In Värmland, where I live, we house about 160 out of Sweden's 200 wolves. The first wolves were sighted in 1979 and they have been a hot topic for discussion ever since then. there are people out there willing to break laws in order to get rid of these animals. A well known saying in the woods is "Skjut, gräv,tig!" meaning: Shoot a wolf, bury it and keep your mouth shut. These people ted to blame everything on the wolves. But is it really the Big Bad Wolf hiding in our woods?
The first thing a wolf hater claims is that wolves kill sheep (raindeers if you're further up north). Yes they do. Wolves hunt in families. They can be 2-8 individuals in a family. Each family needs to hunt every third day which means that they come back to the dead animal one or two times before they hunt for a new meal. What happens when the family runs in to a heard of sheep is the same thing that happens to us at a Smörgåsbord. We get blinded by all the food and over fill the plate. The eye is hungrier than the stomach. The wolves kill more sheep than intended just because they're there and because they intend to come back. This would not happen if more farmers put up fences, specially constructed to keep predatory animals out or if they went back to keeping watch as they did a hundred years ago.
Another thing wolf haters like to blame wolves for is killing all the moose in the woods. Hunters complain that there aren't any animals left for them to shoot. What they keep forgetting is that the traditional moose hunt every autumn was once introduced because of the wolves being locally extinct in the area (by shooting). Therefore they had to keep the moose number on a steady level. This have been going on for a century,making it a tradition hunters won't give up easily. But, as I said in the first paragraph, wolves hunt every third day. This means that one family kills approximately 100 moose every year, and this is a high number since it postulates no other food is supplied in form of deers or sheep. Let's say there are around 10 families. Thenumber of killed moose would be maybe 1.000. it's a small number compared to the over 60.ooo moose shot by hunters. I would say there's enough to both parties, don't you? Another thing that speaks for the wolves is that they take the sick and weak animals whilst hunters kill the healthy, child producing ones.
Last, but not least, another reason for wanting the wolves dead is that they kill dogs and that they are dangerous to humans. Many editorial letters have been written about how parents don't dare to let their children play outside or let the dogs stay out because of the wolves. fact is that out of 1000 killed dogs the main part is killed by cars, then there are about 135 dogs shot by other hunters by mistake, and then we have about 50-70 dogs taken by wolves. This often happens when the dog comes in to a wolf's territory. If hunters would go back to the more traditional way of hunting - sit on stake-out - instead of hunt with dogs, this would not occur at all. When it comes to people being scared, I think we have read too much fairytales like Little Red Riding Hood. In 1821 there was ONE human killed by wolves. It was a child, weakened from famine who was taken. No other rapported casulties are known in Sweden.
As a conclusion I would like to say that predjudices are easily born and fed, but by knowing facts and serving it to anyone prejudgemental we can starve them to death. Instead of Shoot, dig and Shut up we could get a complex world where everyone, animal and human, have a place. The same thing goes for racist prejudges. Kill them too with facts. Make sure you are always well prepared and ready for discussion. i could give youa solid ground to stand on when it comes to that subject too.... but I guess that will have to wait 'til another time.
onsdag 20 maj 2009
onsdag 13 maj 2009
Is it 1984 in a 2009 version?
The new high tech society offers many possibilities and much danger. We have cameras everywhere, when we make a purchase it is registered and saved and we even invite people to keep an eye on us.
Cameras. Good or bad? Well, it depends on who you're asking. I'm not planning on doing something outside the law and therefore I'm not worried. I don't care if a camera somewhere happens to record me scratching some private parts or picking my nose. If the same camera one day will help the police to solve a rape or a murder, I can live with them seeing me in a precarious situation. (Insertion: Almost the very same minute I aired this text a girl was raped outside a funfair in Gothenburg. The perpetrators could soon be arrested because the whole thing was filmed by secuity ameras in the areas.) If I had been the bad guy I probably would have another opinion. Off course there are risks with all these cameras even for us law-abiding citizens. If the recordings end up in the wrong hands, like the hands of a power-mad politician, things could go awfully wrong.
The same thing goes for credit card registrations when buying stuff. I have nothing to hide but I can understand people who don't want anyone to know exactly how many bottles of vodka they consume in a week. Here I'm thinking about a murder case fron the north of Sweden where the police got access to the alcohole habits of a murder suspect. I don't think he was amused at all.
So, what do I mean when I say that we even invite people to keep an eye on us? It started with a new kind of shows on TV called Docu-soaps. Ordinary people was put in different inviroments having cameras filming 24-7. Remember Big Brother and Survivor (Robinson)? Baren? Now we don't need to watch TV to get close to others, we only need a computer. People tend to be quite naïve when it comes to this medium. Without a second thought do we share pictures, films and sound from parties, christmas at granmother's or a family dinner at home. I have Facebook myself but I'm very cautious with what pictures of me I want others to see and I never put pictures of my children out on the Internet. They haven't said OK and they're too young to make that decision and I'm not the one to make it for them. I have friends who put every single party picture out on Facebook, even though we constantly read about employers who look up future employees and who makes an opinion about the person based on these pictures. Who wants to employ someone who seems to have a drink in his/her hand all the time? Think about it... especially if you want to be a teacher.....
After racking my mind about my feelings toward an Orwell society I can conclude that I have mixed feelings.
Cameras. Good or bad? Well, it depends on who you're asking. I'm not planning on doing something outside the law and therefore I'm not worried. I don't care if a camera somewhere happens to record me scratching some private parts or picking my nose. If the same camera one day will help the police to solve a rape or a murder, I can live with them seeing me in a precarious situation. (Insertion: Almost the very same minute I aired this text a girl was raped outside a funfair in Gothenburg. The perpetrators could soon be arrested because the whole thing was filmed by secuity ameras in the areas.) If I had been the bad guy I probably would have another opinion. Off course there are risks with all these cameras even for us law-abiding citizens. If the recordings end up in the wrong hands, like the hands of a power-mad politician, things could go awfully wrong.
The same thing goes for credit card registrations when buying stuff. I have nothing to hide but I can understand people who don't want anyone to know exactly how many bottles of vodka they consume in a week. Here I'm thinking about a murder case fron the north of Sweden where the police got access to the alcohole habits of a murder suspect. I don't think he was amused at all.
So, what do I mean when I say that we even invite people to keep an eye on us? It started with a new kind of shows on TV called Docu-soaps. Ordinary people was put in different inviroments having cameras filming 24-7. Remember Big Brother and Survivor (Robinson)? Baren? Now we don't need to watch TV to get close to others, we only need a computer. People tend to be quite naïve when it comes to this medium. Without a second thought do we share pictures, films and sound from parties, christmas at granmother's or a family dinner at home. I have Facebook myself but I'm very cautious with what pictures of me I want others to see and I never put pictures of my children out on the Internet. They haven't said OK and they're too young to make that decision and I'm not the one to make it for them. I have friends who put every single party picture out on Facebook, even though we constantly read about employers who look up future employees and who makes an opinion about the person based on these pictures. Who wants to employ someone who seems to have a drink in his/her hand all the time? Think about it... especially if you want to be a teacher.....
After racking my mind about my feelings toward an Orwell society I can conclude that I have mixed feelings.
måndag 11 maj 2009
Grades make my day
I give A to the grades!
We need grades in school. Grades are a good way for teachers, students and parents to see progress in learning.
First, I want to point out the most important reason for grades, which is structure. By having grades hanging over your head you will focus less on "hanging" and more on studying hard. Also, by having grades in Order and Behaviour we will get a more quiet and calm inviroment in school. No one wants to come home with a C in that.
Second, I want to mention The donkey and the carrot. Students need something to strive for. They want to have a carrot to follow and the satisfaction when they finally get it. It's important for them to see the results of their hard work.
Finally, we have the future employers. They need a good tool to see how intelligent and capable their soon-to-be employee is. Without grades they would surely buy the pig in the sack,as we say in Swedish.
There are some communist scientists, teachers and politicians who claim that grades are bad, that they destroy more than they build. They also say that there are students with special needs like ADHD and other diagnosis that would be hurt badly, and even forgotten, if we have grades in Order and Behaviour. They go so far as to saying that students with dyslexia or dyscalcyli would not be seen as individuals but as one in the mass and therefore get lower grades because they can't keep up with the other kids.
I have to strongly refute to this. I have one answer for all of their accusations and that is: All they have to do is sit still in class, pay attention to what the teacher is saying, write it down without whining about letters being wrong or some other sad story from their pathetic lives and everything will be all right. It's not THAT dfficult.
// Jan Björklund
Blog owner comment: I'm truly sorry. I meant to write a good analysis on why we shouldn't have grades, you know all we have read about, talked about and discussed through our three years together. But, when I was about to start I got possessed by Jan Björklund's evil spirit and I could just watch how my hands flew over the key board and suddenly this text above appeared.
Anyone who knows the number to a good exorcist?
We need grades in school. Grades are a good way for teachers, students and parents to see progress in learning.
First, I want to point out the most important reason for grades, which is structure. By having grades hanging over your head you will focus less on "hanging" and more on studying hard. Also, by having grades in Order and Behaviour we will get a more quiet and calm inviroment in school. No one wants to come home with a C in that.
Second, I want to mention The donkey and the carrot. Students need something to strive for. They want to have a carrot to follow and the satisfaction when they finally get it. It's important for them to see the results of their hard work.
Finally, we have the future employers. They need a good tool to see how intelligent and capable their soon-to-be employee is. Without grades they would surely buy the pig in the sack,as we say in Swedish.
There are some communist scientists, teachers and politicians who claim that grades are bad, that they destroy more than they build. They also say that there are students with special needs like ADHD and other diagnosis that would be hurt badly, and even forgotten, if we have grades in Order and Behaviour. They go so far as to saying that students with dyslexia or dyscalcyli would not be seen as individuals but as one in the mass and therefore get lower grades because they can't keep up with the other kids.
I have to strongly refute to this. I have one answer for all of their accusations and that is: All they have to do is sit still in class, pay attention to what the teacher is saying, write it down without whining about letters being wrong or some other sad story from their pathetic lives and everything will be all right. It's not THAT dfficult.
// Jan Björklund
Blog owner comment: I'm truly sorry. I meant to write a good analysis on why we shouldn't have grades, you know all we have read about, talked about and discussed through our three years together. But, when I was about to start I got possessed by Jan Björklund's evil spirit and I could just watch how my hands flew over the key board and suddenly this text above appeared.
Anyone who knows the number to a good exorcist?
Prenumerera på:
Inlägg (Atom)
