Hard News: About Arie
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Rent gouging is like looting, says Christchurch Mayor.
There have been reports that some rents have risen 150 per cent in a city where many have been left homeless by the magnitude 6.3 quake on February 22.
"I think that's looting by another name. I just think that's appalling," Mr Parker told TVNZ this morning.
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"The first appeal is just to the people who are doing it. Come on, you're in our community, This is looting by another name. You can't put this in a polite way.
It shouldn't be happening. We're not going to get through this if people take that approach."
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Before "empathy" became a mere synonym for "sympathy" I found the distinction useful.
I'm not that good at reading other people -- my powers of emotional reception are weak. Poor empathy. But I feel strongly for them when I get it -- strong sympathy.
Note: no claim to anywhere on the spectrum is implied, just an admission of being insensitive more than I'd like.
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linger, in reply to
[Aspies’ muted emotional response possibly being a defense against sensory overload] Works for me too.
Somewhat similarly: during Oliver Sacks’s description of [then, 16-year-old] “autistic savant” Stephen Wiltshire [the essay “Prodigies”, in the book An Anthropologist On Mars], Sacks ties himself in knots trying to answer the question of whether Stephen “experiences” emotions. Sacks’ description is in fact perfectly consistent with the idea that Stephen’s brain does process emotions, but that these are blocked out of his conscious thought. However, because Sacks’ account assumes a particular definition of “experience” = “consciously perceive” that is not really applicable, Sacks misses that key realisation.
(Sacks has identified himself as Asperger’s; and his writings show no lack of empathy. Nor is "lack of empathy" a fitting description of Temple Grandin [who is described in the titular essay of the same book].)[Explicit disclaimer: Asperger’s syndrome is not equivalent to savantism – though they may have traits in common, including the one under discussion.]
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Che Tibby, in reply to
having met and read you for a couple of years, i'd diagnose you as a typical geek.
no offence intended.
i suffer from intense empathy. at times it overloads, switches off, and turns me into a complete pr!ck.
again, no claim to being on any kind of spectrum.
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Hilary Stace, in reply to
I think Grant has worded it carefully. As Russell alluded yesterday, Judith Collins is in a defamation seeking mood.
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Rich Lock, in reply to
you should introduce him to dymaxion mapping
I had to go away and look that one up.
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Che Tibby, in reply to
you must stop uncovering my sources of beingsmarterthaneveryone
confession: i used to play the RPG Traveller. o, for awesome.
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Jacqui Dunn, in reply to
Judith Collins is in a defamation seeking mood.
Hm. Well, that's quite a good way to fend off people giving voice, isn't it? Scare them into silence.
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That myth about people with autism lacking empathy is a neurotypical construction. An NT who refutes it is educationalist Doug Biklen in his book 'Autism and the myth of the person alone'. But Biklen is villified by many NT autism 'experts' as he has helped many non-verbal autistic people express themselves in words and what they have to say is often challenging.
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Kracklite, in reply to
I think Grant has worded it carefully
And I'm afraid that that is the problem I have with this so-called opposition. Too bloody careful, averse to risk and therefore averse to principle.
"This is unacceptable!"
"OK, so what are you going to do about it if it's unacceptable?"
"I can assure that at this very moment we are thinking of forming a focus group that will define the terms of reference in consultation with lawyers, a polling agency and public relations consultants for a strongly-worded but inoffensive press release that will be issued in due course at a more propitious time!"
For Hastur's sake (Cthulhu's sleeping in today), there's parliamentary privilege if big bad Collins is so scary.
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There are ways of getting a result other than a frontal attack during Question Time, is how I read MP Robertson's response to a smiliar challenge on Twitter.
it is a sensitive situation (see NZ Herald story today), and there are other avenues to pursue this
I do appreciate cynicism, however.
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(Crap - posted this in the wrong thread. Disregard.)
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Because an attack on the Minister of Police would give her positive media attention, negative for Grant R, and the issue of justice for Arie and other autistic people would be lost. Some politicians are also diplomats.
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Sacha, in reply to
Some politicians are also diplomats.
Literally :)
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Bart Janssen, in reply to
Some politicians are also diplomats.
I really don't like politicians but not even I'm that mean :P.
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Yeah, true... I'm just feeling frustrated with a woefully uninspired and underperforming opposition with a leader who can only think to say "Uh... wait... Me too!" when Key makes one of his egregious lapses of taste. There may be other ways to pursue matters of principle than direct parliamentary attack, but I'm not convinced that principles motivate them all that much to act.
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Hilary Stace, in reply to
OK Kracklite, if you were an MP with a social conscience fronting this issue (probably about one of a hundred urgent issues to deal with), and against a well-resourced government and an easily distracted media, what would your strategy be?
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DPF relents, but I see no apology for his earlier comment...
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Well, I won't take the counterfactual bait for one.
Grant Robertson's job is to represent my interests and it is up to him with knowledge and connections in parliament and the Labour Party to do so.
I do not have that specific knowledge or set of connections, so to suggest that I can easily be slotted into his position and to imply that if I cannot specify what would be done, I should not complain is... not very helpful.
There may indeed be other, more effective strategies than pointed questions in the debating chamber. I do not need to know what they are, but I do demand to see their effects. Admittedly, there has been no time for that to happen and I look forward to him and his colleagues pursuing this matter by whatever means are ultimately effective.
Yes, I am being cynical, but I reserve the right to be unimpressed with MPs who will claim to care about something, wring their hands, do, as you say, consider all the impediments that they face and consequently hand-wring themselves into impotence.
I'm sure that it was repeatedly pointed out to Fran Wilde that the Homosexual Law Reform Bill would cost political capital, could be misrepresented by a fickle media, would cost the votes of conservative working-class supporters, would provide fodder for talkback bigots and so on. Nonetheless, she and her party stood up for principle.
Yes, there might well be negative consequences - certainly in fact, but paths of least resistance always lead down.
The last Labour-led government did not, it seemed to me, have too strong a concern for the rights of people in detention and this should be an issue on which people do speak out, not just those insiders with detailed political strategy plans neatly presented along with sketches for the billboards and storyboards for the TV ads.
Anyway, I look forward to Robertson doing something, as he's identified this as something he claims to care deeply about, but I'm not going to risk anoxia.
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giovanni tiso, in reply to
Anyway, I look forward to Robertson doing something, as he's identified this as something he claims to care deeply about, but I'm not going to risk anoxia.
I have been a little frustrated with Grant in a couple of discussions on Facebook where he appeared to be supporting my position in spite of the fact that Labour didn't (or more precisely never had when it was in power), but my temptation to challenge him to turn these laudable objectives into policy is tempered a bit by the fact that he's not a one-man party, and I don't expect policy statements to be made public in social media at the time of my choosing. That said, I'm going to want to see him follow up on his good intentions and his saying the right things at some stage.
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One of the things that makes us so reluctant to lie, methinks
Thanks Kracklite, that's exactly what's on my mind at the moment, if i may cross thread.
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I seem to recall Grant turning up to the last PAS event in Wellington (the book launch) -- perhaps he'll be at tonight's one and we can take this discussion up in person. I for one would be interested in that.
(if I ever get away from this desk, which is looking more and more unlikely at this point, damnit).
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giovanni tiso, in reply to
I seem to recall Grant turning up to the last PAS event in Wellington (the book launch)
He was in fact hosting it, yes :-)
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izogi, in reply to
Arie Smith, "Face of Looting", turns out to be, in my opinion, yet another actual Christchurch Earthquake hero for the sacrifice he is choosing to make - he has chosen to hold off making a complaint about Police behaviour because of stress and his support for the excellent job the Police are doing in Christchurch.
I can't pretend to know what's going through Arie's mind or what advice he's been subjected to, but for myself I think that if I'd been humiliated in front of a media circus in the way that he was, I'd want it to go away as quickly as possible rather than dragged out in a high profile investigation.
I sympathise with Arie and his family, but police are given extra special rights over other people in the community and they're supposed to be able to be trusted. If there are cops out there bashing people without reasonable cause (and this hasn't yet been established) then they need to be investigated and dealt with -- screw what Arie wants, in the nicest possible way. The issue's much bigger than just Arie and his family. Otherwise it's unfair and dangerous for the next person this cop or cops decide to beat up next time he or she is faced with an unusually stressful day. It's also unfair to all the good police out there who have to be tarred with this kind of brush when trying to work in their communities.
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(if I ever get away from this desk, which is looking more and more unlikely at this point, damnit).
Go on, live a little, get up from the desk, step away from your computer. :)
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