Beneath description.

This is a press release I just translated in English for a client. I have their permission to publish it in my blog.

PRESS RELEASE

“You took us a bunch of little apes”: thrown out of the hotel where they had reserved a three-day holiday.


The Park Hotel of Abbadia Lariana (province of Lecco) throws out a group of disabled young boys and girls who attend the CDD (Disabled Daycare Centre) of Macherio, near Milan.



Rome, September 26 – The CND – Italian National Council on Disability – denounces a monstrous event which took place yesterday at the Park Hotel, Abbadia Lariana, on the Lecco branch of Lake Como. A group of disabled boys and girls were guests of the hotel to experience three days of leisure and autonomous holiday time.

At the end of lunch a girl had a fit of vomiting. Suddenly the hotel’s female owner and her daughter exploded into unprovoked fury.

The children’s educators could not bear to repeat to their parents the obscene and vicious expressions thrown at them, but above all at the children; not to mention the savage tone. No parent could bear them. After some insistence, they only repeated the least odious: “you brought us a bunch of little apes”.
“They did not even let us back into the reception to return the room keys, and they made us leave by the service door,” they added.

“Cruelty and ignorance”, was the horrified comment of Luisa Bosisisio Fazzi, President of CND and mother of one of the boys who suffered this outrage – “one can only hope that these persons never have to expeience what they inflicted on us. It would be hideous for those they love”. She then added: “I now hope that justice proceed swiftly – following the appropriate report to the local authorities – to censure this barbarous behaviour and return serenity to the children, who were all too able to perceive the assault on their selves.”

This umpteenth instance of violation of disabled persons’ human rights, and in this case of persons unable to represent or defend themselves, reminds the whole of society how urgent it is to include the matter of disability into the agenda of Justice, as stated last week by European Commissioner Frattini.

For more information please contact: Alessia Bracci, Secretary, CND

Consiglio Nazionale sulla Disabilità (CND) is the umbrella organisation that represents the interests of disabled citizens in the European Disability Forum (EDF). It is composed of 32 nationwide associations including FISH. Its mission is to ensure disbled persons the full fruition and defence of their fundamental human rights.


I have not been able to find an e-mail address for this place (EDIT, apparently the e-mail is info@parkhotalabbadia.com; however, an attempted e-mail ended up undelivered) but the snail-mail address is as follows: Park Hotel - Via Nazionale 42 - 23821 Abbadia Lariana (LC) - ITALY
tel. +39 341 703193
fax +39 341 703194
And they have a website: http://www.parkhotelabbadia.com/

Please, everyone who can, write to these sods and complain. Copy this on your LJs and get your friends to do the same. This is something that must never be allowed to happen.

I ripped this hilarious item off R.J.Neuhaus, who got it from someone else, who....

I only wish I had had the brains to think of it.

I don’t vouch for the authenticity of this. It was sent me by someone who calls himself “Diogenes.” The editorial note by “JL” does lend a note of credibility to the claim that it is the first draft for a story in the New York Times. In any event, here it is:

Pick Seen as Sign of Contradiction

By Ian Fisher

CAESAREA PHILIPPI (20 Kislev). Yesterday’s surprise announcement that doctrinal hardliner Jesus of Nazareth had been anointed “messiah” provoked mixed reactions in the diverse and sometimes fractious Israelite community, ranging from cautious disappointment to frank despair.

“I see it as a missed opportunity,” said Herodias Schneidkopf, a Galilean incest-rights activist. “Many of us were hoping for someone more open to leadership roles for women and more appreciative of our experience. I don’t feel valued.”

Respected archpriest Caiaphas Bar Nun agreed. “Above all, the messiah should be a good listener. How can we as a faith community keep credibility among the youth of today if we cling to every jot and tittle of an outmoded social code while thousands die of leprosy and hunger? Today’s highly educated Judahite community isn’t satisfied with the old answers. I’m afraid it’s a missed opportunity.”

Even some members of the Messiah’s personal entourage expressed misgivings. The Rev. J.E. “Dimples” Iscariot, S.J., a media consultant, did not hide his regret. “A missed opportunity, I’m afraid. We in the Society of Judas traditionally enjoy a special relationship to the messiah, but we’ll find this choice very hard to explain to gays and lesbians—I mean, of course, to gomorrhaists and sodomitesses—as well as to the divorced and the marginalized. Why just the other day I saw 300 denarii, which might have been used to help find a cure for leprosy, squandered on wholly unnecessary ritual excesses.”

Fighting the spread of leprosy is a vexed issue among contemporary Palestinians. Most polls show Israelites widely ignore official teachings on ethical matters, preferring to follow their own conscience. Some see Jesus’ moral conservatism as a rigidity that leads to disfigurement and death in at-risk populations—and that may ultimately doom his movement to irrelevance.

“Yesterday’s unction was an opportunity missed,” insisted real-estate broker Sapphira Glass. “Today’s young professionals don’t find their own experience reflected in a one-size-fits-all morality that limits options and encodes patriarchal bias. I mean, sacrificing one’s newborns to Moloch is a tragic but often necessary choice, and many of us find the language of apostasy alienating and judgmental.” [NYT copyeditor’s note: Need some quote from supporter—J.L.]

“It all comes down to power,” countered maverick theologian Fr. Richard Maccabeus, retired professor of applied autology, who pointed out that the successful candidate had almost no pastoral experience. “What we’re seeing is a right-wing restorationist fantasy in its death throes. Intelligent Israelites aren’t buying. We want to be heard. We want someone who speaks not with authority but like us academics—I mean, of course, like the scribes and the pharisees. One can only call it a missed opportunity.”

The Procurator of Judea was unavailable for comment.

For dreamer_marie and patchworkmind

My post of five days ago, about Kate Moss, has generated more reaction than I imagined, especially from two members of my f-list. I am, however, unhappy at some of the features of their debate; and I think it is time - as the starter of the thread, the man-in-charge of this blog, and a person, since age has been mentioned, older than either of you - to call for order in this debate. It has got rather more rancorous than I like. And it has gone on sterile, unprofitable ground, far away from its original point.

I will begin by administering both of you a spanking. If you wanna get mad, I will give you reason to get mad at me, instead of at each other.( Read more... )

Boorman's masterpiece

I have acquired John Boorman's EXCALIBUR, which I remembered as an extraordinary experience - and it is. (However, infuriatingly, I ended up with one CD with the first half of the movie in Spanish, and the second in Italian. So much for file-swapping.) One thing that struck me, however, was a peculiarity of the cast: all the protagonists - Arthur, Merlin, Lancelot, Guinevere - are played by good, even excellent actors, but actors, except for Helen Mirren (Morgana), who for some reason do not seem to have had the most towering movie careers. Except for Mirren, you could not unfairly say that as far as the silver screen is concerned, EXCALIBUR was their finest hour. Among the second-rank actors, however, we find Gabriel Byrne (Uther Pendragon), Liam Neeson (Sir Gawain), Corin Redgrave (the Duke of Cornwall), Patrick Stewart (King Leodegrance). That's a pretty fantastic supporting cast. I wonder how many other cases there are where so many of the backing actors are more famous than the principals?