Posts by BenWilson
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My mum and uncle both had elocution training. It's actually served Mum well as a teacher. Her accent has naturally rolled with the yuf, but she has fantastic voice projection and clarity. It didn't sound like an unusual experience in her circle.
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Hard News: Auckland City Nights, in reply to Louise,
I'd concur with that appraisal, today. Nice ambiance about the area, aided by nice weather. Nice coffee at Rushworth, although only one brownie left, my friend got it! Not to worry, I was feeling pretty full by then. Lunch cuisine was not entirely my choice in company, so the internet won out, and I had already had a very nice prawn curry and a beer for $13 in the 'burbs (Nite Spice), but was able to take the coffee/cake choice to the Wynyard Quarter. I do not know if I am simply blessed by the parking gods, but once again I managed to park close and free (4 hours!). I will not say where, in case someone decides to close that down.
Louise, I'd suggest you ask them to take away the curious gimmick picture of a wharf off the website that forces you to use the scroll bar to read about your cafe. It doesn't add, it detracts.
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Hard News: Auckland City Nights, in reply to Sacha,
I aspire to your lifestyle.
Eating a cheap lunch with mates on Friday is within reach of everyone. Unfortunately, it won't be at Louise's shop today, because, despite "absolutely support honest, no holds bared reviewing to keep us all on our toes", I don't have any idea which place is hers. So my first review is "They don't get back to you".
ETA: GAH!!! Sorry Louise... retracted!!!!
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Last chance, Louise...I'm going to lunch pretty soon :-)
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Hard News: Auckland City Nights, in reply to Louise,
Say which one, and you could be on my Friday lunch review list today. I won't identify myself until *after* the bill, of course.
but please don't make blanket assumptions that your experience at one or two is going to be indicative of the whole.
I don't. I haven't eaten there at all, because the area has had bad reviews from nearly every source. But I'll be happy to revise my opinion if you let me know which one you're at, and I go there, and the experience is good, and the prices reasonable.
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OnPoint: Other People's Wars, in reply to Lucy Stewart,
From both a strict legal viewpoint and a common-usage one, repeated use of the word "murder" here is...not entirely accurate.
Yes, sir, control your language. There is a well known precedent of describing murder in the context of international toadying as "national defence". Because NZ is in dire risk from peasants and war lords and jihadists in Afghanistan - several NZers have been killed already (in Afghanistan).
However, if Gaddafi is ever caught, it will be imperative to change the usage and try him in a kangeroo court for mass murder, and war crimes.
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Up Front: I'll Be in My Bunk, in reply to Steve Barnes,
But then again just hanging out and soaking up the sun with a couple of buddies and a case of beer can be way cool, once you get over that Protestant Work Ethic nonsense.
I most like doing that after a hard day's work. Which is why I don't drink so much beer :-).
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Up Front: I'll Be in My Bunk, in reply to Max Rose,
But sex is something that brings mutual pleasure, or should if you know what you're doing, and unlike violence or excessive lazing around, there's nothing damaging about the act itself.
There's nothing damaging about the act of lazing around either. But it could make me unhappy just the same, despite being a powerful urge. That unhappiness comes from the greater context of the rewards of labour.
The same thing is at play with sex, that suppressing the urges we have is usually done with a bigger picture in mind. Sex can often form emotional bonds, everyone knows this, so when you have sex with someone, anyone else you are having sex with has good reason to wonder if their own bond is in jeopardy. It also often leads to children, which takes the connection to a different level again, and could easily jeopardize the security of the other person's children. It also can lead to diseases, many of which are extremely unpleasant and even potentially fatal, which there is a good chance of sharing.
That's why it's not something taken lightly, by a whole lot of people. It can be taken lightly, but to say that it should be is to be as irrational about it as people who insist that their various repressions should be universal. To even be able to take it lightly involves a whole lot of very serious effort and precautions, and there are still going to be risks. It's only been an extremely short amount of time in historical terms that polyamorous sex even could be of low consequence. Monogamous sex is less dangerous, but still of pretty high consequence.
Another thing that makes sex rather unusual is that it is illegal for minors nearly everywhere. Since I know for sure, having once been a minor, that their sexual urges can be extremely strong, our sexual repression is absolutely guaranteed to be trained into us from a young age, from the absolute beginning of our sexual lives, most likely. The reasons for this have some strong arguments (I won't say they're knockdown, though. I doubt that I would have been scarred for life at age 13 if Elle MacPherson had thrown herself at me).
then perhaps questioning those attitudes is at least as good an option as accepting repression and denial as part of everyday life.
It's always good to question attitudes. But repression and denial are parts of everyday life. Either that, or the consequences of not repressing and denying become parts of everyday life. It's not guaranteed that those are better consequences, each has to be weighed on its merits, by each person. Constantly.
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Up Front: I'll Be in My Bunk, in reply to Max Rose,
I just had a real deja vu moment. Have we had this conversation before? Did you get a new login?
I don't disagree with any of that. Just noting that unhappiness seems just as rife amongst the polyamorous. Love is tricky. I'm pretty much just taking the same line as Lucy, that the idea of monogamy being purely form of social oppression is no more true than saying heterosexuality is - many people just are that way, and are happy like that. Relax all social strictures, and there will still be a lot of heterosexual people, and, I suggest, a lot of monogamous people.
But I do agree that non-monogamy is frowned on far more than is justified, and that causes perverse outcomes, as any form of oppression does.
Also, the fact that non-monogamous relationships might not last doesn't mean that they fail, any more than not having a job for life means that one has had a string of failed careers.
Interesting analogy, and one close to my heart at the moment, being unemployed. Certainly there is a lot of social pressure that sticking with a career is a good thing, and that contractors are just whores. I guess that makes the unemployed into soloists, something we're trained to feel guilty about, as if feeling stink about it wasn't enough. Sitting around at home watching TV when you could be out job hunting is like watching porno. It needs to be fixed, preferably by harsh measures.
Maybe I am a freak.
No way. You're neither a freak nor wrong in what you're saying. It's impossible to know what people would be like in a different kind of society without actually trying it, but I expect there would be some proportion of people who were much happier with polygamy being accepted. There would probably also be a proportion who would be less happy.
Happiness is a tricky game generally. Repression is not guaranteed to make people unhappy. I repress, for instance, my urge to bash people I don't like. On the whole, I'm probably actually happier than I would be if I allowed that urge free reign. Also, I repress the urge to just laze around all the time, and force myself to work. That can have a positive net happiness outcome, at times.
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Hard News: Auckland City Nights, in reply to George Darroch,
Ben, your words are an evocative outpouring.
My 5 months there were formative. My favorite encounter was with a drunk rural Maori guy who came in and asked for "1 fish and a dollar chips". The look of shock on his face when he saw how much $1 of chips was at McDs was comical/sad. I really felt for the guy.
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