Why is self-determination an inalienable right for the people of the Falklands, but a gross example of Iranian meddling for the people of Bahrain?
Answers on a postcard please with a twenty pound note and framed photo of William Hague to Wars’R’Us, Oil and Armaments Ltd, House of Lords.
Bahrain is the home for the US fifth fleet, obviously no need to invade the place or bomb the place into democracy. However because the pesky Bahrainis have bought into the cock and bull story of “democracy, freedom, self determination” lark, there is a need to put these jumped up villains/rioters/militia/illegal demonstrators/terrorists in their place; killing a few hundreds, maiming a few thousands, jailing a bunch. As well as copious applications of the the usual general coercion and harassment campaigns that Saudi do best, all out, in the open, can be a bit of bad mark for the dictator of Bahrain who is our very own hand picked dictator and does not dictate anything that we don’t tell him.
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Blame the Iranians, and the problem is solved, in fact I hear that Argentinians had been talking to Iranians before deciding to start the Malvinas lark again. However, as we all know the two hundred Bennies in Falklands are indeed in need of “freedom and democracy” from the mullahs in Iran. Ergo problems solved. The short answer: Save the Bennies, kill the Arabs and blame the Persians for all the mishaps.
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Where do I apply to get me fiver?
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PS even with so much loot stolen from various vanquished nations, the bunch of pratts running the show still have fucked up their economies so bad to the extent of the current deep shit they are to be found. How can these incompetent bastards get away with mass murder is beyond logic?
For that matter, why is self determination an inalienable right for the people of the Falkland islands, while we Brits are deemed not competent to choose for ourselves whether we want the EUSSR to absorb and govern us. Politicians are a breed that make it up as they go along according what suits them best. Treason’s’us.
http://jews4big.wordpress.com/2011/12/22/build-pressure-on-uefa-to-red-card-israeli-apartheid/
“That will become increasingly hard to justify as schools shut down and hospitals cut services in the UK.”
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Err – they don’t need to justify anything. Everyone who votes will be voting for them (Lib/Lab/Con) at the next general election, just as they did at the last, just as they will at the next after that, and after that and after that. They have a permanent electoral mandate. Kings were legitimised by religion, democratic governments are legitimised by the same ignorance. They have no more validity than voodoo.
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Darwin’s natural selection doesn’t mean that we shall ascend, discarding our weaker traits, evolving and strengthening. Most species that appeared have already disappeared. We’re like to join them.
A4E Give it a few years and we will be reading the same sort of thing about the ‘health’ outfits.
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2012/feb/24/emma-harrison-quits-chairman-a4e
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Will Harrison be refunding any of the £180m she has extracted from the HMG? Is Cameron’s face even more red? Probably not.
I was wrong. A4E’s take is £234m.
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…a firm whose £234m turnover depends entirely on government contracts and yet repeatedly fails to meet its targets.
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http://www.private-eye.co.uk/sections.php?section_link=in_the_back&
Craig. Humans have an inalienable right to worship their sole Creator on His Own. That’s their fitra, their birth-right and internal programming. Shi’a place the blood descendants of our prophet SAW, over those who adhere to the religion in its rules of Justice and how to treat other human beings. They worship saints in their graves instead of the Living God.
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Saudi Salafism has completely failed to deliver the justice of Islam, but it tries to deliver the inalienable right of Tawheed, monotheism.
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Sheep on the other hand have an inalienable right to eat grass, whether they are in a paddock in Kent or in the Falkland Islands. I wouldn’t send a battleship to fight over the ownership of the grass or the oil.
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Similarly until and unless the regime in Saudi Arabia protects the central core of Justice in the religion of Islam, I wouldn’t join its mercenaries in Syria to fight over the ownership of that country. Without reform they will just be replacing one form of dictatorship with another. Shi’a shirk or Al Qaida Stupidism. Maybe the names on the arms/oil contracts will change.
Despite my leftist instincts, I’m for the Bennies. They are not depriving any Argentine of his dinner. I had to spend a lot of time in Argentina in the 1970s. They are pretty nuts. At that time, they were claiming the S Pole was Argentinian, since an air force wife had given birth to a son on an Antarctic base. Argentinian blood had sanctified the national territory! Real Blut und Boden Nazi stuff. Trouble is, the Args have a huge chip on the shoulder. They imagine themselves a world power but have used their army only to slaughter their own natives. Their
neighbours laugh at their pretensions of being an outpost of white European culture, while they sneer at their ‘mestizo’ neighbours, and resent it when the Americans dismiss them as another bunch of greasers. The problem with the Falklands is that it is not a real, cohesive place. There is no ‘there’ there. The island of Mauritius at 2,000km2 has a population of 1.2 million, while the Falklands, at 12,000km2, have a permanent population of less than 2,000. Unlike, say, the Bahamas,there is no nationhood or identity, suitable for statehood. They have built no roads or towns. The place is the size of East Anglia, yet apart from Stanley, a sort of Butlin’s holiday camp, there is nobody there. The UK will inevitably revert to indifference. However the Args are terrified of the
efficient Chileans and back off from any dispute. Therefore the best future for the islands would be as an extra province of Chile, next to Magallanes…..Tierra de los Bennios!
A propos, how come the Benny population is so low after 160 years? There should be loads of them. Don’t they breed? Where do they put the children? It all seems a bit ‘Village of the Damned’….
Sandman, only in the fantasies of the Unionist Labour, Tory and Liberal Democratic parties which delusions you presumably share; your point about the Shetland Islands is straight out of the McCrone report, which infamous paper tries, as you do to foment differences where none exist between mainland Scotland and the Islands Of Orkney and Shetland. I’ve no doubt these approaches from the Falkland Islanders are another red-herring and their instigation probably stems from Whitehall Machiavellianism rather than Falkland Island sentiment.
Having around 8 percent of the UK population Scotland can expect around 8 percent of the Falkland Islands as with all other joint possessions, to dispose of in due course as they will. England, outside of the city of London has nothing in common with the elitist cabal of politicians and fatcats within, there’s a far stronger argument there for separation, infact these crooks have already set themselves apart from everyone else and in truth do not belong and England would be better without the capital lording it over them as no doubt would everyone else here and around the world.
I am of course sympathetic to the plight of England and Wales, left all on their own, subjected exclusively to the torments of the tyrants of Westminster and Whitehall after Scotland has broken free; by then most of the UK’s foreign buccaneering will also be at an end as the US partner in crime implodes into very uncivil well-armed fratricide, roughly half-an-hour after they run out of motor fuels for civilian use. Westminster will then turn on their remaining English and Welsh captives, their first and ultimately also last victims, and only outlet, with a vengeance and with impotent and terrible rage.
Furthermore, what about the fool Tappin, now languishing in a hellhole in El Paso? No UK government [‘Better live on your knees than die on your feet’] can be anything but abject towards Amerika, but had this Brit no wit? He’s 65 FFS! Rather than dying in an Amerikan jail, he had plenty of time to sell up and disappear to Dublin, or Paris, or the Costa del Crime. Presumably not short of money, he could then plan a sunny non-extraditable retirement in Malaysia, Venezuela, Brazil…etc…
A genuine passport from Belize, Jamaica, or Montenegro is available at reasonable cost. FFS what was wrong with him? It is a genuine question. Anybody sane would be on their toes.
Even Belgium wouldn’t extradite him.
Bonifacegoncourt: at 1.53 am on 25 Feb you wrote:
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“The problem with the Falklands is that it is not a real, cohesive place. There is no ‘there’ there. The island of Mauritius at 2,000km2 has a population of 1.2 million, while the Falklands, at 12,000km2, have a permanent population of less than 2,000. Unlike, say, the Bahamas,there is no nationhood or identity, suitable for statehood. They have built no roads or towns. The place is the size of East Anglia, yet apart from Stanley, a sort of Butlin’s holiday camp, there is nobody there.”
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Having visited the Falklands and having friends there who perfectly rationally and emotionally regard “there” as their home, I find it hard to know which of your strange points to deal with first. Some people will tell you that most of the 700 or so islands in the Falklands archipelago are “uninhabited”. That’s only true if only humans count as inhabitants.
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Nor do I see why density of human population should be regarded as making a place more real or cohesive. Mauritius, where I also have friends, is regarded by many of them as considerably lacking in cohesion – those descended from indentured labourers from India, from Chinese emigrants, from colonial French stock – as well as Chagossians dumped by HMG on the quayside of Port Louis (go and see “A Few Man Fridays” at the Riverside Studios, Hammersmith before 10 March; and listen to the Radio 4 “Midweek” interview on 22 Feb with a Chagossian exile and the author of the play): these people often get on badly with each other. And ask those in Rodrigues how much they appreciate the cohesiveness of rule from Port Louis.
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If the Falklands had as large a population as Mauritius there would be considerable environmental degradation; and if Mauritius had the population of the Falklands it would be a far pleasanter place in which to live – and, as well as humans, there would be extensive endemic fauna and flora, perhaps including the Dodo.
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Why not deal with the world as it is rather than pretend that places don’t exist and that large human populations make places more real? And talk to the Tierra del Fuegians – if you can find any – about the benefits of colonization by Europeans and Argentines of European origin.
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PS The food in the Falklands is as far away from Butlin’s bangers and mash as the islands are from Billy’s beach chalets. Indeed, it is almost as good as the best restaurants in Mauritius.
OT, but on the subject of yesterday’s Extradition of the 65 yr old British Chap who allegedly exported batteries to Iran.
A BBC reporter called ‘Andrew’ has just said on their breakfast program ( 7:23am ) “he had no idea these batteries were to be used in a nuclear missile”
‘nuclear’ !!!!!!!! – Deliberate propaganda. sigh.
http://www.smeggys.co.uk/images/smilies/zbc_news.gif
I read they hadn’t had fresh eggs or salad vegetables in the Falklands for almost two years prior to the future King Billy’s impending arrival there, and that a South American trading boycott of the islands has bitten hard. Not being familiar with the restaurants of Mauritius, I can’t comment on the lack of choice or nutrition there or the merits of the different methods of rendering mutton almost palatable. I can hardly believe its far flung parts being some sort of unspoilt nature reserve is a justification for the continued burden, and sheep I doubt were indigenous to the Falklands. Strange how we’re left with all the cold wet and windy places post-empire, yet gave away jewels such as Palestine at a bankers whim. As Europeans, we’re not known for our philanthropy or over-burdened by concern for the natural world or its diversity, preferring it hunted, shot skinned, under a glass slide or stuffed and mounted, humans included, else herds of buffalo would still roam North America.
Oilbaron McJock Of The Isles [which isles would these be then?]: I can assure you that the food is excellent, especially the seafood and Roast Upland Goose. For a taster, go to http://www.falklandislands.com/contents/view/58 .
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Don’t be so dismissive of “wet and windy places”:
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This darksome burn, horseback brown,
His rollrock highroad roaring down,
In coop and in comb the fleece of his foam
Flutes and low to the lake falls home.
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A windpuff-bonnet of fáwn-fróth
Turns and twindles over the broth
Of a pool so pitchblack, féll-frówning,
It rounds and rounds Despair to drowning.
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Degged with dew, dappled with dew
Are the groins of the braes that the brook treads through,
Wiry heathpacks, flitches of fern,
And the beadbonny ash that sits over the burn.
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What would the world be, once bereft
Of wet and of wildness ? Let them be left,
O let them be left, wildness and wet ;
Long live the weeds and the wilderness yet.
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Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844-1889) “Inversnaid”
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Most humans – and not just Europeans, though they indulged in species-cleansing with the greater efficiency of their firearms (cf big game hunters like the Duke of Edinburgh) – have wrought havoc on the natural world. However, attitudes are changing. The Falkland Islanders have an excellent record – far better than the UK – in conservation, human rights and non-aggression.
Thanks Iain. I like the alliteration there and the imagery.
Not bad for such a wee chap, only 5’2″. And such a short life sadly.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerard_Manley_Hopkins
I read they hadn’t had fresh eggs or salad vegetables in the Falklands for almost two years
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The Falklanders are being denied egg and cress sandwiches. The UK government’s response of sending nuclear powered and armed forces is well considered, balanced and justified.
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It is another fine judgment by closet homosexual and alleged Foreign Secretary William Hague. The British people can be proud to have this man representing them on the world stage.
Guano, I was brought up as a Shia, although, and as I grew up, I found out for myself that Sunni is most likely to be the true path of those who are Muslim, I am not practicing either and prefer to follow path of humanity, but I can assure you, Shiaa Do not worship anyone but Allah, and believe he is the only one and do not see anyone else as his equal. Yes there is lot nonsense there, 1400 years later they still mourn the grandson of the prophet, but there is a clear line drawn between Allah and his prophet or descendants of him. There are times I believe that theocracy in both spread this nonsense for power.
Just had to leave this reply to Simon Tisdalls article, though I do not expect the Goniad to let is sully their pristine hasbara forum.
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/feb/24/iran-war-buildup-iraq
Fact Persia/Iran has never attacked another nation for 2500 years, although it had to defend itself against aggressors from outside and it did.
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“The regime in Iran is extraordinarily unpopular and corrupt. It is a vile, vile government.” dualismn wrote.
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Poppycock propaganda
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Ahmadinedjad was re-elected, despite the 400 million/annum spend on undermining his regime since 2004 and I do not agree that his regime is more vile than that of the Shah. It was the Shah who left Bahrains shia’s to suffer under its sunni rulers, not khomeni.
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Vile practises in Iran will be tackled by its people, society is far more modern than that of any other Arab enforced regimes and the electoral process is also better than anything Saudi can come up with.
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What is vile is thst the same leviathan politicians who had no regards for Iraq’s future when they attacked Baghdad, are using the same lame excuses to wind up and provoke Iran/Persia into a response.
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Whilst we have no problems seeing the Falklands as ours, Bahrain, inhabited largely by Iranian shia’s, was part of Iran until 1951, did we hear any claims made by Irans so called regime?
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Iran is being bullied into a war by a small group of vested interests and neocon war mongers, so fret you not, we are proposing nothing more than violence and death for amny more civilians and those who crow for the use of nuclear weapons on Iran are clearly mad or psychopathic, because they are proposing to pollute and contaminate third parties with isotope they have no conmtrol over, criminal would be another word for it.
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The UK/US and its western vasall NATO are now the tools for oppression, like mafiosis who rather shoot than pay the full price for others resources, we are now judge juror and executioners, just to get our way. It is despicable that our newspapers are part of this agenda, as is the BBC.
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Finally, this continuous baying for more violence against Arabs who are able to hold their own in the ME, will work against our long term aims and objectives, it will sour relations with Muslim/Arab countries for decades, if ever reparable, not a good example to set for our children, we are increasing our own unsustainable lifestyles at their peril making their future life’s hell on earth.
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We must never forget that Persia has never attacked another nation, it is one of the oldest civilisations on earth, its ancient breadbasket and bringer of poetry, matmatics. Persia’s constitution safeguards minorities rights, for hundreds of years, when the buffaloes still roamed the American plains and its indigenous Indian populations was able to live sustainably.
Actually I should mention that my son (who is a practicing Sunni), has studied both (in original text in Arabic), also confirms that there is nothing in any of the these books to demonstrate what many are claiming. Shiaa religion was invented to divide the Muslims of the world and it has achieved its goal!
Top story in the New York Times:
‘U.S. Agencies See No Move by Iran to Build a Bomb’ tinyurl.com/74k9t2r
Azra
would it not be a good idea to practise?
Thanks for your clear explanation of Shi’a belief.
Can you tell me what distinguishes the Alawi sect from others please?
O/T GB February 2012
Loan sharks. Payday loans threats and intimidation
When her account was eventually passed on to debt collectors, her original £100 loan had spiralled to £750. She is now paying back £50 a month.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-17127951
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Workfare.
The scheme, aimed at 16- to 24-year-olds on jobseeker’s allowance (JSA), allows them to do unpaid work experience with a company for up to eight weeks – without losing their benefit and potentially with some expenses paid. But if jobseekers choose to take part and then fail to turn up without good reason after the first week, their benefits could be docked for a period. This has led critics to question whether the placements are really “voluntary”.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-17150593
Mary
Gerard Manley Hopkins
Glory be to God for dappled things, or The Windhover
These amazing poems and psychedelia fashion and hard rock are part of my childhood. They simply blow the mind, but nothing touches the Qur’an for totally blasting one’s mind into outer space.
bonifacegoncourt,
Not having traveled along with the Gaucho on the plains of Argentina, I take your word for their hubris and arrogance. However due to the endemic fascist tendencies fostered and promoted by the School of Americas in US, we can safely assume that regardless of Argies or Chilean taking the mantel of power over the Bennies their lot would be the same.
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However, given that the costs of keeping the Bennies all democratic and free is getting born by the unemployed, the sick, the retired, and the school children, on the mainland. Further, without much of returns in any tangible way. It is high time that the oligarchs either started to exploit the resources of that god forsaken corner of the Earth, instead of trooping up to the mid east and fighting over the access to oil, or sell/lease the Bennies as they did with the Scots and the Irish.
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The grand notions of dominions and shite may have been appealing to those free loaders who did not traipse around the world looking for fights and wars, but the current batch of free loaders taking the piss by burning the candle at th both ends cannot justify the extra costs of keeping the Islands and best to either hand these over or start drilling pronto.
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Oilbaron McJock of the Isles,
Ditto
How come the banker gets the cream and honey, and we are left with the afterbirth?
Oilbaron McJock of the Isles: the notion that Scotland would take 8% of each of the UK’s overseas territories is a ludicrous one.
I live in Bermuda, which is 21 sq miles. Which 8% is going to go Scotch?
The overseas territories are largely autonomous, with Westminster having a say in foreign affairs, etc. They are also all common law jurisdictions. Doesn’t sit easily with Scotch civil law.
If Scotland went independent, it would have no bearing on the overseas territories. The Queen would still appoint the Governor, and Scotland would have no say in the matter.
I am ambivalent about Scotch independence – it’s a matter for the Scotch, just as Shetlands independence is a matter for the Shetlanders (if I were Shetlander, I’d be seriously considering campaigning for the Shetlands to be an autonomous overseas territory if Scotland goes independent, like its close neighbour the Faroes).
But the Scotch can keep their hands off Bermuda – it’s nothing to do with you!!!
Azra, Guano,
his prophet or descendants of him…….. Shiaa religion was invented to divide the Muslims of the world and it has achieved its goal!
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Fact that Saudi have proved to be the perfect Muslims and custodians of all things Islamic, proving their devotion through their shameless hiring out of; Allah and profit Muhammad to the Yanks and the ziofuckwits. That in turn clarifies the notions of a unified Muslim brotherhood would have spelled out the total and abject subjugation of all Muslims to the AIPAC ran US control constructs.
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Often those expounding worship for the sake of worship, are the agents of reaction or caught up in the torrents of propaganda, that discounts/forget the basic tenets of religion being a set of rule to be abided by all of the members of a society/group in the way of facilitating a harmonious life and coexistence.
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Therefore religion is politics, and judging by the dogmatic mumbo jumbo passed as the political debate evidently politics is a religion too, hence the almost automatic disdain of the politicians for the religious lot. Furthermore given the excess of the Caliphates that rendered the Islamic world to be so underdeveloped due to the lack of foresight and forethought brought on by the constant state of intoxication of the various Caliphs in their respective harems, the best that could have happened to Islam was the advent of the Shia, that to date keeps the corrupt bastards from degrading Islam further. Although this latter point is debatable given the Saudi efforts in this direction.
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Shia rejection of Ab Bakar (Muhammad’s father in law) being the first Caliph ( he actually became the first Caliph), instead accepting the choice of Muhammad who appointed Ali his son in law as the first Caliph (theoretically) has nothing to do with idolatry and or saint worship but getting back to the basics of the choice of the prophet at the time of his death.
Guano, As you are aware Iranian are not Alawi and what I was taught in my younger years is what you call 12 imams shiaa (nearly all the Iranian Muslim follow this branch of Shiaa) therefore I really do not know what distinguish Alawis from others. I need to ask my son, he will know I am sure .
Passerby : I agree, those who worship for sake of worship, are easily corrupted, whether they call themselves Muslim, Jews or Christians..
Passerby,
Why do you keep calling the Falklanders Bennies? I know where the term originated from, but it is the height of dis-respect.