The Mediasphere

Petition: Hong Kong Government: Legislate a ban on the sale and possession of shark fin in Hong Kong.

From Honduras to New Caledonia, from the Bahamas to the Maldives, the people have spoken. And governments have listened. Now is the time for Hong Kong to wake up! The public is ready. The business sector is behind us. Now is the time for a total sale and possession ban on shark fin in Hong Kong. By doing so, Hong Kong will take a giant step to join the conservation efforts of numerous countries around the world who have enacted shark protection legislation. In Latin America it will join Honduras. In the United States it will join California, New York, Hawaii, Washington, Maryland, Delaware and Oregon. In the Pacific region it will join Palau, Tokelau, Marshall Islands, French Polynesia, Cook Islands, American Samoa, Guam, Northern Mariana Islands and New Caledonia. Even China has agreed to stop serving shark fin soup at official banquets, to take effect in the next year or two.

Banning shark fin from the streets of Hong Kong will be the single most important marine conservation achievement of the year. It will be an important step towards protecting the health of our oceans. It will also remove the stain on Hong Kong’s reputation as a world-class tourism hub.

This petition is endorsed by: Shark Rescue

A Sussex jury roll from the 1600s includes the names Accepted Trevor, Redeemed Compton, Kill-Sin Pimple, Fly-Fornication Richardson, Search-The-Scriptures Moreton, The-Peace-Of-God Knight, Stand-Fast-On-High Stringer, The-Gift-of-God Stringer, and Fight-The-Good-Fight-Of-Faith White, Obediencia Cruttenden, Called Lower, Hope-For Bending, More-Fruit Flower and Meek Brewer. Some other wonderful Sussex names around this time include Safely-on-High Snat, Mortifie Hicks and the marvellously-named Humiliation Scratcher. And let’s not forget Be-Stedfast Elyarde, Faint-not Dighurst, Hew-Agag-in-pieces Robinson, Swear-not-at-all Ireton and Obadiah-bind-their-kings-in-chains-and-their-nobles-in-irons Needham.

Here’s another good naming method: There was a tradition among some Puritan villagers of opening the Bible and selecting the first name their eyes landed upon, which led to some interesting christenings. One poor child was landed with the name Ramoth-Gilead as a result of this method, reportedly leading a rather bemused parson to ask, “Boy or girl, eh?” There’s some evidence that certain parents, whose reading was perhaps not the best, would simply open the Bible and choose a word at random - hence the existence in Connecticut of Maybe Barnes and a girl by the rather unfortunate name of Notwithstanding Griswold. One child in England was christened Sirs, the parents insisting that it was a Scripture name and citing as proof the passage “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” Another Puritan named his dog Moreover after the Gospel passage “Moreover the dog came and licked his sores.”

Yet another story tells of a priest who was befuddled when a woman informed him that her child was to be name “Axe-her”. “What name?” he spluttered. “Axe-her,” repeated another woman. After much discussion he discovered that the women were referred to Achsah, the daughter of Caleb. This may also explain the existence of an Axar Starrs in Stockport - the daughter, appropriately, of one Caleb Starrs. The name Axar remained popular in Devonshire for some time.

A little boy called John wound up with an unfortunate bonus name due to his godparent’s strong accent and a misunderstanding at the baptismal font. “What name?” the priest asked, to which the godparent replied, “John honly.” The priest dutifully went on to declare, “John Honly, I baptise thee…”

Thomas and Elizabeth Pegden, residents of Kent during the late 18th and early 19th centuries, named their first four sons after the four evangelists, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. When Elizabeth gave birth to a fifth son in 1795, they decided to continue this theme by naming him after the next book of the New Testament, and thus he was christened Acts-of-the-Apostles Pegden. According to one source, his nickname was Actsy, “for the Vicar of Boughton has heard a parishioner speak of her uncle Actsy Pegden.” An older relative bore the name Pontius Pilate Pegden.

In the late 1800s, a Thurstonville man named his four sons Love-well, Do-well,Die-well and Fare-well Sykes. Around the same time, another boy, being the younger sibling of sisters Faith and Hope, was given the name And Charity.

Another fellow, rather bemusingly, named his son Judas-not-Iscariot.

Zachary Crofton, died 1672, clearly scoured the Scriptures in order to find names for his children. His five sons were called Zachary, Zareton, Zephaniah,Zelophehad and - presumably after all alliterative possibilities had been exhausted - John.

The Presbyterian clergy were fond of foisting on illegitimate children names reflective of the sins of their parents - names like Helpless, Repent, Repentance,Forsaken, Fly-fornication.

Among many other excellent Puritan names, there was also:

Abstinence

Abuse-not

Continent

Creature (a unisex name, apparently!)

Do-good

Experience

Fear-not

God-helpe

Hate-evil

Increased

Job-rakt-out-of-the-asshes

Joye-in-sorrow

Lament

Learn-wysdome

Magnify

More-fruit

More-triale

Muche-merceye

No-merit

Obey

Original

Preserved

Refrayne

Renewed

Safe-on-Highe

Silence

Sin-deny

Sorry-for-sin

Thanks

The-Lord-is-near

Unfeigned

What-God-will

I’m so sorry to tell you, but when someone works 40+ hours a week, or even just part time, and still can’t afford to spend $2 for a damn coffee, THEY ARE NOT THE PROBLEM. Our society is.

You’re out here buying yourself $20 lunches and $50 shampoos like, please tell me more about how a coffee that puts a smile on my face is me “spending irresponsibly”.

I had a time in my life where I was incredibly poor and struggled to feed myself, but every month or so I’d spend $10 to get a coffee and cake at a local bakery I liked.

I wasn’t paying for coffee and cake, I was paying for a moment of relief. For a sense of normalcy. For the ability to say “yes” when a friend asked to meet them on the weekend rather than sadly saying I couldn’t afford it.

I can tell you for certain I would not have been any less poor if I’d put that $10 in savings. It doesn’t work that way. I needed way, way more than that for my financial situation to see daylight.

The Daily Bugle Spidey Villains 

We at the Alamo Drafthouse would like to officially apologize for our role in the end of mankind as we knew it, and the ascendant Gynocracy that followed. We didn’t know our women-only screening of Wonder Woman would result in the overthrow of all world governments and the total subjugation of men, but in hindsight we probably should have seen it coming.