The current Nature is carrying the following article about some very positive research at University of Pennsylvania into gene expression.  Where is denial now?  Mr Diamond?  Mr Lewontin?  To be brutally honest, we’ve just been told all this on another thread.  But anyhow ...

Some ethnic differences could be down to the same genes behaving differently.

From dark skin to fiery red hair, the world’s ethnic groups all have characteristic physical features. But how does our genome code for these differences? New research shows that it isn’t just because different groups carry different genes — some of the variation is down to the same genes being expressed differently.

The study is the latest contribution to the popular new field that uses modern genomic tools to unravel the genetic basis of variation between ethnic groups. Such analyses have only become possible recently, thanks to tools such as the International HapMap Project, published last year1, which charts the prevalence of single DNA-letter differences (called single-nucleotide polymorphisms, or SNPs) between different ethnic groups.

Such work has spotted many genetic differences between groups — some of the genes that determine skin or eye colour, for example, have been unpicked. But scientists usually study one trait at a time, and only find a genetic explanation after years of painstaking work.

Richard Spielman, Vivian Cheung and their team at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, took a much faster approach, screening thousands of traits at once and working back to their genetic roots in mere months.

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Over 6 years ago, I brought up “the death of the West” as a theme with some folks discussing Kevin MacDonald’s trilogy.  It merits wider publication now that there are nuclear weapons poised to bomb Iran’s uranium facilities.  It turned catch phrases like “holocaust”, “denial” and “fascism” to novel uses:

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His contemporaries in Northern Ireland politics have praised him.  The obit writers are now posting their copy.  David Ervine, leader of the PUP, “passed away quietly with peace and dignity” according to a statement issued by his family today (Monday).  Unionism in Northern Ireland will feel his loss.

Ervine was one of the many UVF prisoners whom, during the 1970s, Gusty Spence turned from violence to politics.  He started appearing on our television screens as, essentially, the political voice of the UVF in the latter half of the 1980s, if my memory serves me correctly.  Even then, and notwithstanding the difficulties of speaking for an appallingly violent organisation only nominally engaged in terrorist counter-activity against the Provisional IRA and quite prepared to murder Catholics at large, Ervine struck me as a highly articulate and sympathetic character.  That he developed as he did in the period running up to and after the Good Friday Agreement into a passionate spokeman for peace was really rather remarkable.  He was a man of genuine vision, and his vision was that of a progressive Unionism as the only practical guarantor of Ulster Protestants’ interests.

He did not carry his own organisation with him on his political and spiritual journey.  The UVF remains armed and, in part or whole, criminally active.  He endeavoured to merge his PUP party with the Ulster Unionists and failed.  The times had not travelled so far or so fast as David Ervine.  Now the man is gone, and his too brief life stands as an example for those that might yet follow.

From a Times article reporting on research into red-hair in Britain for the Oxford-based People of the British Isles project:-

But why do we have such numbers in these parts of the British Isles today and not others? The answer, says Bodmer, is that red-hair genes were common among the first Britons and that populations in the archipelago’s fringes still carry their bloodline.

“Genes for red hair first appeared in human beings about 40,000 to 50,000 years ago,” agrees Rees.

These genes were then carried into the islands by the original settlers, men and women who “would have been relatively tall, with little body fat, athletic, fair-skinned and who would have had red hair”, says David Miles, of English Heritage.

Redheads therefore represent the land’s most ancient lineages. So if you want an image of how those first people appeared, don’t think of a hairy savage with a mane of thick black hair. Contemplate instead a picture of a slim, ginger-haired individual: Prince Harry, perhaps, or the actress Nicole Kidman who has Scottish and Irish descent.

Distinctiveness among native groups is the true diversity.  It is simply not the one the British government desires us to celebrate.

It is a trifle ironic that the oldest bloodlines in these isles will, being scattered to the peripheries, likely survive the alien genetic inflows ... again.  But all native British distinctiveness is valuable and an ethnic genetic interest in its own right.  We are under no obligation to dissolve ouselves in the bottomless seas of the Third World, and the true racism belongs to those who deny us, red-haired or not, our natural right to self-preservation.

A few highlights: National Guard at border retreats in the face of Mexican gang gunshots (probably were afraid of being called “racist”)... Apparent breakthrough in small stream hydroelectric… UAE dumps dollars… $33,470 fertility bounty for Germans… South Florida gated community guards get armed, dress like SWAT teams and make citizen’s arrests (don’t try this if you’re a goy community or the SPLC will confiscate your real estate) ... amazon.com founder had successful rocket test… Bussard wins IAS award for “fusion breakthrough”... Schwarzenegger provides another fertility bounty for illegals… MIT offers all courses free…

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Semites and north Africans have a history of conflict with Europeans going back a very long time—long enough that they may have created/evolved biological weapons targeting Europeans.  E. O. Wilson in “On Human Nature” estimates 50 generations is all it takes for mere selective pressure to significantly subspeciate and if we look at the dawn of civilization, when animal husbandry may have been generalized to human husbandry, it is reasonable to conjecture that some very long-lived civilizations may have bred subspecies of humans for very specific purposes.

Now, admittedly Islam is a very young religion compared to this history, but it may be that Islam is largely an extended phenotype of the semitic and north African peoples—one which, like Christianity, transfers loyalty for family and ethny to a larger memetically controlled group which may itself be controlled by a hypocritical ethnic elite that taxes the large memetically controlled multi-ethnic population.

So the hypothesis is this:  Jews are a subspecies of humans coupled with a particular meme complex, whose purpose it is to subvert European societies to the point that Islam’s moral system appears less toxic than the restricted options made available by Jews to Europeans.

My thanks to Michael R for the latest on the long-running story of the gay sheep of Oregon:-

Science told: hands off gay sheep

Experiments that claim to ‘cure’ homosexual rams spark anger

SCIENTISTS are conducting experiments to change the sexuality of “gay” sheep in a programme that critics fear could pave the way for breeding out homosexuality in humans.

The technique being developed by American researchers adjusts the hormonal balance in the brains of homosexual rams so that they are more inclined to mate with ewes.

It raises the prospect that pregnant women could one day be offered a treatment to reduce or eliminate the chance that their offspring will be homosexual. Experts say that, in theory, the “straightening” procedure on humans could be as simple as a hormone supplement for mothers-to-be, worn on the skin like an anti-smoking nicotine patch.

So far so good.  But then the Times reports the reactions from a famous lesbian who won Wimbledon once or twice, a Professor of bioethics who seems, to judge from his blog, terribly interested in homosexuality (and doesn’t much like Iran), Peter Tatchell of the former Bermondsey bedsit tendency, and a spokesperson - or possibly spokes-sheep, it isn’t clear which - from animal rights group, PETA.

For some reason none of these people are advocates of parental rights.  Ovine, yes.  Homosexual, certainly.  Parents?  Children?  Not a chance.

It puts me in mind of a similar “debate” some years ago about a newly discovered and effective means to restore hearing function to certain deaf children.  The outrage from professional deafness advocates was very similar to the story here.  A hitherto undiscovered richness in deaf culture was noisily evoked.  We the public were asked to believe that something profoundly rewarding in signed interaction, something that weighed more heavily in the treasures of the personal life than the very voices of those one loves, would be lost to these children if the treatment was provided.  It was obviously untrue.  But then as now, nobody wanted to point out the reason for the deception: that it is unbearable for the disadvantaged, having fought perhaps all their lives to erect some semblance of self-respect and equal worth, to have this exposed as nothing by the simple mechanism of parental choice.  So unbearable is it, the antis will willingly deny new generations of children a normal life.

For such delusion to attend disability is no cause for our political satisfaction.  It is human farce upon human tragedy.  But it is also not really the point because rights of free speech and free association are taken from the majority not to raise others to some leftist utopia of joyous equality, but to deprive the majority of its healthy and natural cultural hegemony.  There is absolutely no morality in this, and no reason why we should hesitate to prick the “rights” balloon out of some newly learned Marxist sensibility.

Back in September I posted a piece titled Why we do it … and is it enough?.  It flowed from a call from Rusty Mason for less focus on analysis and news and more action.  The post generated a long and lively thread.  Too lively in parts.

Anyhow, on Svi’s Inverted World thread the same demand for a more pro-active way forward at and beyond MR has surfaced via a couple of suggestions: one from JB, to whit:-

How about creating a ‘Activism’ section ?  Debating and talking among ourselves is alright but we have to expand and bring more of our people to the cause.

How about making a movie reviews section?  It would probably bring more traffic to the site.

Is there anything we can do to help you get that radio/podcasting station done?  Will Steven Palese be a regular?

... and the second from Lurker:-

Its been said before - do movie reviews on IMDb.com and vote for those you approve of.  Reviews that more people ‘find useful’ in imdb parlance get pushed up the ranks, just like on Amazon (who own IMDb).  They could be cross-posted here too.  If we knew they were there (on IMDb) we could then vote for them if we felt like it.

Now, Lurker is correct, the movie reviews idea has been floated before.  Much in the same vein the sturdy Calvin, he of the Vox Celtica, suggested concentrating reviews of appropriate books at Amazon .  We will fully support such suggestions.  I think that in response to the first time the movie reviews idea was floated I said something like, “OK, we will willingly open a page on that, linkable from the left column.  But we’ll need someone to step forward and take on responsibility for editing and generally nourishing it.”

Thereafter, silence.  But these things don’t just happen.  If you read this and think, “Hey, that would be great” and if you can write as well as or better than the average IMDb reviewer please consider whether you have the time and energy to make it work.  We will provide the platform and welcome you, cost-free, among our number.  If you can’t commit to running the thing but would relish reviewing the movies, then that again would be a fine and, obviously, necessary way to help. 

The Contact button is right there under the header bar.

In closing, the radio facility has been a bigger build than anticipated.  We are in the “any day” phase.  There are interviewees lined up, of whom the least interesting and talented will certainly be the first.