The Simpsons as Real People

Destination Creation has produced a frankly disturbing series of films showing what the Simpsons family would look like if they were real people. Worth watching with a sick bucket handy.

Also, Homer Simpson gives his top ten reasons he should be US President:

Wii're Number One

Oddly, as this blog can't really be classified as a "tech" site, today this blog appears as the number one search result for the Wii on Google Images. That'll make a couple of geek friends of mine jealous!

Should John Sweeney Have Lost His Temper?

Last night on the BBC's Panorama programme, journalist John Sweeney lost his temper at senior Scientologist Tommy Davis and launched into a violent verbal battering which would make John Reid proud. A clip of this encounter can be found here and Sweeney writes about the experience on the BBC News website (where he also . The BBC has also helpfully posted the Panorama editor's interview on BBC Breakfast this morning about the incident.

Open wide

Yet somehow, I can't help but feel that his reaction was justified... even necessary to some extent. It came after Tommy Davis and his cohorts had been stalking the reporter all week*, questioning his objectivity and professional abilities and sounding off at the slightest mention of the word "cult".

The environment in which the verbal assault took place was also not the most conducive to a well-controlled temper - the "Mind Control" part of a exhibition attacking psychiatry for its "links" to the Holocaust (a despicable connection to make, insulting a profession which has helped a lot of people through hard times).

Thankfully, in the UK, Scientology is not a religion, thanks to the judgment in Church of Scientology's Application for Registration as a Charity [2005] W.T.L.R. 1151 (and quite a few earlier judgments stretching back to the "Churches" foundation), which means they don't get charitable status and so they're not receiving any tax breaks. Hooray!

See also:

• Cheezy on the incident ... and also Crispy Duck with Cream.
• Emil Steiner of the Washington Post gives his view.
  

* In the most extreme way as well - showing up at his hotel, following him wherever he drove and even at one point interrupting an interview he was conducting with a Scientology critic.