Right then.
This effort is directed primarily at myself, to maintain a public record of that which I've extrapolated from the developing situations surrounding us. But it's also a commentary of that which I've seen developing in the common(sic) public mind, through interaction within chatrooms, and the depth to which some of these become integral to the users everyday existence.
Let me begin by stating the obvious. We are in the midst of events which will most certainly lead our civilisation into drastic change. A schism has developped between East and West, perhaps instigated by the East as it's developed a sense of autonomy with it's oil wealth, but one which is based on the most volotile of man's 'causes', faith. We have America's George Bush, and Britains Tony Blair, giving lip-service to 'patriotism' and 'anti-terrorism', poised to invade a country already locked in deep depression and not yet recovered from the effects of the last Visit the Americans paid. To be fair, we have Mullah's whipping the immemorial chant 'death to the infidel', and declaring fatwah as though they were party favours, while literally telling their followers that 'to die killing the Infidel is a glorious death for Islam..'. We have an apalling increase in the numbers of Islamic young men and women, who are willing to strap themselves about with C-2, take the crosstown bus in Jerusalem, and make a somewhat sudden, if not unplanned stop, as close to a dense crowd as possible.
Now, were this confined to the Middle East, it would not be particularly noticable perhaps, what with the inevidable escallation of Palistinian/Israeli relations. But it is not. It has hit the USA itself, not to mention Bali, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Kurdistan, The UK, France, in short, most of the world. The battlelines are beng drawn, and they include everywhere.
It's going to be quite an adjustment for some, taking violence and war from their television screens, and transposing it to the street outside their house.