Italian Fear for Rascists!

In the Swedish newspaper SvD (Swe link) they write about the Italian fotball player Mario Balotelli who is the big question if he will play in European Championship in Fotball. If he is subjected to racism, he leaves the plan immediately and goes home. He don't tolerate racism. Now coach Cesare Prandelli is supporting Balotelli to stay in the European Championship, by saying he will leave the bench andwalk out on the pitch if it happens. The team is also supporting Balotelli because he is a good player and very very important. The Italian team talked in a press conference last Thursday and said that they will help him with problems and if they sing racist songs. The group who Italy is playing in is C where Spain, Croatia, and Ireland also plays. Italy will be staying in a hotel in Krakow (Poland).

According to the Telegraph he said it after hearing warnings from Sol Campbell in a BBC program about violence in football. Ukraine and Poland reacted strongly and disliked what he said.

My opinion is clear here.

Poland

I believe that Poland will do a good job in protecting everybody against rascists. I've been there and seen how helpful they are and trust them. One thing they can't protect against is that after hearing Balotelli saying like that surely some people will sing rascistic songs if they are on the edge to loose playing with Italy!

To understand this you only have to look at Sweden. That is a safe country, but anyway there are rascists there that say studipd things. For example did the party secretary in Sverigedemokraterna, Björn Söder, say "Sweden?" (Swe link) on his facebook page when Sweden won the Eurovision Song Contest 2012 (Read more on this post). Sweden had a singer those parents were born in Morocco, and the party have a lot of people from the old Neo-nazist party among their voters. If Sweden has dirty among their "top" politicians, then it is no wonder if it happens to be some in Poland too. That is no excuse, we all have to proceed fighting for the equal rights for everybody.

Ukraine

Ukraine, on the other hand, I doubt will be able to protect the players and audiance against rascists. Why? Because if they can't protect their own ex-premier minister and democratic fighter, Tymoshenko, against the dictator and a seven years long time in prison, why should they want to protect foreigners?Also by listening to people in Romania makeing me doubt. When I was going to travell by car from the north of Romania to Poland I was told it was unsafe to drive past Ukraine, although I would save 400 kilometers. I was told stories about cars being stoped by the police and robbed and other things. Well, I doubt in Ukraine, but we will see. Time will tell.

Lets hope that the players dare to fight un-democratic powers in the world by telling that Ukraine is a dictatorship and that they should releaseTymoshenko, just like Loreen dared in Azerbaijan!

Hypatia- Christian censorship victime

Old news
Hypatia was murdered by christian monks in a riot in Alexandria year 415. She was working in the Library of Alexandria until the pope Theophilus ordered it's destruction, he is now a saint in the coptic church. When the pope died Cyril became pope after his uncle. He ordered massacres of jews and pagans, and where in a conflict with the roman prefect, how had Hypatia as his advisor and philosophy teacher. That made Cyril trying to get her out of the way by all means, until he started a small riot so that monks attacked Hypatia on her way home, stripped her naked and dragged her through the city to a Christian tempel were they skinned her with tiles and then cut her body in parts. Finally they burnt her body. Cyril is a saint in most of the Christian churches, and one of the church fathers according to the Catholics.

That's history and fact, but how does that affect us?
2009 a great epic Spanish movie, Agora, went in the cinemas in most European countries telling this story, and it became the most visited spanish movie in Spain that year.. It was broadcasted in Swedish television this week. When the end of the movie came with the death of Hypatia (not showing all the cruellity made by the monks), my beloved one cried out load in the sofa next to me. She could not understand why and how, and she is a student of theology and christian history- knowing her subjects.

Censorship
In Spain the catholic defens group Observatorio Antidifamación Religiosa wrote an open letter how the movie where raising hatred against Christianity and reinforcing false clichés about the Catholic church. When the director Amenábar responded that he wanted to say the movie was against those who kill in the name of their god the group responded "Why didn't you make a movie about the Middle East (the muslims they ment)?". Hey are we supposed to hide the truth here? That is facts, written by christian bishops during the time it happened.


In the US they did not want to buy the movie claiming it "was to intellectual and heavy". A silly claim. making US citizens look stupid by their own leaders (I know that is not true, not my friends there anyway...) The real reason seems to be the religious causes too. The companies where affraid to buy it, making the right fanatics of christianity in the US angry, and then loosing a lot of money. Maximum of theatres showing the movie duing a weekend in 2010 (the year they showed it there after a year of censorship) was 17. Only 17 in all of the US of A! What a terrible shame.


The coptic church, what did they do? Well, they stopped the movie from being shown in Egypt and poor Hypatias hometown Alexandria by claiming it "is an insult of the religion". Of course they say so, their saints real faces would be shown for the masses, scary to show that even christians have killed lika that?


School
I lika Hypatia. I use to show her as a good example, while teaching, of a woman scientist struggling because her sex, but being one of the best. She and Marie Curie will help the girls to find good examples that they are as good, or better, than the boys. That girls are ment to study math and science too!!!


May Hypatia not be a brick in a religios fight about a religion she did not even believe in. She believed in philosophy!