Life Neutral: like carbon neutral, but for kids killed by arms dealers’ products
Leah sez, "DSEi, the worlds largest arms fair, takes place in London every two years. This year, Life Neutral Solutions announced that it was using the event to launch a new 'life offsetting' scheme. The company claimed that it was working with the defense industry to balance the 'unfortunate side effects' of weapons use by sponsoring the costs of raising a child in the west. After causing a bit of a fuss, it turned to be just an activist prank. The BBC World Service ran the story, but got the hoaxers to reveal their intentions. The culprits were the Space Hijackers, who have harassed the arms fair a few times before. In 2007 they even bought and sold their own tank."
Life Neutral - Life Beyond Conflict (Thanks, Leah!)You’ve heard of the importance of being carbon neutral? Well, being Life Neutral is the same - but with people. For every* life lost as a result of the use of products from our member organisations, we make sure that a new life flourishes. Join today and your next child could be a Life Neutral™ child. Life Neutral Solutions works with the defence industry to provide solutions for balancing the unfortunate side effects of weapons use. Through sponsoring the birth and care of children in North America, the United Kingdom and Europe, Life Neutral™ is committed to offsetting the collateral effects of defence operations in third-world conflict zones.
Life Neutral Solutions is interested in working with you. We are seeking potential parents who are committed to an ethical approach to weapons use and are excited by the possibility of an integrated package that would support you in bringing new life into our world.
Shameless Screen Grab courtesy of Boing Boing
Using Satire and Intelligence to bring attention to real problems is Villainous, and it isn't make believe, or fake, a game, or playtime. It IS real, and has always been real, from the time of renowned writers like the great French Satirists (Villain is a word of French derivation: "from Old French vilein serf; see villain" ), and our own Mark Twain and Thomas Nast. It is a purpose, and not a game for people who want to think of themselves as "bad people" and play games of Seduction and Betrayal for the Lulz.
We Are Villains.
We are better than this.
It is entirely true and noble* that Villains should bring light to the shameful perversion that is superheroes: Grown people parading around claiming to be better than everyone else, because they mistakenly believe "only superheroes care enough". That they care so much more than everyone else - so much so that they must prance around in leotards. The rest of us - citizens - those without capes, just don't "get it". We never do enough, because if we did, we'd also have to "cape up", and take as much credit as possible for doing what everyone else has always been doing: Helping each other.
If you want to be a Villain, the very best Villain you can be, you will need to have a purpose. A reason to keep going when the novelty of being what you were born to be wears off. Villains don't persevere throughout drama because we like drama. We do it because we are fighting for something we all believe in. It is why Francois-Marie Arouet, the Great Voltaire ("Voltaire" was his Villain name) risked everything to write through satire and comedy, the truths that society needed to hear.
One holds this as Truth: It is the origin and purpose of MetaVillainy.
You can be a MetaVillain and change the world. More than through intimations of crime, hatred, games of Seduction and Betrayal, Trolling for the Lulz, capes, and terror. You change it by your Will, your Intelligence, Audaciousness, Reason, and Wit. These are ALL qualities Villains have in abundance. We celebrate and delight in these things. Who else can claim as much? More, it is a proven method to success. Those names - Voltaire, Twain, and Nast are but a small handful of many, who have wrought change in society through writing. Jefferson too, for he was a Villain also (though he didn't mock King George quite a much as Villains are wont to).
But it is not without cost: You must be worthy of the Purpose. The Will. The Character. The Mantle and the Heritage. Don't aspire to be the least of what you can be. Like a true Villain reach for more than you think you can grasp. You may fail as Villains have before, or you may succeed.
-Lord Malignance
* As mentioned earlier, Noble does not necessarily connote Moral Righteousness. Instead it may be defined as (courtesy of Dictionary.com) any or multiple of;
l
adjective
1.
distinguished by rank or title.
2.
pertaining to persons so distinguished.
3.
of, belonging to, or constituting a hereditary class that hasspecial social or political status in a country or state; of orpertaining to the aristocracy.
4.
of an exalted moral or mental character or excellence; lofty:a noble thought.
5.
admirable in dignity of conception, manner of expression,execution, or composition: a noble poem.
6.
very impressive or imposing in appearance; stately;magnificent: a noble monument.
7.
of an admirably high quality; notably superior; excellent.
8.
famous; illustrious; renowned.
9.
Chemistry . inert; chemically inactive.
10.
Falconry . (of a hawk) having excellent qualities or abilities.
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