XPost: soc.culture.british, soc.culture.europe, soc.culture.greek   
   XPost: soc.culture.turkish   
   From: tartan_army@msn.com   
      
   The European Union commissioners have announced that agreement   
   has been reached to adopt English as the preferred language for   
   European communications, rather than German, which was the other   
   possibility. As part of negotiations, her Majesty Government   
   conceded that English spelling had some room for improvement and   
   has accepted a five-year phased plan for what will be known as   
   EuroEnglish (Euro for short).   
      
   In the first year, "s" will be used instead of the soft "c".   
   Sertainly, sivil servants will reseive this news with joy. Also,   
   the hard "c" will be replased with "k". Not only will this klear   
   up konfusion, but typewriters kan have one less letter.   
      
   There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year, when   
   the troublesome "ph" will be replased by "f". This will make   
   words like "fotograf" 20 per sent shorter.   
      
   In the third year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be   
   expekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are   
   possible. Governments will enkourage the removal of double   
   letters, which have always been a deterent to akurate speling.   
   Also, al wil agre that the horible mes of silent "e"s in the   
   languag is disgraful, and they would go.   
      
   By the forth year, peopl wil be reseptiv to steps such as   
   replasing "th" by "z" and "w" by "v". During ze fifz year ze   
   unesesary "o" kan be dropd from vords kontaining "ou" and similar   
   changes vud of kors be aplid to ozer kombinations of leters.   
      
   After zis fifz year, ve vil hav a reli sensibl riten styl. Zer   
   vil be no mor trobls or difikultis and evrivum vil find it ezi tu   
   understand ech ozer. Ze drem vil finali kum tru.   
      
   --   
   Alistair Sim   
      
   Of all the systems of religion that ever were invented, there is none   
   more derogatory to the Almighty, more unedifying to man, more   
   repugnant   
   to reason, and more contradictory in itself, than this thing called   
   Christianity. Too absurd for belief, too impossible to convince, and   
   too   
   inconsistent for practice, it renders the heart torpid, or produces   
   only   
   atheists and fanatics. As an engine of power, it serves the purpose of   
   despotism; and as a means of wealth, the avarice of priests; but so   
   far   
   as respects the good of man in general, it leads to nothing here or   
   hereafter. -Thomas Paine   
      
      
      
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