirut. The attack involved the detonation of a moderately sized vehicle-borne improvised explosive device as al-Hassan's car passed by the vehicle in which the device was hidden. The explosion killed not only al-Hassan and his driver but also six other people and wounded about 90 more.
Al-Hassan, the intelligence chief for Lebanon's Internal Security Forces, had been a marked man for some time prior to his death. He was the security chief for former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri, who was assassinated in February 2005 in an attack that most believe was conducted by the Syrian regime and its allies in Lebanon.
But more recently, as Stratfor noted in February 2012, al-Hassan played a critical role channeling support from the Gulf states and the West to the Syrian rebels through Lebanon. This involved smuggling arms from Lebanon to Syria destined for opposition forces, providing a haven for Syrian defectors in Lebanon and allowing Syrian rebels to use Lebanese territory as a staging ground for attacks in Syria. His part in the Syrian opposition movement clearly made him a prime target for Syrian intelligence and indeed the Syrian regime had previously attempted to assassinate al-Hassan -- one such plot was thwarted in early 2012 by Jordanian intelligence, which caught wind of the plot and passed a warning to Lebanese authorities.
Al-Hassan was doing dangerous work in a dangerous place, and he knew he was a marked man. His former boss had been assassinated and there were plots afoot to kill him, too. Due to the manner in which al-Hariri was assassinated, al-Hassan decided to employ a very different style of security -- low-profile security instead of the high-profile measures employed by al-Hariri -- and yet he was killed despite his different approach.
This failure does not mean that protective security measures are useless in an environment such as Lebanon or fatalistically suggest that it is impossible to keep a high-value target alive in the country. Rather, an examination of the al-Hariri and al-Hassan assassinations provides an important lesson to security practitioners everywhere -- that protective security measures alone are not enough to keep a marked target alive in such a hostile environment. Whatever security strategy is employed, whether high-profile or low-profile, it must be accompanied by a robust protective intelligence program. If potential attackers are given free rein to conduct surveillance and plan attacks, they will eventually succeed.
Details on Protective Details
As noted above, Rafik al-Hariri's protective detail utilized a heavy motorcade to travel in Lebanon. On the day he was assassinated, he was traveling in a six-car motorcade. In addition to a fully armored Mercedes-Benz limousine, this security detail also employed two lead cars and two follow cars along with an ambulance staffed by trained medics bringing up the rear of the motorcade. The motorcade used three sophisticated electronics countermeasure sets in an attempt to jam any remotely detonated improvised explosive devices, or IEDs, that might lay along the motorcade's route. Reports at the time indicated that these countermeasure sets interfered with cell phone, radio and television reception as the motorcade passed through an area.
The solution for assassinating al-Hariri despite this heavy security detail was not elegant, but it was effective. The attackers used a very large suicide vehicle-borne IED that international investigators estimated contained approximately 1 metric ton of military-grade explosives believed to be TNT. As the motorcade passed a Mitsubishi van containing the explosive device, a suicide operative initiated it, causing considerable damage to the vehicles in the motorcade and the surrounding neighborhood. The massive explosion left a 30-foot crater in the road at the seat of the blast and killed al-Hariri and 21 others while wounding another 231 people.
The van carrying the device was seen driving slowly toward the attack site just before the device was detonated. By using a mobile device, the attackers mitigated the possibility of the device being noticed at the attack site by security vehicles sweeping the route ahead of the motorcade. By using a suicide operative to activate the command-detonated device, the attackers bypassed the motorcade's electronic IED countermeasures and ensured that the device detonated when the limousine was close to the van carring the bomb.
By using a huge charge, the attackers ensured that their device would be potent enough to defeat the fully armored limousine, and they ensured that the attack would be successful even if the device were not triggered at precisely the ideal moment. Even the most sophisticated fully armored vehicle cannot survive the detonation of a 1 metric ton VBIED at close range. On Oct. 1, 2004, an attempt to kill Lebanese opposition lawmaker Marwan Hamadeh using a smaller VBIED failed; al-Hariri's attackers did not want to replicate that failure.
Al-Hariri's assassination occurred after he left the parliament building to return to a lunch he was hosting at his home with a number of people. This meant his location and destination were both likely known by his attackers. There were three different routes the motorcade could have taken to travel from the parliament to his residence. The U.N. investigation into the assassination noted that al-Hariri had appeared in public on less than 10 occasions in the three months prior to the attack but that his motorcade had taken the Maritime Road route, the one on which the attack occurred, on six of those occasions. By establishing such a clearly observable routine, al-Hariri's killers could have a fairly high degree of confidence that the motorcade would take that route on the day of the attack.
Wissam al-Hassan was intimately familiar with the security measures employed by the al-Hariri protective detail. Indeed, according to the U.N. investigation of the al-Hariri murder, a few months prior to the attack, al-Hassan and others had met with al-Hariri and urged him to increase his security due to the perceived threat from Syria and its Lebanese allies.
When al-Hassan found himself in a similar threat situation in recent months, he recognized that a high-profile detail alone could not protect him from those who would do him harm. He also lacked the resources of the wealthy al-Hariri family. He therefore decided to adopt a different form of security: keeping a low profile. The idea was to use nondescript rental cars that would be changed frequently in an attempt to blend in with other travelers on Beirut's busy streets. Al-Hassan also reportedly used a series of clandestine residences, unlike al-Hariri's well-known home, the Kuraytem Palace.
However, it appears that there were some obstacles that kept al-Hassan from maintaining a truly low profile. The night before his death, he returned to Beirut from a trip to Europe. But rather than deplaning like a normal passenger and passing through immigration and customs like an ordinary traveler, he was met planeside by the rental car that would take him to his residence for the night. Such an arrival draws attention.
Hezbollah has long controlled security at the Beirut airport. When the Western-backed government of former Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora attempted to remove Maj. Gen. Wafik Shuqayr, one of Hezbollah's fellow Shia, from his post as the director of security at the airport, Hezbollah resorted to violent protests to ensure he remained in his post.
This meant that Hezbollah was in a prime position to initiate surveillance on al-Hassan upon his arrival at the airport, or to help others pick up surveillance on him. Once it was established that al-Hassan was back in Lebanon, all that remained was to follow al-Hassan's vehicle to the residence he was using that night and then set up a VBIED along the route he would have to take to get to his office at the Lebanese Internal Security Forces headquarters building. Since the attackers knew that al-Hassan was in an unarmored rental car rather than a fully armored limousine, they were able to use a smaller explosive device than the one used in the attack on al-Hariri.
They also knew al-Hassan did not have IED countermeasure sets in his vehicle, so they could use a remotely detonated device rather than a suicide operative. However, like al-Hariri's assassination, the attack was quite inelegant. The attackers still used a larger device than required to ensure that the attack succeeded. The larger device also provided a margin of error in case it was not detonated precisely on time. Like in the al-Hariri attack, this larger-than-needed device produced quite a bit of unnecessary collateral damage, which the attackers didn't take any steps to avoid.
The Importance of Protective Intelligence
Despite using a different security concept than al-Hariri, the end result was the same -- al-Hassan was murdered, most likely by the Syrian regime and their allies in Lebanon. The Syrian military occupied Lebanon in 1976 and maintained control of the country until it withdrew in 2005. During this time, the Syrians developed a robust intelligence network in Lebanon, a network that remained largely in place after the withdrawal of Syrian forces. They also maintain close allies in various Lebanese political parties and militias, most notably Hezbollah. As noted in the U.N. investigation of the al-Hariri assassination, this intelligence network can be used to conduct surveillance that is used to plan and execute attacks against enemies of the Syrian regime.
However, that does not mean that the Syrian hand in Lebanon can move without detection. Even a sophisticated, professional intelligence network is bound by the requirements of the attack planning cycle. Their efforts are also vulnerable to detection during certain phases of that planning cycle, especially the surveillance phase.
While the Syrians and their allies have the ability to tap phones in Lebanon at will and Hezbollah controls security at the Beirut airport, these advantages do not remove the necessity for the Syrians to conduct physical surveillance in order to plan and execute attacks like those directed against al-Hariri and al-Hassan. It is therefore possible to detect such attack planning as it occurs. Indeed, it is not only possible, but essential, to detect the attack planning if protective security elements are to have any hope of keeping their principal alive in an environment like Beirut.
If attackers can freely surveil the operations of a protection detail, over time they will be able to identify the personnel, equipment and tactics employed by the security team and design ways to defeat them. A robust protective intelligence program that employs surveillance detection and countersurveillance capabilities, and that actively investigates suspicious activity, can help restrict the ability of potential attackers to gauge protective measures. Protective intelligence elements can also warn the protective detail that it needs to change tactical operations when those operations have been compromised by hostile surveillance efforts.
Unlike traditional security measures that react to threats, protective intelligence teams proactively search for evidence of hostile activity before an attack can be planned and launched. This allows the protective security team to keep on the positive side of the action/reaction equation and avoid potential problems. Certainly, protective intelligence efforts are complicated in a very busy urban environment such as Beirut, but a high level of activity on the street also complicates the operations of surveillance teams. Protective intelligence efforts such as countersurveillance teams can effectively detect and frustrate hostile activity in such places if they are properly deployed.
As evidenced by the assassinations in Beirut, any type of protective security program can be defeated if it allows potential attackers to operate freely against it. The solution lies in denying potential attackers that advantage.


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When the German Constitutional Court nodded with a stern smile on the ESM bailout fund and the Fiscal Union treaty, the world, or at least the politicians at the top, breathed a sigh of relief.
Those two treaties, designed to keep the Eurozone duct-taped together, transfer budgetary sovereignty from elected national parliaments to unelected bureaucrats in the bowels of the European government. After months of verbal warfare, the revolt of the Germans was over.
But suddenly, steam is billowing once again from the rusty pipes of the Eurozone. This time in France, where the Fiscal Union treaty has been silenced to death—and it could blow apart the whole construct.
The only time the Fiscal Union treaty bubbled up was during the presidential campaign when François Hollande vowed to "renegotiate" the text that President Nicolas Sarkozy had already signed. He won the election. The dust settled. And then, not a word.
He hasn't explained the treaty to his compatriots, hasn't outlined the sovereignty transfer to unelected bureaucrats, hasn't indicated which parts he'd renegotiate. Nothing. Nor has he renegotiated one iota. Even during his speech last Sunday, he didn't mention it. It no longer existed. Yet, on October 2, parliament is scheduled to ratify the exact treaty that Sarkozy had signed.
"European coup d'état and rape of democracy," howled Marine Le Pen, president of the right-wing National Front, and third in the presidential election, at a press conference on Friday. She'd be "the tip of the spear" against the treaty, she said and called for a referendum. A dreadful word in the French political lexicon. No politician would ever forget the debacle of 2005. In parliament, the European Constitution passed with 93% of the votes. But in the subsequent referendum, the people, who loved their sovereignty, killed it by a margin of 55% to 45%.
She accused the two big parties—Hollande's Socialists and Sarkozy's UMP—of "perfect collusion" on topics that determine France's "destiny as free nation." With this treaty, the EU would become "the worst enemy of France and of all nations that aspire to prosperity and liberty."
And the refusal by the Socialists and the UMP to debate the treaty? Well too bad, she said, "we will debate it with the people." According to the polls, a clear majority demanded a referendum. National sovereignty and democracy were at stake. The treaty would put France "under budgetary guardianship"; and the policies of the nation would be guided by "dogmatic choices of the European Commissioners." And so, she said, "the whole democratic edifice, which is already widely cracked, is threatened with collapse."
She's a bit of a firecracker. But the rebellion on the far right is coagulating with a rebellion on the left. They're hoping to pull another 2005. Opposition to government by unelected European bureaucrats transcends party lines. The referendum in 2005 divided the Socialists (in the opposition at the time). Hollande led the YES side, and ironically, current Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius led the victorious NO side. But Fabius, expediently, has changed sides.
The French are frustrated, given the current economic malaise. If they were handed a referendum, they'd kill the Fiscal Union treaty. But in parliament, the treaty has rock-solid support from the UMP, the party that negotiated it, and from Socialists who have circled their wagons around Hollande. Enough to ratify it. Hence Hollande's silence. He doesn't need to persuade the people.
Unless there's a referendum. Opposition on the left is mounting. Even the fringes of the Socialists oppose it. So do the Greens, the Communists, the Front of the Left, of which firebrand Jean-Luc Mélenchon is co-president. He called for a referendum, just like Marine Le Pen. They butted heads during the election for third place, but now his big battle is no longer Le Pen, he said, but the Fiscal Union treaty that would "condemn Europe to austerity for life."
An uphill battle. No referendum is scheduled. And without that common cause, it will be tough to mobilize the masses in three weeks to oppose a parliamentary vote on a topic that the rulers are still trying to silence to death. But Le Pen and Mélenchon are at least forcing the topic into the open. A petition drive for a referendum is next. And just maybe, they'll succeed in keeping the unelected bureaucrats at bay—though it would require a miracle.
The referendum in 2005 was an unforgettable lesson for European politicians: don't let the riffraff decide. Such matters are best handled by the elite—politicians, bankers, and unelected bureaucrats. And in Germany, they were busy handling such matters. Read.... Power Grab: The Noose Tightens On National Sovereignty in Europe.
And here is the hilarious but brutally truthful video from down-under comedians Clarke & Dawe that in 2.5 minutes summarizes better than anything else the entire Eurozone debt crisis.


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Marblehead is a rich masculine outdoor series and the latest addition to the Quoizel Coastal Armour Collection. The stately form of the metal arches gives the clear seedy glass a window like appearance. Made from a new weather resistant outdoor composite material and featuring a 5 year warranty it is sure to stand the test of time. Add beauty to your home for many years to come with the Marblehead Outdoor Collection. It is available in mystic black, palladian bronze and fresco finishes.
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Items where Year is 1969
Group by: First Author/Editor | Item Type | No Grouping
Number of items: 2.
Bowles, A. J. (1969) Spectroscopic studies of some unsaturated carbonyl compounds: with particular reference to conformations of [alpha beta] unsaturated carbonyl compounds. (PhD thesis), Kingston College of Technology, .
Rosie, David A. (1969) An examination of some reactions of fatty cyclopropenoids. (PhD thesis), Kingston College of Technology, .


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Why Hellgate: London Failed and How Developer Flagship Got Flagshipped
"I'm sure some of you are familiar with that term," said former Flagship business developer Stephen Goldstein. "For those of you who are not, the term 'flagshipped' literally has no less than five definitions in the English language."
An illustrative slide appeared on screen:
Tim: "I just bought a new table tody and one of its legs broke."Goldstein spoke at length this morning on the demise of Hellgate: London developer Flagship Studios, highlighting specific areas that he feels lead to the ugly end of a studio with tremendous promise.
Mike: "Man you got flagshipped."
"Everything we did, the entire corporate setup, was meant to swing for the fences," said Goldstein. "Everything was solely plan A. There was no plan B."
In particular, Goldstein noted that the company should have raised more money when they had the chance, saying that it was the "company-killing moment."
"We had a title a year from launch, with a team that had sold 17 million units worldwide from their previous franchise," he explained.
"It's my guess that we could have probably raised 25 to 30 million dollars to just stick in a coffer and wait. It would have provided us the ability to delay the launch of the title. We needed another four months, possibly five, to get things polished. And we just could not take it."
Goldstein also zeroed in on the highly publicized Hellgate billing errors, which lead to some users being billed multiple times during the first days of the launch.
"[Billing] got left to the last minute. We ran out of resources, we ran out of time," he said. "Which lead to a situation where, a very small, small percentage of users got charged twice. That's very bad."
"Imagine how bad this if you're giving everything away for free, and you're trying to get people to pay you. Because then they hear that the billing is screwed up. And they say hey, I can get all this stuff for free. Why would I pay for it?"
Hellgate: London's multiple business models was also a significant problem, according to Goldstein.
"The issue that we had with Hellgate London was that it was a boxed product, it was sold at retail, it had a free singleplayer version, and then it had a subscription," he said.
"What we probably should have done is just piss off our community up front and say you know what, it's going to be a subscription. All of us were very concerned about consumer perception, rather than if money was going to be coming through the door."
As it turns out, Hellgate sold a respectable amount of copies in the US and Europe. But the game's business model depended on subscription revenue in the long term, and not enough of those sales translated into subscriptions.
"The problem wasn't that we sold 500,000 units," said Goldstein. "The problem was we weren't getting subscription [revenue] from those units."
Goldstein guessed that if the game was subscription-only, it would have sold around 250,000 copies less, but the subscription revenue would have kept Flagship afloat.
Goldstein also noted that Hellgate also represented too many "firsts" for the company, including the first 3D game, first FPS, and first subscription-based game.
"This game wouldn't be made today," he said, while turning that particular failure into a testament to the team's resiliency.
"The fact that it was in the box really is a testament to the team that we had. They didn't get the credit that I think they deserved, because with the amount of challenges that we faced, they pulled through."


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Faster Charging Technique Boosts Battery's Capacity
Faster Charging Technique Boosts Battery's Capacity
In the quest to develop higher-capacity, longer-lasting batteries, the focus is typically on materials or fabrication techniques. While developing a new way to study and observe battery performance in realtime, a team of researchers from the University of Maryland also discovered that by altering how their battery was charged, they could increase its capacity. The results are reported in the November 25 online issue of Advanced Energy Materials.
Together with collaborators at Monash University, Department of Materials Science and Engineering (MSE) professor Liangbing Hu and his research group at the University of Maryland Energy Research Center are the first to measure the optical and electrical transport properties of the individual nanoflakes that make up a battery's electrode while it is being charged.
"Conventional measurement techniques reveal the electrochemical and mechanical properties of the entire electrode," explains MSE graduate student Jiayu Wan, a member of Hu's research group and the first author of the paper, "but they can't be used to the measure electrical properties of individual electrode flakes. Our new microbattery platform does. It reveals equally important, if not more important, information that we need to make better batteries."
Wan, Hu and their colleagues wouldn't be able to do it with any battery off the shelf. The key to their technique was designing one that could be simultaneously observed and charged in a device called a probe station, which measures electric transport properties. They created a planar (flat) lithum-ion microbattery with electrodes made of two dimensional molybdenum disulfide (MoS2) crystals, a material currently being studied for use in photonic, optoelectronic and energy devices.
Schematic of the MoS2-Li microbattery.
Wan and research associate Wenzhong Bao (MSE/Physics) were testing the resistance of the new battery's electrodes at the nanoflake level when they realized that the way in which it was charged could be as important as how it was made.
"While we were developing our measurement process, we discovered a novel rapid charging technique that led to enhanced conductivity and three times the capacity than when the same battery was traditionally charged," Wan explains. "We're the first group to demonstrate this. There have been studies associating charging speed with how long a battery lasts, but not with its energy storage capacity."
For now, Wan says, the application of the charging technique is limited to Li-ion batteries made with MoS2, but the team is continuing its research, searching for other compatible battery configurations and electrodes.
Bao, Hu and Wan's collaborators include Professor Michael Fuhrer (Monash University, Australia); Hu Group members Jiaqi Dai, Fei Shen, Lihui Zhou, Daniel Urban, and Yuanyuan Li; Yang Liu and Katherine Jungjohann (Sandia National Laboratories); and Xinghan Cai (Department of Physics, University of Maryland).
For More Information:
Jiayu Wan, Wenzhong Bao, Yang Liu, Jiaqi Dai, Fei Shen, Lihui Zhou, Xinghan Cai, Daniel Urban, Yuanyuan Li, Katherine Jungjohann, Michael S. Fuhrer, Liangbing Hu. "In situ Investigations of Li-MoS2 With Planar Batteries." Advanced Energy Materials. Published online 25 Novermber 2014 (print edition forthcoming). DOI: 10.1002/aenm.201401742. Abstract
Room To Move: Spacing Graphite Layers Makes a Better Battery Anode
December 1, 2014
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Did You Know
UMD is the only major public research university inside the Washington, DC beltway!!


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SA Orthopaedic Journal
On-line version ISSN 2309-8309
Print version ISSN 1681-150X
SA orthop. j. vol.10 n.2 Centurion Jan. 2011
Ethics of billing - determining one's value
Robert Dunn
Prof. Consultant Spine and Orthopaedic Surgeon. Associate Professor, University of Cape Town. Head: Orthopaedic Spinal Services, Groote Schuur Hospital. Spine Deformity Service, Red Cross Children's Hospital. Private Practice: Constantiaberg Medi-Clinic Hospital
Costs of medicine and fees in private practice are topical as ever with pressure from all sides to make care affordable to all. Many see specialists as cost drivers and excessively remunerated, yet many specialists are unhappy with their earnings. Unless surgeons earn adequately, their service will reduce.
The conflicts of financial reimbursement and professionalism are discussed along with the history of billing in medicine.
Using the state salaries as a basis, equivalent private practice turnovers are calculated demonstrating the vast difference between perceived earnings based on turnover and the real earnings of the surgeon.
An individualised tariff calculation is recommended along with appropriate billing practice.
This paper is based on an ethics lectured delivered at the 2010 South African Spine Society meeting in Cape Town.
Key words: ethics, billing, salaries, reimbursement, surgeon
Medicine is a profession on which physicians rely for their livelihood and patients for their lives. If physicians do not charge for services, they cannot survive. If patients cannot afford those services, they cannot survive. No wonder many physicians have long agreed that fees are 'one of the most difficult problems ... between patient and physician.'1
Globally medical costs have increased faster than inflation and the ability of many patients'ability to pay.The rapid rise in medical costs is multifactorial. There is the increased sophistication of medicine especially with the equipment and prostheses used. Patients demand the 'best', as they see it, despite the costs. Minimum risk is demanded, increasing the costs of monitoring equipment. Intervention at all costs is expected. This is evident in the oncology field where a vast amount of money is spent to prolong life for a few months with questionable benefit to society or the individual.
However, denying care in these circumstances is difficult for many reasons. Government promises the electorate access to care and so they expect it. In the private sector people feel they have purchased the care by belonging to medical aids and paying what they often think are exorbitant monthly premiums. Both sectors experience entitlement which drives utilisation of services. This may be further exacerbated by specialists concentrated in urban areas. Figures 1a and 1b demonstrate this increasing cost and volume for spinal fusions per beneficiaries.
The funders are faced with rapidly increasing spend due to this rising cost and volume. They cannot pass this onto the consumer as their ability to pay is limited. Private medical administrators make their money from the medical aids and thus cannot risk losing members by adjusting premiums markedly upwards despite actuarial requirements.
Their ability to manoeuvre is limited. The hospital groups are few and strong. They have the administrative muscle to negotiate with funders. Funders also realise that if their members are not accepted by a big hospital group, the medical aid product will not sell.
It appears that currently the funder's response has been to attempt to avoid increased payments to professionals - you and me. Of course this is counter-productive as, if a surgeon attempts to work at these heavily discounted rates (National Reference Price List - NRPL), then he must increase his volume to make the living he desires. As the surgeon's fee is only a small component of total intervention cost, this simply drives the costs further.
This problem is ongoing and not specific to South Africa. Two strategies have developed in this milieu. One is the surgeon who feels he cannot charge more than the NRPL rate. This is often based on the fact that he feels his patient population cannot afford more. This may be morally based, but often the surgeon feels threatened that he will lose work, especially if his area is heavily traded by NRPL-based surgeons.
The other strategy has been the surgeon who simply says, 'I am worth more', and bills at a higher rate. He may have a lower volume practice, but the turnover may in fact be more.
There has been a response to this above-NRPL billing by government and funders. Many refuse to pay the higher rate and attempt to penalise the surgeon by paying the patient directly, or excluding the surgeon from a referral group with the implementation of the designated service provider system. Government has attempted to cap these fees playing into the hands of some funders who threaten the doctor with overcharging and unprofessional conduct.
This has led to adversarial relationships between surgeons and the Department of Health as well as some funders. The SAOA (along with other groups) is currently in a legal battle with the Department of Health over its continued refusal to base reimbursement on real costs as opposed to a historical system with submedical inflationary increases. The courts recently vindicated this stance by dismissing the current NRPL tariff calculation.
This leads to many problems. Many surgeons feel under-remunerated. This may lead to questionable billing practices such as excessive coding where surgeons feel they are unable to charge above NRPL. There is temptation to look for another income stream which leads to issues of perverse incentives. Patients suffer by being left with big shortfalls on their accounts. Surgeons may even leave the profession or consider emigration to less hostile financial environments.
How do we as surgeons deal with the situation?
It is extremely difficult as we are faced with conflicting aspects. Medicine combines both elements of altruism and self-interest, with obligations to others (patients) and yourself (and family). There is a pull between professionalism and commercialism.2-4
Hall et al1 summarises the history of payment for services where centuries ago, English physicians could not legally bill for their services or sue to collect fees. Following the supposed Roman practice, patients paid 'honoraria' that were supposed to be given voluntarily.
Thomas Percival's influential 'Medical Ethics' delicately called medical payments 'pecuniary acknowledgements' and were received as a point of honour. This honorarium rule applied only to physicians and not to surgeons (as they sometimes also treated animals!). The laws of the time regarded surgery as a public calling and emphasised the profession's differences from business, in that courts could limit surgeons' fees to 'reasonable amounts'. This may well sound familiar!
The honorarium and 'public calling' principles reflected the special constraints on professionals even in commercial settings.
However this ethos did not survive the trip to the American colonies. American law freed physicians to pursue the 'making money' side, but they appeared to honour the 'making health' by departing from commercial practice in a crucial way. Doctors frequently charged according to what they thought the patient could afford.
In 1931 a physician's median fee for treating diabetes was $402 but ranged from $232 to $1052. For a major operation surgeons often charged one month of the patient's salary.
Sliding fees were the norm so they became a legal rule. Patients generally did not contract in advance; rather the patient's obligation to pay was implicit and 'reasonableness' was the standard should a disagreement reach a court.
When competition was fierce and medical services dubiously helpful, many had to drop their fees. Collectively doctors fought these market forces by promulgating recommended fee schedules. With medical education reform bottlenecking the supply of physicians combined with expanding treatments, there was increasing leeway in setting prices. There was an increasing tendency to charge 'what traffic will bear' - therefore the tendency to scale up rather than down.
Sliding fees allowed rich to subsidise poor, but charity care became increasingly institutionalised by free clinics, etc. Thus by the mid-twentieth century sliding fees tended to rise above standard. Eventually changing economic conditions weakened the sliding scale and health insurance sounded its death knell.
Insurance drove standardisation of fees. It not only prevented surcharges but also limited discounts, e.g. Medicare co-payments may not be waived as they are there as a disincentive to avoid over-utilisation. In the USA this had led to the perverse situation where insurance groups negotiate low rates and the uninsured are charged up to 2.5 times more.5
So what is the right price?
From a commercial perspective, costs incurred need to be covered and a profit generated. We can calculate our costs but what are we worth? What should we earn?
We are bright, study for many years, sacrifice and work hard. Some doctors feel they deserve the world! Many others work hard but do not earn well.
There are many difficulties when determining our worth. We do have a duty to humanity but need to earn a living. In the past only the wealthy were educated and thus in a position to study further and become physicians. Now with widespread schooling, doctors come from a far more diverse background. Many of us need to earn our living, and do not start with huge family fortunes. Costs of living are higher and our expectations are equally high. We often compare ourselves to other professions but it is difficult to compare cost structures without all the information.
As a start we can use state salaries as a base. After a period of negotiation (occupation-specific dispensation), government has come up with what it is prepared to pay doctors. Although many would not accept this as a realistic marker of a doctor's value, it provides something to work with.
In 2010, government decided that a medical specialist with less than 5 years' experience should earn R491 892 per annum cost to company, i.e. inclusive of employee benefits such as medical aid, pension etc. This is for a 40-hour week, no overtime, with 22 working days leave a year.
In an attempt to calculate what is required to earn the equivalent in private practice, costs need to be taken into account. Healthman6 performed a survey of private practitioners to assess the real costs encountered in practice. Based on 2009 figures they identified the average cost per annum for surgical disciplines was R801 271 with the breakdown shown in Table I. The practice cost for an average Western Cape orthopaedic surgeon was R834 450. As this is a 2009 figure, 6% inflation has been added to correct to 2010, i.e. R884 517.
But generally surgeons use assistant surgeons. For the sake of this example, I have assumed an assistant is used 90% of the time and added the 20% fee, thus R274 754. Of course, SARS wants its slice, so 14% VAT of R227 383 is added on top.
To correct for the month's leave, this turnover needs to be generated in 11 months. Thus R964 per hour needs to be generated every hour for 40 hours a week to equal the state salary of a young specialist (Figure 2). At a NRPL consultation rate of around R230, irrespective of duration, this cannot be maintained. It is even difficult to maintain with surgery at NRPL rates. A lumbar discectomy is worth about R3 700 in turnover but from start to finish with admin, ward rounds and follow-up, consumes at least 4 hours (even though 'skin to skin' is 60-90 minutes).
Even if this turnover generation is maintained, it is only R40 991 per month gross, never mind after tax and pension. This is not exactly what most surgeons had in mind when making all those sacrifices along the way. It also does not include the state pension contribution or sick leave benefits.
Figure 3 shows the calculation to equal a state-employed senior specialist salary where R1 057 per hour, every hour for 40 hours is required in private practice. The total turnover required is close to the average specialist earnings of R2.3 million published in a recent Financial Mail article on salaries. They derive this by dividing the total paid by medical aid to specialists by the number of specialists and give the impression that this is earnings. Of course there is a big difference in earnings and turnover as these examples illustrate.7,8
In the Healthman survey, the average duration of practice was 11 years 8 months. This would equate to the old principal specialist or now termed 'Head of clinical unit'. Based on the 2010 salary, a private practitioner would need to generate R1 244 per hour to equal this on a 40-hour week basis. However, few doctors work 40 hours and HOCU are paid a 52 week by means of an allowance. To equal this, a private practitioner would need to generate R1 086 every hour for 52 hours to equal this (Figure 4).
Healthman made a submission based on their practice cost survey and an annual salary (cost to company) of R858 600. In addition they added an amount of R161 365 as a return on investment. In addition to the surgeon being the 'labourer', he was also the owner of the business and should expect a return on this. Healthman then calculated a unit value for billing, coming to R27.25 for surgical disciplines to achieve this turnover (in excess of three times the recent NRPL rate).
Many would argue that well-established sub-specialists should earn well in excess of this especially when compared to non-medical professionals in the financial field where annual salaries (not turnover) of R2 million are seen advertised (Figure 5). To achieve this (using the previously used calculation methodology), an hourly generation of R1 554 every hour for 52 hours a week is required.
Although as doctors we are taught not to discuss money, this is the reality. To earn what we think we are worth, these are the turnovers required. We need to be tempered by our professionalism and be compassionate to our patients, but if our practice is not financially viable, private medicine will not survive. We need to be far more transparent as regards our finances. The HPCSA is insisting on this and expects us to discuss fees with our patients pre-operatively. This is only reasonable. By including our patients in this financial discussion, our worth is highlighted. If we choose to discount, we can do so expecting gratitude and early payment.
If we can justify our costs, there can be no argument. We need not be ashamed that we cost money and even seem expensive to some, as long as we are delivering the service we promise.
As a group we must avoid funders dictating our income as their interests may not be aligned with ours. Patients need to be made financially responsible for the care rather than the illusion that the third party will pay. This will encourage them to 'buy' up rather than down in terms of medical cover. Inexpensive GAP cover (insurance for professional fee shortfall) is available and patients must be encouraged to be adequately insured.
The HPCSA publishes ethical and professional rules which are available on their website.9 They state that the practice as a health care professional is based on a relationship of mutual trust between patients and health care practitioners. The term 'profession' means 'a dedication, promise or commitment publicly made'. They emphasise that to be a good health care practitioner requires a life-long commitment to sound professional and ethical practices and an overriding dedication to the interests of one's fellow human beings and society.
In the HPCSA booklet on fees and commission the financial relationships are discussed, especially in connection to perverse incentives. In 7(3) is states that 'a practitioner shall not offer or accept any payment, benefit or material consideration (monetary or otherwise) which is calculated to induce him or her to act or not to act in a particular way not scientifically, professionally or medically indicated or to under-service, over-service or over-charge patients'. Over-charging is not defined in financial terms however.
The SAOA also publishes its standpoint on principles of medical ethics and professionalism.10 Its comment on remuneration is limited to that it should be commensurate with services delivered and that surgeons should deliver high quality, cost-effective care without discrimination. It does not indicate a level of fee that is ethically acceptable.
Thus it becomes clear that there is not one standard fair fee. Each surgeon is to be encouraged to actively determine his cost structure as a basis of fee calculation. To this he should add his expected remuneration for service adjusted by risk, experience and skill. By determining the expected number of cases to be processed, a surgeon-specific unit value can be calculated.
This may range from the NRPL basis of around R8 up and even beyond the Healthman calculation of R27 or so. There are many factors that will influence this, some surgeon-specific, including but not limited to experience, skill level and case mix, and some geographic due to cost of living. This is evident in a recent spine surgery survey where initial consultation rates ranged from R352 to R900 and a single level spine decompression from R3 330 to R17 604.11
Fees should be transparent and the patients included in the discussion. Discounts should be individualised, based on the case and patient circumstances. A consistent billing protocol should be employed to avoid accusations of account manipulation and overcharging, especially when it comes to prescribed minimum conditions.
Rather than capitulation to whatever the third party funder will pay, surgeons should employ balanced billing where the full account is rendered to the medical aid on behalf of the patient. The shortfall following payment by the medical aid is then due by the patient. This is legal and palatable to patients if they understand this beforehand.
Code use should be defensible in terms of procedures performed and consistent in use. Multiple coding (in excess of reasonable surgical execution) should be avoided as a means of increasing the account with a low unit value. This places the surgeon at risk and perpetuates an under-insured patient population. There are many funders with plans that reimburse at acceptable unit values, conceding that we are worth much more than the recently rejected NRPL value. By applying these principles we can not only avoid disciplinary action by HPCSA and other bodies, but also encourage our patients to select better plans. This will ensure our future financial viability and thus continuing patient care.
As stated right at the beginning, medical billing remains a difficult and often uncomfortable area to address. Possibly some wise words from an anonymous physician in 1882 may help:
'When in doubt what to charge, look around you [to what others charge], then upwards [to God], then make out your bill at such figures as will show clean hands and a clear conscience.'5
1. Hall MA, Schneider CE. The professional ethics of billing and collections. JAMA 2008;300(15):1806-808. [ Links ]
2. Kassirer JP. Commercialism and Medicine: An Overview. Cambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics 2007;16:377-86. DOI: 10.1017/S0963180107070478 [ Links ]
3. Rodwin MA. Medical commerce, physician entrepreneurialism, and conflicts of interest. Cambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics 2007;16:387-97. DOI: 10.1017/ S096318010707048X [ Links ]
4. Chee YC. No, no to the commercialisation of medicine. Singapore Med J 1999;40(12):1. [ Links ]
5. Hall MA, Schneider CE. Learning from the legal history of billing for medical fees. J Gen Intern Med 2008;23(8):1257-60. DOI: 10.1007/s11606-008-0605-1 [ Links ]
6. Venter C. Healthman Private Practice review 2008 distributed to members of SAOA May 2008 by email. [ Links ]
7. Paton C. Remuneration cold comfort. 2010 (Dec 17) 28-31. [ Links ]
8. Paton C. Earnings of a doctor - healthy pay packet. Financial Mail 2010 (Dec 17) 24. [ Links ]
9. HPCSA ethical rules & regulations. http://www.hpcsa.co.za/conduct_rules.php [ Links ]
10. Principles of Medical Ethics and Professionalism in Orthopaedic Surgery. www.saoa.org.za. [ Links ]
11. Dunn R. SASS billing/coding survey. Presented at SA Spine Society meeting May 2010, Lord Charles Cape Town. [ Links ]
Reprint requests:
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Microsoft's event today was long on promise and short on specs. RAM? We dunno. Processor speed? We dunno. Price? We dunno. Release date? We dunno. But even a very brief hands-on made something abundantly clear: It's a super solid device and if Microsoft can deliver what it demoed, the iPad finally has a real competitor and Android has a big goddamn problem.
Microsoft kept touting build quality, and for good reason: the Windows RT Surface tablet is solid and stunning. Attention to detail is positively amazing, and it's so well designed from every angle that it's just a joy to look at. The keyboard is so thin it seems made from fabric. The lines are gorgeous, and it's a well-balanced device that you'll be able to hold for extended sessions. It is, certainly, easier to hang on to than any of the three generations of iPads to date. The screen is bright and vivid, and the viewing angle is as wide as you could reasonably expect to hold it. Even the kickstand that lets it sit upright, which seemed kind of, well, dumb onstage was a fantastic touch once we saw it in person and attached to the keyboard.
It's also fast and responsive. When we flipped through an app, going from snap state to full screen, it blazed faster than your average reggae band in Humboldt County. Touching led to instant firing. We don't know what kind of processor or RAM is in there (mysterious!) but it's ground-up quick.
And then there's typing on it. We couldn't do that! Notably, every single Surface tablet Microsoft let us put our hands on either was turned off, or didn't have a keyboard connected. I kept hearing how quickly you could type on it—"I did 63 word per minute the first time I used it," one Microsoft employee told me—but there was no way to try this out for ourselves.
So. Yes. It's awesome. It's going to be fantastic. Google had better step things up at IO, because this Windows RT tablet is far more impressive than any shipping Android tablet I've ever seen. It's a clear rival to the iPad. Or at least, so it seems. We'll see. Can't wait for Fall.


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** 3 piece set of materials
These chanderi salwar sets are produced from three kinds of fabric i.e. pure silk, chanderi cotton and silk cotton. Traditional coin, Flora art, Peacocks and geometrics are woven into different chanderi patterns. The weaving culture or tradition has been available from the 13th century.
- It has Combination of block prints and hand painting
- Care: Dry clean first time to set colors. Later handwash in mild detergent (Ezee)/Machine wash with Delicate setting
- Dimensions: (L x B) Tops - 200 cms x 115 cms, Bottom -250 cms x 120 cms, Dhuppatta - 230 cms x 90 cms
- Material: Chanderi Silk Top and Duppatta, Cotton For Pant
- Weight: 300 gms
The Chanderi silk with Batik print Salwar Set (3 Piece material - Bottom , Tops & Dhuppatta) - 52145A is the product you didn't think you need, but once you have it, something you won't want to live without.
Inventory Last Updated: Oct 04, 2023
Inventory Last Updated: Oct 04, 2023


text: Native American Made comes with Certificate of authenticity stating artist and tribe. 20 count Real Black Bear claw necklace A matched set from the same bear! Buyer must check their local laws before purchasing product by purchasing this product I am assuming you have read my store policy and agree to its terms. I am licensed in Idaho if you are unsure if this product is legal in your state please call YOUR local wildlife office/DNR/Fish and game Thank you for understanding. I am not a legal resource for your state wildlife laws unless you live in Idaho. By purchasing this product I am assuming you have read my store policy and agree to its terms. Do NOT use fingernail polish on authentic claws. All my claws come clean polished and sealed in a protective professional finish. Finger nail polish looks nice at first but will peel off making your claws look like they too are pealing. I seal these claws to help them last a lifetime otherwise a claw can break or come off of the knuckle bone. My claws will not do that to you. Largest claws are 2.5" Great eye-catcher. 20 claws what a deal!!!! With 2 fangs that measure 2 1/2" this necklace is about 20" long this is a one size fits all necklace has clasps for a perfect fit! Red beadsfor the warrior, and black buffalo beads to protection. Bear represents inner voice look inside yourself for all life's answers learn to trust your instincts and to take life a day at a time.Throughout history the bear claw represents Strength, inner knowing, and commands respect. The Bear claw necklaces were always worn by the most successful warriors. To defeat an enemy in battle whom wore bear claws was considered a great honor. Real bear claws are always an eye catcher no-matter where you go. Real Bear claws are almost never seen these days. Pow wow dancers will drool over your bear claw necklace and even out and about in daily activities people's eyes will pop out of their skulls at the sight of a bear claw imagine a whole neck full of them! This item is native American made I will send a certificate of authenticity with its purchase including my enrollment number and tribe's information in compliance with the Native American Arts and craft act of 1990 Buyer is agreeing that they are responsible to know of their wildlife laws and are agreeing to my shop policies.


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We would love to have you attend a class or crop! Please call 724-287-4311 to register. Click on the event title for full information and pricing.
STORE HOURS: Sunday 12 – 5 PM | Monday – Saturday 9 AM – 8 PM
How would you like to have a night or day out with the "girls" and learn techniques to make WOW cards to send to everyone? We want you to have that "girl time!" We will guide you while making cards every month, throughout the year, for you to send to your friends & family. You will use stamps, inks & mists, as well as the latest and greatest products that arrive throughout the year to make two each of four different cards, for a total of 8 cards! We will stay ahead of the seasons, making cards each month for upcoming events and holidays. Get on board and sign up for each month so that you don't miss out on the fun!
Cancelation policy: Fees are non-refundable. Notify us 3 days prior to date & we will reschedule you to another class. If no notice is given, fee is forfeited. Workshop is closed to open cropping for all scheduled classes and crops. *Indicates a special event requiring registration to participate or an event for which the workshop is closed.


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Adriaen de Hoedemaker (d. 1573)
Adriaen de Hoedemaker (also called Kort-Adriaentgen van Gent: Short Adriaen from Gent), whose official name was Adriaen van den (or der) Zwalme, an Anabaptist martyr, was burned at the stake at Bruges in Belgium 7 August 1573 (1574 in Martyrs Mirror is an error). Adriaen, who was a hatter by trade, was baptized about 1572 by the elder (oudste) Paulus van Meenen. Shortly afterwards he was imprisoned at Ghent, and after being retained a year in prison, he softened under the repeated trials, and abjured his faith. Having thus become free, he went to Dordrecht in the Dutch province of South Holland. After four months he returned to Flanders, and avoiding Ghent, established himself at Bruges, where he joined the congregation. Before long he was recaptured and remained faithful to death. Adriaen was twenty one years of age. He was the last martyr in Bruges.
Braght, Thieleman J. van. Het Bloedigh Tooneel of Martelaers Spiegel der Doops-gesinde of Weereloose Christenen, Die om 't getuygenis van Jesus haren Salighmaker geleden hebben ende gedood zijn van Christi tijd of tot desen tijd toe. Den Tweeden Druk. Amsterdam: Hieronymus Sweerts, 1685: Part II, 676.
Braght, Thieleman J. van. The Bloody Theatre or Martyrs' Mirror of the Defenseless Christians Who Baptized Only upon Confession of Faith and Who Suffered and Died for the Testimony of Jesus Their Saviour . . . to the Year A.D. 1660. Scottdale, PA: Herald Press, 1951: 992, 1095. Available online at: http://www.homecomers.org/mirror/contents.htm.
Verheyden, A. L. E. Het Brugsche Martyrologium (12 October 1527-7 Augustus 1573). Brussels, [1944]: 63, No. 72. Available in full electronic text at: http://www.theologienet.nl/documenten/Verheyden%20Brugse%20Martyrologium.pdf.
|Nanne van der Zijpp
|Date Published
Cite This Article
MLA style
Zijpp, Nanne van der. "Adriaen de Hoedemaker (d. 1573)." Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online. 1955. Web. 2 Oct 2023. https://gameo.org/index.php?title=Adriaen_de_Hoedemaker_(d._1573)&oldid=148772.
APA style
Zijpp, Nanne van der. (1955). Adriaen de Hoedemaker (d. 1573). Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online. Retrieved 2 October 2023, from https://gameo.org/index.php?title=Adriaen_de_Hoedemaker_(d._1573)&oldid=148772.
Adapted by permission of Herald Press, Harrisonburg, Virginia, from Mennonite Encyclopedia, Vol. 1, p. 15. All rights reserved.
©1996-2023 by the Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online. All rights reserved.


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Featured Model: May 2005
Stats: 34D-24-33
Height: 5'7" l Hair: Brown l Eyes: Brown
Number of pics: 52
Photography: Bullz-Eye staff
Justine has a killer smile to go along with her amazing body. With her sultry good looks this hot Latina will definitely grab your attention, and you can see that she loves to pose for the camera. She has exactly the kind of attitude you want from an exotic glamour model, as she loves to show off her sensual figure. Enjoy!
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text: >email@example.com] On Behalf Of Adam Shostack >I'm not sure which of these approaches would work best. Are there >other non-product-cetric issues that folks have encountered? Perhaps >with more samples, we can find a category. It bears reiterating that there are (at least) 2 dimensions to this problem: + What is important to cover + How do we describe what we will and won't cover An analogy that I find useful (some on the CVE team strongly object to this one) is the role of jurisdictions within law enforcement. Throwing a dart at the US map arbitrarily, the California State Police might have their criteria for how they select criminals they will put on their "10 Most-Wanted" list. But, these criteria are very different from the state boundaries that define their operational jurisdictions. We are moving into a time in which we must accept that CVE can no longer aspire to provide ID coverage for the global software market. Our interest in identifying the sources that we'll provide full and partial coverage is primarily driven out of our need to define our "jurisdictional boundaries" if you will. It's a way for us to begin the dialog of how to coordinate with other id issuing capabilities and to manage the expectations of those who rely on CVE ids. Compared to law enforcement, vulnerability information coordination is pretty immature -- it's that millennia versus decades thing. Our attempts to define our operational boundaries are going to be crude, clumsy and inexact for some time to come. And just as the police don't patrol all streets equally, we know that we'll need to prioritize among the sources in our coverage boundary and we'll need to exercise on-going judgment as to which issues we provide ids for and which ones we let go by (as we've been doing for a very long time now). -Dave ================================================================== David Mann | Principal Infosec Scientist | The MITRE Corporation ------------------------------------------------------------------ e-mail:firstname.lastname@example.com | cell:781.424.6003 ==================================================================


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Monday, May 4, 2009
Print or trace the block diagram onto foundation paper, number and cut out as in the photo.
Foundation piece all the numbered sections and trim their seam allowances to 1/4". Cut the unnumbered triangles out of fabric, remembering to add 1/4" seam allowance to them as well. I ironed them onto freezer paper to stabilize them and make it easier to cut the seam allowance.
Sew together the small pieced sections as in the photo.
Sew the shortest sections to opposite sides of the center square.
Sew the longer sections to the other two sides of the square.
Attach the four corner triangles.
Cut out and applique the corner diamonds using your favorite applique method. I have a really hard time appliqueing these so if anyone has some wonderful advice, please let me know.
11 comments:
I love your detailed tutorials for these blocks! I am anxiously awaiting the arrival of my dear jane book...it's definitely going to be a challenge but I'm looking forward to it. Keep up the great work!ReplyDelete
Yikes!! It's a good thing we had a break so we could tackle this block. So many little pieces. Yours turned out beautifully.ReplyDelete
Could you remind me what width the sashing is supposed to be, please?
Wow for the block! And thanks again for a wonderful tutorial!ReplyDelete
I had a feeling this would be one of the blocks this week. Yours looks spectacular!ReplyDelete
Beautiful work...thank you!ReplyDelete
I hated all those appliqued diamonds (past tense! Yay!). I drew lines and FPFP'd them. It's not even noticeable in the finished quilt.ReplyDelete
Those little pieces with sharp points are super tough. I found the tutorial that Carrie P. has over on her blog really helpful... I am now a HUGE fan of toothpicks!ReplyDelete
Needleturn pointsFreezer-paper pointsYour block looks lovely with those polka dots. :)
Grats! you were on whipup.net :)ReplyDelete
I use the double freezer applique method. Trace the shape onto the dull side of a single layer of freezer paper then iron that onto a second piece of freezer paper. then trim the piece without seam allowance. Now iron the shiny side of the freezer paper onto the wrong side of your fabric. I spray some regular starch into a cup and use a small cheap paintbrush to paint the starch onto the seam allowance. Use a small iron (Clover or Hobbyco) and a stiletto to iron the seam allowances over the edge of the freezer paper. When this is done, pop the freezer paper out and you have a perfect shape. I use Roxanne's glue baste to glue the piece on, a few dots on each side is enough. I use my seam ripper or the tip of an old scissors to tuck in the points, smooth them out and put a dot of glue on to hold it down. Then applique away...I have appliqued this way for years. It is a little more time consuming but you get perfect shapes! Try it.ReplyDelete
P.S. I really love your blog. I finished this block last week. It was a crazy little one!
hi, Anina..ReplyDelete
I've just pop out from Katie's blog and visit here. Thanks for the tutorial, I'll try soon :)
You said you scared to sew curvy blocks. I have a tutorial of it at my blog if you wanna try.
amazing work! That scares me just looking at it!ReplyDelete


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Bundled up against a cold wind on a training run several years ago, Juli Windsor was bounding along a sidewalk when she noticed sirens flashing and a police officer emerging from his cruiser, urging her to stop.
She looked back to face the officer and watched as his concern turned into embarrassment.
At 3-foot-9, it wasn't the first time Windsor had been mistaken for a runaway child.
"That's what it's like for me running," she said.
On Monday, after years of taunts and overcoming doubts about their stamina, Windsor and a friend will become the first dwarfs on record to run the Boston Marathon, race officials said.
The 27-year-old physician's assistant from the South End and John Young, 47, a high school math teacher from Salem, both qualified by running previous marathons, perhaps making them the first dwarfs ever to complete the 26.2-mile race.
"I'm not aware of any other dwarf to run a marathon," said Mike Cekanor, a spokesman for the Dwarf Athletic Association of America, which organizes the annual US National Dwarf Games.
Aside from the extra effort it requires to take at least twice as many steps as the average runner, dwarfs often suffer from problems in their spines and can experience greater back and joint pain after running long distances.
Given the physical challenges, it's a major feat for a dwarf to finish a marathon, said Gary Arnold, president of Little People of America, an advocacy group for the roughly 35,000 Americans with dwarfism.
"It's just a lot more wear and tear on the body," he said. "It's amazing that they can do this."
Windsor, who notes that she is "as tall as the length of some runners' legs," has been flouting expectations since she joined her middle school's cross-country team while growing up in a suburb of Atlanta.
Running was a peaceful time for her, she said, and a means of measuring up to other students, especially when she beat them.
"I had a lot of anger and felt like life wasn't fair," she said. "I found running to be a time that I could think through and process life. It allowed me to push myself in new ways."
The idea of running the Boston Marathon loomed as the ultimate achievement, something she put at the top of a list of life goals she has kept on a piece of paper since high school. (The list, with star stickers beside each goal, includes earning a doctorate, adopting a dwarf, and inspiring others.)
"I've always known about it and read about it. I've heard all these stories, and in my mind, I've always thought that if I could run Boston, that would be amazing," Windsor said. "For every runner, Boston is a dream."
She ran her first marathon three years ago around Disney World, finishing in just under five hours. Last year she ran the Bay State Marathon in Lowell — despite having pneumonia — and finished in under six hours, just qualifying her for Boston's mobility-impaired division.
Over the years, Windsor has faced her share of challenges and discomforting moments.
There have been the epithets, such as when children and others have called her a "midget" derogatorily. Too often people laugh at her or take her picture surreptitiously, as if she's a circus freak, she said. She can recall being stopped while running at least three times when someone thought she was a child, although that has never bothered her.
"I'm like the average size of a 6-year-old," Windsor said. "I'm glad people care about children running away."
However, she feels violated when people take her picture without asking.
"It's like I'm a spectacle, or some kind of amusement for them to laugh at or share with friends on Facebook," she said. "I feel like little people are part of the last group that people feel OK about making fun of. It's like we're cute, and we're supposed to respond cheerfully. You would never do that with people in a wheelchair."
While Windsor is rippling with muscles and may be as chiseled as the most elite runners, her back curves inward, making running downhill painful. She has to use her abdominal muscles when she runs to try and avoid pain. She also faces risks while running in tight packs and has been kicked in the face a few times.
For John Young, who is 4-foot-4 and has competed in more than 20 triathlons, long-distance running is still a relatively novel experience. Before 2009, when he weighed nearly 200 pounds, he had never run more than a lap around a track.
His road to the marathon began when a student at his private school in South Hamilton challenged students and staff to ride their bikes to school. Young began making the 11-mile trip every day on his child-sized bike, sparking a good bit of ridicule.
"It's usually staring, pointing, laughing, and sometimes yelling," he said. Things like: 'Look at that midget on a bike!' "
The pounding of road races is particularly hard on Young, as he also suffers from a curved spine and experiences numbness in his lower back after long distances.
But he, too, finds motivation in the challenges.
"The people who support and encourage me are the ones that get me to the starting line, while the ones who doubt or ridicule me are the ones that carry me to the finish line," he said. "Whenever I really start to hurt, I think of someone laughing, pointing, and saying, 'You can't do that!' and it seems to give me the strength to carry on."
Windsor and Young are among 27,000 people registered to run the 117th marathon. They have been training nearly every day for months and are counting on more cheers than jeers to spur them to the end, especially from their friends, spouses, and extended family who will line the route. Young's 10-year-old son will be there, too, first along the route and later at the finish line in Copley Square.
Windsor hopes to finish in four hours and 15 minutes, while Young aims to make it in under six hours. With Windsor starting an hour and 40 minutes later in the last wave of runners, the two friends could finish together. "I would love to finish with her," Young said, "but of course don't expect either one of us to slow down to make that happen."
Unlike other competitors, their division lacks prize money, which ranges from $30,000 for the winner of the wheelchair competition to $150,000 for the fastest elite runner, awarded in equal amounts to men and women.
"It's just such a small group, and the money is not there from the sponsors," said Marc Davis, a spokesman for the Boston Athletic Association, which organizes the marathon.
The omission smacks of unfairness, Windsor and Young say.
"If you're going to include people with disabilities who are in wheelchairs, why not include all disabilities?" Windsor said. "I think it should be more inclusive."
Young added: "I have done too many races where that is always the case."
Both are running for larger reasons, which include raising money to help dwarfs.
"There is something to prove," Windsor said. "I really hope that this run sends out a message to the greater population of little people that anything is possible."
David Abel can be reached at email@example.com. Follow him on Twitter @davabel.


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The 13th California 'Welcome to Our World' (W.O.W.) for California legislators and regulators will be held on Monday April 29 from 3-7 pm on the south steps of the state Capitol building in Sacramento, California.
Hosted by the Professional Beauty Federation of California and various sponsor companies, beauty industry executives spend quality time helping educate state policymakers and regulators on current issues of concern to the beauty industry in California, and share PBFC's positive message about the industry's professionalism. To learn more about becoming a WOW sponsor, contact Fred Jones at 530-887-9944.
Here are some photos from last year's California Beauty Federation's Welcome to Our World event.
For reprint and licensing requests for this article, Click here.


text: To quote my favorite show, Girls, "You tend to over-think things and that's an issue for you." I do tend to over-think things, particularly when it comes to my creative endeavors. I paused for two years post-college contemplating the perfect writing platform and waiting for the proper 'experience' to come along that would prove to be blog worthy. Teaching and living in Korea helped me to realize that I could learn to write about anything anywhere and I could no longer wait around for perfect circumstances. I needed to write as much as possible and only then would I become a better writer.


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Today Twitter confirmed that it has filed an S-1 with the SEC and is therefore on the road to going public. This is an important moment for Twitter, and for tech, as it shows that the IPO window is open. Here's Twitter on its filing:
Count to 10 and let's hope the damn thing leaks right away. We don't know much, but expect Twitter to go public at a valuation of roughly between $15 billion and $20 billion, roughly. Its last private money came in at around a $10 billion valuation, and those investors will want a return on their funds.
Goldman Sachs is said to be the lead underwriter of the offering.
Facebook's IPO, for comparison, valued the social giant at around $100 billion on the day of its flotation. The irony here is that Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg yesterday at Disrupt told the world that it should not be afraid of going public. Twitter did not decide to go public on the back of Zuck's axiom, but it is nicely pat that it announced this news the day after his comments.
Facebook's public offering was marred with trading errors and a slipping stock price, and the company lost tens of billions of value before it recovered. Facebook is currently trading at fresh highs, helping to set the stage for Twitter: Whatever the Facebook IPO hangover was, it is no more.
Twitter's public offering has been a very long time in coming, and contains inside of it oodles of institutional pressure: With hundreds of millions of invested capital under its belt, Twitter has a number of investors that want their money back. It has been well-managed, sure, but cash has a certain feel to it. The IPO will be a zoo. But it will be a fun zoo, and that is all that matters. The NASDAQ and the NYSE are at war a bit on who gets to host more tech offerings, but I think that we'll be seeing the NASDAQ scoop up this deal.
Now, what are Twitter's revenue and profit figures? We'll actually get to know soon, though the fact they are filing in this fashion does imply that Twitter had less than $1 billion in revenue in 2012. So, there's that.
Top Image Credit: Emmanuel Huybrechts


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When I was 17, I spent a month as an exchange student in Paris. I remember vividly one evening when my host mom had prepared a questionable looking fish of sort for dinner and placed it proudly in front of us. As hard as I tried, I could not eat the meal and afterwards my host mom took me aside. I knew she wasn't happy with me, and I had tried to explain my eating habits, but to no avail. She sat me down and, in the only English I ever heard her speak, she said, "You know, there are people starving in China."
Life is a bit more complicated when you are a picky eater, a category in which both my partner and I fall. We're not trying to be difficult, but we just don't like certain foods. Ok, a lot of foods. In our defense, we have tried, but no matter how some things are prepared, we just can't eat them. So far this doesn't sound so strange, right? Hang on a sec.
The foods that generally fall onto our "can't eat" list include all seafood, most vegetables, and just about anything made from these two food groups. It would be one thing if we could just avoid these dishes and move on, but people constantly harp on the fact that we don't eat these things. And it's annoying. I'm sorry I don't like lobster, but I don't belong in a circus freak show.
Fast forward to 2010. Throughout our travels, we've done a good job of finding things we can eat. Luckily grilled meat of some sort is a pretty common staple throughout the world. There are some trouble spots though that cause problems. Like the Bahamas.
I absolutely loved my brief stay in the Bahamas but, and I think they'll probably admit to this, their culinary point of view can be at times a bit questionable. As far as I can tell, their entire diet is based on conch. Or a dare. Or both. During one meal, our host was describing all of the possible variations on conch and, like a scene from Forrest Gump, I began to fully understand the width and breadth of my problem.
I, unlike Scott, can stomach small amounts of foods which I don't like in order to be polite. I had to do this in Morocco when I had to hold my noise to get down some sort of fresh veggie dish that had been made for us, and I did it again in the Bahamas. As it turns out, most of the conch I had was actually really good. The probable reason though is that it was breaded and deep fried, a universal cooking technique to make anything taste good. But the inevitable happened and a seafood showdown ensued.
We were at a meal, hosted at a local restaurant that had been set up to highlight Bahamian history and culture. That part was great. The meal started out as I had expected, with a couple of conch variants, all of which was fine. The next course though was too much for me to take. I don't remember exactly what it was, but I'm pretty sure it was something like fish with a side of fish and a delicious fish sauce.
I'm slightly envious of people who like seafood. They always look so happy when they're consuming shrimp or lobster and while I have tried, that same look of fishy pleasure is not to be for me. But what irritates me is that people can't seem to fathom the concept that there are people in this world who actually don't like seafood. Worse than that, they never, ever plan for us.
When the fish platter was announced, I just couldn't do it. I was tired and hungry and there was no way I could pretend to eat the seafood buffet headed my way. I tried, as politely and quietly as I could, to indicate to my hosts that I could not eat the kind entrée that had been prepared.
Simultaneously, I must have sprout antlers, since that could be the only explanation for the looks of shock and amazement I received in response to my confession. I doubt any other announcement could have elicited the same response.
They quickly regrouped and sent out what I suppose used to be red meat, but in its current form was more appropriate for shoe repair. The meal had become a disaster and I was starving.
I'm not writing this to say, woe is me, rather I want to announce to the world that it is not a crime to not like seafood. I'm not sure about this, but I am fairly certain that out of 6 billion people, Scott and I are not the only two people who don't participate in consuming this particular food group. I understand that many people love their lobstah rolls and chowdahs, which is fantastic! Yay you! But please, don't presuppose that we all have dreams of boiled crustaceans and instead of spending 20 minutes discussing how odd we are, help us find some ham or something.