Posts by Rob Stowell
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Did you get it back?
Yeah. APB still firmly attached, like an angry limpet.
Lucky, 'cos a trip to Benin for a magical replacement sounds... fraught.
[We were denied visas to Benin in '88 on the grounds that New Zealand was a racist country. But in next-door Lome there was a busy 'voodoo market' where dried (animal) penises were just another commodity. I'm sure there were pickled APBs there, too.] -
It is very hard for men to 'get' this, but for me, working one night at the "Mr Gay NZ" final led to a tiny insight.
It was a hoot. People were having a great time.
And I got hit on a few times: that was ok. But one guy was persistant enough to disturb my working (I was trying to record the show) and make me feel uncomfortable. Using the toilets later, someone else grabbed my crotch and ran off snickering.
I didn't feel threatened. But for the rest of the night, I couldn't help thinking: this is probably an everyday, anytime thing for women.
On one level, it was just stares, a few words, a little groping. And the vast majority of attendees were as friendly and helpful and welcoming as you could wish. There was a lovely party atmosphere.
But the unwanted sexual attention was not ok.
I can only begin to imagine what effect living in a world (this world, our world) where being an object of undifferentiated male lust is the norm must have.
It needs to change. -
And I'd be dead ;(
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Belatedly- thank you James Green. Your analysis of this has been clear- as much as one can be- informed and very helpful. Respect.
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...Coney, Bunkle and Cartwright's howler over the "two groups"
From Barton's Hearld piece:
Bryder argues that because there were not two groups of patients in a randomised controlled trial, there was no experiment at all, no research component to Green's 1966 proposal for the treatment of CIS.
"It's a complete non sequitur," says Manning. "The judge didn't make that mistake. She knew there weren't two groups." By the time of the inquiry, Coney and Bunkle also knew about the error they had made in their article about Green dividing the women he treated into two groups.
Manning quotes from page 63 of Cartwright's report: "Green's 1966 proposal was not a randomised control trial, but it was experimental research combined with patient care." And from page 65: "Green himself eventually conceded that his management of the patients was a research programme into the natural history of CIS."
I don't think anyone is now claiming- as perhaps Coney did initially- that Green was following a clear experimental design.
But equally clearly there could be established from the records, post factum, two "groups": those whom Green had not treated, and those who were treated 'conventionally'.
That's what the McIndoe/McLean paper did. Misinterpreting that paper was Coney and Bunkle's mistake-. whether they've owned up to it sufficiently or not.
Foisting that mistake onto the Cartwright Inquiry- and then opting for the explanation that therefore nothing at all was amiss- appears to be Bryder's. -
Well, the Listener can kiss my big toe before I read another- next week! omg! story. I'm not shocked: the Listener is a sad travesty these days.
But I can't read Joanne Black's smugly triumphal prose for more than par or so before having to run outside and sit in a cold puddle, waiting for the steam to stop coming out my ears.
Who wants to pay for that? -
Quite an achievement from the Charitable sector: they've made the IRD- and associated bureaucratic Govt departments- look good, and relatively efficient.
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Plato puts up quite a good argument, yeah. But still insufferably smug and self-serving. Philosphers have egos, too- some of considerable dimension, some in another dimension entirely. ;)
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Apologies if this has been posted already: but for more on Afghanistan- and Dr Haywood on tour!- worth checking out the latest Werewolf.
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Remarkable load of rubbish in a short post, Robert. I'm not sure what YOUR point is, exactly, but I'm guessing you are desperate for a verbal savaging. Good luck with that.