Opinionated Libertarimum

Failing to live up to parental expectations

2011-09-12T15:03:00.001+12:00

Noticed on the stuff.co.nz site.....

Three young people died when a passenger of a small car grabbed the steering wheel and the car veered into the path of an on-coming bus, a jury has been told.

In the High Court at Wellington today the Crown has outlined what prosecutor Claire Boshier called "a moment in time" when Worthy Redeemed, 39, yanked the steering wheel sending the Mitsubishi in front of the bus on State Highway One near Woodend, north Canterbury.

I can't be bothered given Worthy any space or time, other than spending an inordinate part of a bus journey home wondering what his middle name is.

Children: do not do as I do

2011-08-28T23:16:00.001+12:00

I took some work home with me 2 Wednesdays ago. All I had to do was draft up a quick paper. I thought on that Wednesday, "I'll just do this tonight when all is quiet, and get it out of the way."

Instead I did the following, sometimes more than once:

knitted scarf;
painted nails (necessary to test 4 different colours - this takes some time);
shopped;
did a Where's Wally 250-piece puzzle to determine which piece is missing;
found Wally;
engaged in Mighty Beanz warfare with children;
looked for Mighty Beanz;
spent the entire afternoon travelling up and down the same small section of track on the Silverstream Steam Railway;
made sushi in various permutations.

I realised with a sinking heart this evening that this paper is due to the Minister's office tomorrow, so I reluctantly sat down to do it. 10 days of procrastination....it took me 15 minutes.

I feel I should hang my head in shame.

Coffee deprivation homicide

2011-08-22T22:27:00.001+12:00

There are three golden rules in life:
1. Nothing works.

2. Everything sucks

3. Everyone you meet is either an idiot or plotting against you.

Being an optimistic and sunny person, I have no problem accepting that this is all an unavoidable part of life and may even play a valuable role in shaping the human condition by teaching us humility through suffering. All I ask is that somebody pays for it.

It’s about time people who indifferently ruin other people’s lives every day were jailed alongside the criminals who do it on purpose.

In fact I would like to see criminal prosecutions for the CEO of every company that delivers a crappy product that ruins your life in some small way.

Let me give you an example. Having offloaded a good $30 on a coffee plunger in an earnest effort to stop spending $5 a day on my morning coffee, I put the required scoops of coffee into the pot, filled it up with hot water, and waited, shutting my eyes against the familiar head thump when I've left my morning coffee too late. When it looked dark and foreboding enough, I gently depressed the top plunging thingy. In normal circumstances, it is supposed to simply crush the coffee into the bottom of the plunger so as to extract every bitter ounce of caffeine possible. It is not supposed to separate from the base so that it no longer plunges, and then decide to jam into an awkward position so that I can't tip out the coffee beneath it. Until the glass accidentally drops out of the handle bit and smashes all over the sink. Naturally this all had to happen at work, in day one of my new job, when I was wearing a white shirt. Just before a meeting with my new staff. Fuck you, coffee plunger.

Businesspeople who profit from faulty goods should be removed from society, locked up, wiped out and expunged like the parasites they are. Destroy the bastards in one fell swoop, before they destroy our lives, one tiny disappointment at a time.

Disclaimer: This blog was written before the author had her first cup of coffee for the day.

Election year yawn

2011-08-15T15:20:00.001+12:00

Quite by accident, I watched an item on the news on the National Party conference in Wellington today. I honestly didn't mean to, but I was half way through knitting and, when I am in the middle of knitting, I am unable to multitask (such as in putting down the knitting to turn off the tv).

So National this year has decided the country's biggest issue is youth and getting them working through long term, socially proven measures, like.... reducing the minimum wage. Naturally, there was a dissenting view from an unemployed senior citizen (wearing a red top - should I read into this?). "If you reduce youth wage rates, it will make it harder for us to find work," he bleated.

Good point. The Government should also, therefore, look at cutting the minimum wage for senior citizens. But then that may not be seen as fair on the middle aged population, who unfairly enjoy a higher minimum wage, whether we want it or not.

Everyone knows there has long been a percentage of lazy citizens who were just waiting to get themselves fired so they could rake in $227 a week. Presumably, through proven National Party research, these lazy citizens were youth. That’s why they staged the global financial crisis.

Since then these selfish schemers have dodged the queues of employers (notorious for trying to snap up eager youth workers) by "volunteering". Fortunately the Government will shut down that little rort and youth will have to get a job. Or work for the dole in a volunteer programme.

Another policy that's been well thought through. Must be election year.

It's iPads what caused it, innit. UPDATE

2011-08-14T15:53:00.004+12:00

Dear Comrades,

It is not surprising that the freedom-fighters in London have been denounced as “rioters’’ by the right-wing media machine.

These brave revolutionaries have selflessly risked other people’s lives to create a new socialist utopia.

But, as always, the dark forces of capitalism have sought to crush their spirit and incarcerate them until their parents make bail.

Never has one group of people done so much to promote equality, freedom and the equitable redistribution of iPads. And yet they are pilloried by the capo-fascist power structure and painted as common criminals by counter-revolutionaries in the ruling classes.

As a result I am obliged to circulate this test to idenfity subversive elements seeking to infect the revolutionary spirit.

In Solidarity,
Chairman Libertarimum

Please complete the following sentences. If you unable to read, please get your probation officer to help you.
Slain Tottenham resident Mark Duggan was:
A) A drug-dealing gangster who was carrying a home-made gun
B) Hopelessly caught in a cycle of poverty and crime
C) A Marxist visionary

Setting fire to heritage buildings across London is:
A) A sickening desecration of history, culture, and property
B) An inevitable by-product of spending cuts
C) A defiant blow to the capo-aristocratic establishment

Increasing police numbers on the streets to stem the rampant destruction is:
A) An move required to restore order
B) A confrontational move that will only provoke more violence
C) The jackboot of fascism on the throat of the working classes

Smashing shop windows to steal flat-screen TVs is:
A) Unacceptable behaviour no matter what your background
B) Only to be expected in a consumer-driven society in which individuals are judged by their material possessions
C) The first step in a wave of progressive internationalism

Tottenham vs Everton is:
A) A football match that had to be called off because of the London riots
B) A BBC mini-series about a bitter custody battle
C) An artificially constructed social division created to distract the working classes from their economic oppression

Welfare payments to the unemployed are:
A) No more than a temporary safety net of last resort to facilitate re-entry into the workforce
B) Contributing to a sense of dislocation, but must never be cut
C) A vital redistribution of wealth from the industrial-military machine

Public housing estates are:
A) An outmoded recipe for ghettoisation that should be replaced with integrated housing throughout the community
B) An outmoded recipe for ghettoisation, but must never, ever be cut
C) A rich breeding ground for the revolutionary spirit

The Tweet "F*** the electronics, them Turkish jewellers needed to get robbed" is:
A) A clear incitement to violence
B) A complex study in socio-racial interaction
C) A call for a people’s uprising against capitalist materialism and/or the post-colonial oppression of the Ottoman Empire

A BlackBerry Messenger system is:
A) A smartphone communications network used by rioters to co-ordinate attacks
B) A means for disenfranchised youth to express their hopes and fears
C) Racist

Overall the UK riots are:
A) No different to any other outbreaks of violence
B) No different to what happened in South Africa under Apartheid
C) No different to what happened in Canberra under John Howard

Results:
If you answered mostly A: You are an avid consumer of news and current affairs
If you answered mostly B: You are writing a doctoral thesis at the Deepak Chopra Centre for Peace and Conflict Resolution
If you answered mostly C: You are a far-sighted visionary, no longer blinded by the mask of capitalist hegemony. Your name is probably Sue Bradford.

UPDATE: What I didn't go into in the above sarcasm was my assumption that the yoofs quit rioting becuase they got a bit tired, and decided the next morning that rioting was too much like work. Seems I got it wrong. It was the rain.

Voting conundrum

2011-05-10T13:10:00.002+12:00

For the first time in my voting career, I don't want to vote. Labour and National are cut from the same blue and red striped sateen nylon blend bedsheet and have never appealed to me, I don't bother with any party run on separatist or thugish platforms, and I don't go near anything that even hints at the prospect of reducing my freedom. And I can't get excited about rabid, frothy mouth zealousness.

And I despise any party that thinks we need 120 MPs, or that 99 MPs is somehow better. It's still too many when all that is really needed is an elected board of 10 directors governing the country, with specific skills, rather than seniority and numbers based on party loyalties.

I do not generally consider myself to be of the anarchist persuasion. And the reason I do not want to vote in the next election is not because of apathy. I have always voted, and always treasured that I have the right to do so. But I also don't agree with the oft-quoted comment that if don't vote you do not have the right to speak out against the government.

Even if a libertarian politician got into the House, brimming with good intentions, they would be naive to think that they will use the State to further their ends. The sad truth is that the State will use the libertarian politician to further its ends.

My civic role would be much easier if the libertarian voices infiltrated the major parties to create an influence.   And, in doing so, becoming the group to which the major parties rely on. Of course the problem is not losing sight of the principles when doing this. The small parties, even though they ensure balance of power while maintaining some of the principles of those who voted for them, do very little to meet any libertarian ends.

I know I am letting the side down if I don't vote. Politics is ugly, like war. The objective is to win. There are really no moral victories in politics, only moral losses, and I would rather my preferred party loses elections rather than their souls.   Many in New Zealand view political participation as a endorsement of the status quo - an endorsement of the State. If there is to be a political solution, then a lot of people need to change. And that's not going to happen in a hurry.

Which brings me to my original dilemma: what is the point of voting this year? Does voting change anything? Probably not a great deal. At best, it makes it slightly harder for certain measures to pass.   And then, after all my ranting, there comes an inevitable point on voting day where I just say "screw it, I'll take five minutes to vote against this nonsense".

Time to invent the Teeth Spa

2011-05-02T23:47:00.000+12:00

Dear Dentists,

I only saw you because I was acting on this bizarre realisation that I frequently have "hand spas" and "feet spas", but rarely make an effort to "spa" my teeth. You should have been proud of me.

But no. After 10 minutes, I decided that I'm sick of you all. I rarely see you and your fellow counterparts because I am fed up with your efforts to medicalise the tooth experience. Having teeth is not a disease, so why do you spend all your time worrying about tooth problems? I hate that you treat me like my teeth are a disaster waiting to happen. And then charge me over $100 even though my teeth and gums are perfect and hole-free. Are you penalising me for having no issues?

Oh, don't fret. I am conscious that as an extreme coffee drinker and garlic lover, who works in close contact with people, I need to have fresh breath and, as I detest chewing gum, I will brush my teeth. I also prefer the fuzz-free teeth experience. But I don't brush my teeth because I want you to sleep more easily at night. You will never sleep easy as long as you worry, fret, stress, agonise over the potential damage I and my children could cause to our teeth and gums if we foolishly or brazenly ingest sugar, or inexplicably start smoking.

Oh, and in case you are wondering, I am not concerned about my two-year-old sucking his thumb. I presume you are asking because you are concerned that his thumb might be filled with juice? I checked. It's not. I hope you will sleep a little easier, and therefore be less grumpy with your clients tomorrow, knowing that my child does not have juice-filled digits.

And what happened to the funky bumble bees you used to get after the murder house experience? Do you only give those to people who have pain inflected on them?

Your profession needs to work on the teeth spa experience before I return.

Kind regards,
Still-has-her-own-teeth Libertarimum

Blasphemer in the temple of the State and philosophical musings

2011-04-27T00:15:00.000+12:00

Ok, confession. I am a ........wheeze................public servant. I suck taxpayers' money and assist politicians.

In a perfect world, I would not be a public servant. It wrangles with my taxpayer accountability principles, and I find myself ranting on an hourly basis against yet another law passed under urgency, or yet another highly paid project manager sitting on bottomless funding because she intimidated the minister with her large and imposing bone tiki hairclip and she ranted in te reo. I find myself suppressing dangerous tendancies when ministers haul me into their offices at short notice, and yell and scream at me before realising the useless private secretary summoned the wrong policy manager. I voice out loud how I would like to sell my share of the America's Cup/RWC/state-owned assets contribution, and what I would do with the money. And I get murderously angry when useless private secretaries with no experience whatsoever stab me in the back to cover their sycophantic uselessness. And I can only grit my teeth into a powder because "Yes Minister" is more alive and kicking under National than it ever was.

I consoled myself when I entered the public service with the thought that I could create a more libertarian New Zealand from the inside. Hah! Deluded and naive for such a deeply intelligent woman. Perhaps I was drunk that night.
In October last year, having only been back in the workforce for 4 months after 2 years as a stay-at-home mum, and hating every second of being a taxpayer-sucking policy analyst, I unexpectedly became the manager of the policy team. I was slightly apprehensive - management is my area of expertise, not policy, and the combination scared me, as did the speed of the ascension - but I was very excited at the prospect of being a manager.

I have to say, much to my surprise, coordinating the lives of 3 boys at home has actually made me a better leader than I used to be pre-children, in that I am more confident of what I want, I communicate things much more clearly, and I ensure I get people's support, and they get mine, before charging on with something controversial. Perhaps the life challenge of the past 18 months has contributed to this greater maturity as well. This all sounds very basic and obvious when I read it, but, in my earlier manager roles, these were the very things that freaked me out. I used to prefer the "lock-self-in-office-and-all-my-problems-will-resign" style. No wonder I struggled. Maturity and motherhood has made an impact on my professional development that I didn't envisage.

And I'm loving it.

One of the first principles I chose to follow when I took on the manager's role was to instigate a more libertarian approach to management, and thereby stealthily encourage libertarian thought in the development of policy and advice to the minister.

I'm fortunate that my staff are all highly intelligent, highly ambitious, and open and honest, and all sit in the preferred area of the political paradigm. This wasn't always the case - the team I inherited was unmotivated, frustrated, there were divisions in the team, dishonest discussions between the manager and staff, and the quality of advice was poor and taken from the perspective of "government must save people, and government will decide when the people are ready to be saved".

So, when I came on board, we decided to think less like public servants and more like taxpayers looking for accountability, innovation, and value for money. We quickly realised we could have some fun with this, and it would actually need less than our budget appropriation. We now relish identifying pockets of innovation and working with international research institutions, who do all the work and we take the findings; we have developed a bottom up strategic plan rather than a strategic plan that exists to justify an organisation's existence; the staff create and manage their own objectives, tasks and assignments. I merely give them the resources and mentoring to make it happen. And we involve the private sector, NGOs and academia in an effort to take services out of government, make it consumer-demand driven or it doesn't exist, and force people to take ownership for their own lives.

This extends to the performance appraisal process, which, within the confines of departmental and public sector rules, we practice what we preach. It is honest, open, and focused on personal ownership, rather than relying on the traditional concept of a "manager" to get things done, and everyone is a part of their colleague's appraisal, or performance improvement process. And, just to gloat, there has been an astounding improvement in the quality of work and the attitude of the team.

For some context, when I started, one individual was a struggling devoted unionist. I decided the only way I could manage this situation was to be true to myself, rather than pandering to membership choices to force me to hold on to a poor performer. If the union wanted to "discuss" something with me, bring it on. Now, through this libertarian approach to management and policy development, this individual is thriving. And they have finally understood the pride that comes with a personal turnaround because they realised that if they didn't take responsibility for their own career, they would ship themselves out. Their performance was a nuisance to me, but was not my problem because I could get rid of it; it was their problem if they wanted to stay. They saw the light.

This same individual ranted recently:

"The Union is not in the best interests of staff - a bunch of self serving red underpants wearing sycophants paying lip service to their own purpose. They get in the way - kick up a fuss - provide bad advice to staff to serve their own agenda and fail to get anything useful out of it. Indeed their failure to provide advice to me probably served me better in the long run."

One lesson that has guided me enormously was one that was demonstrated to me early last year, when I was despondent and feeling destitute after a marriage gone wrong and no money. I never begged for the money, but I did hint in a blog that I was feeling useless and worthless and was losing hope. In the space of 3 days, a fellow blogger had galvanised the beautiful people in blogland and I suddenly had enough money to pull together a suit to score the above mentioned role, and messages of support and love that I could slip into my handbag and refer to when urgently required.

The lesson that I seem to have taken from that overwhelming experience is compassion. It has enabled me to relate to those who have a reporting line to me not as "my staff" but as equals. They too are seeking happiness, trying to avoid suffering, they too have known sadness, and despair, they too are seeking to fulfil their needs, and they too are learning about life.

This lesson has been an epiphany for me personally and professionally, and has been instrumental in enabling me to be a much better person than I ever was. I now volunteer my time and finances to organisations and individuals who I once would never have taken a second glance. Now, I see hope, determination, and dignity, and I wonder what took me so long to see this lesson.

(And if you were one of those beautiful people, from the bottom of my heart, thank you again.)

Naturally, I am not going to divulge where I work. And, if our approach works, my team and I will have worked ourselves out of a job within the next 5 years. Sadly, the portfolio tends to be politically driven to hope for a wind up any earlier than that.

I searched far and wide for a decent book on libertarian management or leadership. While there are a few lauded theorists, Drucker apparently the most popular, a lot of what I've implemented in my team is actually made up, based on my interpretation of basic libertarian thinking and common sense.

I would love to do a Masters degree on something like this, but with a full time job, and 3 boys aged 6, 4 and 2, that's not going to happen any time soon. In the meantime, does anyone have any recommended bedtime reading as an alternative?

Chocolates and betrayal aversion

2011-04-24T15:05:00.000+12:00

A post by Homepaddock triggered my memory of a psychology article I read as part of a management course a while ago, coupled with an argument raging in my house this weekend over superiority of Easter eggs. I am very partial to plain, hollow, non-Cadbury eggs, and have always spurned the gloopy Creme Eggs. The rest of the family, however, dares to disagree with me, and came back from the supermarket yesterday with vast quantities of disgusting Cadbury chocolates (the disgustingness of which I have blogged about in the past) . They justified this lapse in judgement with, "but you've lost so much weight this year and you're looking really good now and you're so much healthier, so we thought you wouldn't appreciate any temptations. Probably."

Oh, thank you so much for caring, but your answer is as wrong as that dissatisfying mucus in Creme Eggs. The fattening aspect did not feature in my decision to go for one chocolate over another, so why do you feel the need to attribute a risk factor now? The only risk I can identify is chocolate withdrawal, but they seem to have identified an extreme risk of death through fat.

How do people analyse risks to determine the best course of action?

If I take their argument, let me imagine that I was given a choice of a hollow egg and a Creme Egg, and I was planning to make my decision based on which offered the most protection from death. The Creme Egg has a higher sugar content, and therefore, we'll say, an imaginary 2% risk of death; the Swiss-made hollow egg has no sugary mucus in it, and is therefore supremely healthier (although I concede I have not compared the nutritional information), with a 1% chance of death. All other factors being equal, those who are death averse will choose the hollow egg with the lower sugar, right?

Not necessarily and the reason is a widespread but seldom noted phenomenon: betrayal aversion.

A recent paper by Gershoff and Koehler, Safety First ? The Role of Emotion in Safety Product Betrayal Aversion, published in the January issue of the Journal of Consumer Research, notes that some risks are apparently more frightening than others.

Consumers often face decisions about whether to purchase products that are intended to protect them from possible harm. However, ...products rarely provide perfect protection and sometimes "betray" consumers by causing the very harm they are intended to prevent. Examples include vaccines that may cause disease and air bags that may explode with such force that they cause death. ...

Using the above Easter deliciousness example, what would happen if consumers were also told that the hollow egg contains a carcinogen, therefore increasing the risk of dying by an additional 0.01%. In other words, the Creme Egg is associated with a 2% risk of death, and the hollow egg is associated with a 1% + 0.01% risk of death. Of course, this doesn't factor the hormonal risk associated with chocolate deprivation.

Most would choose the Creme Egg, even though it had double the increased risk of death. That's because, for most participants, the tiny risk of "betrayal" (product malfunction, in this case, carcinogen) is much more frightening that the much larger risk of actually dying.

It is this visceral reaction that causes people to make irrational decisions about what to eat at Easter. When parents balance the much larger risk of a child dying from choking on Creme Egg fat against the tiny chance of a child being injured by a shard of hollow egg fat, they regard the possibility of product betrayal with out-sized horror. And because they are horrified by the tiny risk, they paradoxically choose the much larger risk. Ironically, they actually think that they are "protecting" themselves by embracing the much higher risk of death from gloop fat.

If, after careful consideration of the actual risks, some people elect to accept the higher risk of harm from a Creme Egg over the much smaller risk of harm from a hollow egg, they have every right to do so. But in order to carefully consider the risks, people need to realise that their emotional reaction to product betrayal may be clouding their assessment of the magnitude of the risks.

I'm just saying.

The Talk

2011-04-21T10:02:00.000+12:00

Mothering is marked by transcendent moments. I've had those moments while nursing my infants, watching my children play in school sports or perform on stage, and looking on proudly as they graduate from kindy or playgroup.

Teaching children the facts of life is not one of those moments.

Bring an enlightened libertarimum, I vowed that I would not subject my children to agricultural theories of human reproduction. None of that "daddy planted a seed" bollocks for us. I planned anatomically correct, age appropriate, completely truthful answers to any questions about sex, supplemented with charts from my father's medical books. Each of my children will know where babies come from the moment they ask.

I was conscious of the burden. If I wasn't completely truthful, the toll of this misinformation would be measured in unplanned pregnancies and sexually transmitted disease.

I had the best of intentions.

So, what the hell just happened?

Mr 6 and Mr 4 tentatively walked up together, and stood quietly beside me, I assumed to gather up the courage to tell me that had done something naughty.

Mr 6 was the first to talk. " Mummy," he asked, "do you remember all three times you had sex?" I tried to look thoughtful.

"Actually," I replied, "I've had sex more than three times."

His eyes widened. "Why would anyone do that?"

"Sex is not just for making babies," I explained. "Most of the time, people have sex because they enjoy sex itself."

He thought about this for a bit, and made a face of disgust. "Really? I can't imagine why. Gross."

I stood there, feeling oddly relieved at how that conversation had gone, while wondering if perhaps they were too young to know this but now it's too late, when Mr 4 piped up.

"I have a question," he declared. "I just want to know how, after the man takes off his penis and puts it in the woman to make a baby, how does he stick it back on his body?"

Fired by doctor. Crime: being too healthy.

2011-04-20T11:50:00.003+12:00

I called my son's medical practice. I needed to make an appointment to see the nurse, having just received a letter telling me that Mr 4-year-old was due for his 5 year jabs as soon as possible. First available appointment was next Friday (11 days).

But I wasn't allowed to book it.

Let's rewind.

A transcript of the call follows:

Medical Centre: "Hello, ***********Medical Centre. Please state your NHI number."

Me : "Pardon?"

Medical Centre: (talking loudly, perhaps in case I don't speak Unglush): "PLEASE STATE YOUR NHI NUMBER."

Me: "Oh. Ummmm I'm actually just calling up to make an appointment with the nurse for my son's 5-year-old jabs. I got a letter the other day. I only need to see the nurse, not the doctor. Why do you need my NHI number? Or his NHI number?"

Medical Centre: "Answer the question."

Me: "No. You answer the question."

Medical Centre: "Do you have his NHI number then?"

Me: "Of course not!"

Medical Centre: "SIGH. Fine. What's your first name?"

Me: "The appointment is for my son to see the nurse. Do you want his first name, perhaps?"

Medical Centre: "No. I want your first name, your surname, any previous surnames you have had, your date of birth, current address, previous address if you have lived at your current address for less than 5 years....."

Me: (dutifully answered, stifling the tourettes syndrome infiltrating my brain)

Medical Centre: "Now give me his first name, his surname, any previous surnames he has had, his date of birth, current address, previous address if he has lived at the current address for less than 5 years....."

Me: (dutifully answered.)

Medical Centre: "Oh. He has a different surname to yours. You should have said. How do I know he's your son?"

Me: "GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR."

Not surprisingly, she found my record. Then his record. But she noticed it had been 2 years since he last had an appointment.

Now I was in trouble.

I said, “He last came in for his 3 year jabs. He has visited a hospital in the meantime for a nasty injury, but aside from that, he's been healthy."

To which she said, “Well, I’ll have to e-mail the doctor. He’ll need to agree to the practice seeing him since it’s been so long.” It gets worse: “It’s going to be another week until we know,” she said. “He’s on leave this week, so it may not be until next week that you hear if your son can get in. Unless he is checking e-mail while away.”

Have we just been fired by his practice for not coming in?

"But", I countered, quite reasonably. "We never see the doctor with these vaccinations. The nurse sees us, and then sends us off once she's given the all clear. The doctor never makes an appearance. I just want an appointment for his routine jabs. What does it matter if the doctor is on leave? ******stifling rant noises****** Ahjustforgetaboutit. Fine. Let's grab that appointment then, so I don’t lose the opportunity. If need be, you can cancel it.”

But.......

Medical Centre: "I see you have health insurance for you and your children?"

Me: "What!? Yes. So what?"

She declined to make the appointment.

Having undertaken an empirical investigation of other doctors' practices, I am happy to say it didn't take long to find a much more polite practice, who seemed delighted that I have health insurance.

Health care isn’t supposed to feel like this. Doctors should never expect their patients to feel like they can’t access them, that they “expire” if they remain healthy, or that they are an e-mail decision away from being in or out of the fold of care. Their patients' medical record number should never usurp their name. This shouldn’t be about “working the system”, turning up for an appointment even when healthy just so that I or my children don't get fired from the books. This distance between doctors and patients is counterproductive. Does the funding regime incentivise poor health and repeat visits? I had the freedom, wellbeing and mobility to shop around for an alternative. I feel for those who are trapped at that practice.

Battle hymn of the Labrador Libertarimum

2011-04-15T17:38:00.004+12:00

Ah! Bliss! I finally get a chance to return to my much-missed venting post. Apologies for the last teaser that just left everything dangling.

Life since mid-last year has been a frenzy, and I marvel at those who work full time, have kids, and still find the time and energy to vent meaningfully and intelligently, rather than collapsing into bed and falling asleep before your head hits the pillow. Don't get me wrong - I do vent, and a lot, but it tends to be work-related, face-to-face, and I therefore am careful of the words I choose and the company I keep.

So, now I get a chance to chill, although it took a major op to make me find the time again to blog (the op wasn't related to hypoblogging).

While I was recuperating, one well-meaning but deluded soul mistakenly assumed that, because I have three kids, I must therefore read parenting books. Note: number of parenting books I have read in my life = 0. Number of parenting books I intend to read = 0). The proffered book: "Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother".

*******shudder*******

For those who successfully missed the storm of self-righteousness, congratulations. Amy Chua has been making herself known for defending her ultra demanding parenting style (not that I'm aware of anyone publicly challenging her, so why she wrote the book, I'm unsure). Ms Chua asserts that her extreme "Chinese"-style of parenting produces superior children.

Chua didn't let her own girls go out on play dates or sleepovers. She didn't let them watch tv or play video games, or take part in activities like crafts. Once, one of her daughters came in second to a Korean kid in a maths competition, so Chua made her daughter do 2,000 maths problems a night until she regained her supremacy (the daughter's supremacy, presumably). Once, her daughters gave her birthday cards that she deemed to be of insufficient quality, so Chua rejected them and demanded new cards. Once, she threatened to burn all of her daughter's stuffed animals unless she played a piece of music perfectly.

Through a leap of logic that isn't immediately clear to me, the result of this was Chua's daughters got straight As, and won a series of musical competitions.

Well, if mother (and presumably father too?) and daughters are content with this strategy, then I wish them all the best and ask that they don't contact me to boast when my sons come back from their tennis lessons with broken tennis racquets because they discovered rugby balls can't substitute tennis balls.

I believe Chua is actually protecting her children from the most intellectually demanding activities, because she doesn't understand what is cognitively difficult and what isn't. Practising a piece of music for four hours requires focused attention, but it is nowhere near as cognitively demanding as a sleepover with 14-year-old girls. Managing status rivalries, negotiating group dynamics, understanding social norms, navigating the distinction between group and self: these and other social tests impose cognitive demands that squash any intense disciplinary or tutoring sessions.

If you hadn't already guessed, I'm ambivalent about Chua's ideas. Admittedly, I only glanced at the book briefly before deciding its rightful place was in the hospital sterile rubbish bin (never a pleasant place). She fails to approach the issue of child rearing and education from any systematic, well considered perspective. I say this as a parent who admires the Montessori-style systematic and logical approach, and related disciplinary techniques. But I also think diversity in parenting styles is fine. To each their own.

But Chua led me to ponder (ok, recovery from a major op is boring) what a similar list might look like for a state-hating libertarian parent. Here's what I came up with.

My sons will not:

be punished for not getting an A;
be conscripted by the state to fight in its wars;
be subjected to pro-state, pro-environmentalist propaganda, without the mother giving them anti-propaganda vaccinations at home;
be forced to recycle;
be lied to by their parents;
be spanked or otherwise abusively punished;
be taught that it is their duty to pay taxes;
be taught that aggression in any form, private or public, is okay;
be made to feel they have an "obligation" to "give something back" to "society" (quote marks used because I'm not sure what those words really mean);
be talked down to just because they are children;
be unaware of libertarian intellectual traditions;
be made to feel their parents can't wait for them to grow up and get out of either parent's house;
be made to feel like they are unwanted or a burden;
be allowed to object to at least 10 kisses a day;
be treated like less than a full human being with rights and dignity, just because they are "under age".

I confess, with my kids I am a labrador, to the extent that I will even eat their unfinished dinner. I'll stick to this for now. It's easier, more fun (if a little daring at times), and seems to be working for everyone.

May this be a lesson to anyone who deigns to give me a parenting book.

Is this a return???

2010-12-27T15:20:00.001+13:00

Oh Blog. How I've missed you! Forgive me for my absence, but life just got away on me as I juggled new singleness, new-fangled unexpectedly busy high-powered job, three kids, new suburb, new schools and kindy, new gym.... And new me. While 2010 has been good after a rubbish 2009, there has always been a sense that something is missing...... it only took a few months to click......my blog!

It's not like I haven't had anything interesting to say! People around me are sick of my rantings. So wait for a re-invention, coming soon.......

Oily rhetoric

2010-06-05T14:27:00.001+12:00

Just to add to the vacuous comments by Tony Hayward (BP's CEO and this month's winner of the made-up-just-now Most Hated CEO) about this "disruption" (FAIL. Try "DESTRUCTION") because of an inconvenient oil spill, and how this has "cost him a lot of money" (oh my heart bleeds oil for you):

BP CEO Tony Hayward promised that the company would clean up every drop of oil and "restore the shoreline to its original state."

So far, he's has almost redeemed himself. I say "almost" because he has failed to clarify if this will be cleaned up out of BP's coffers in its entirety, or if the American victims (read: taxpayers) are expected to contribute.

"BP will be here for a very long time. We realize this is just the beginning," he said.

Actually, that scares me. Just the beginning of what. exactly? More oil spills? More failed attempts at ceasing this damage on the coastline and the innocent creatures who once happily populated it? More pointless rhetoric and failed attempts at sympathy for the CEO?

I've got nothing against drilling for oil - I do not think this one event (well ok, there have been a few) should prevent further oil exploration and drilling. But I do have everything against BP's rhetoric. Especially when they have so blatantly prioritised spending enormous sums of money on hypocritical greenie sycophantic advertising, and it seems very little on the safety and maintenance of their oil wells and for the people who staff them, and the innocent wildlife who tolerated giant rigs being randomly placed through their habitats.

And where exactly are those hypocritical greenies who benefited financially from BPs fawning?

“[T]he Nature Conservancy lists BP as one of its business partners. The Conservancy also has given BP a seat on its International Leadership Council and has accepted nearly $10 million in cash and land contributions from BP and affiliated corporations over the years,” Joe Stephens wrote for the Post May 24.

It’s not just Nature Conservancy either, the Post found $2 million in donations to Conservation International and relationships between BP and other lefty activist groups Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), Sierra Club and Audubon.

Hard to know what to do. If I exercise my consumer choice and avoid BP, I'm still unable to shop around for a competitive price, and the only people who will be affected by my boycott are BP's innocent franchise owners and their employees.

Feeling conflicted.

Minimum wage = unemployment

2010-06-04T20:30:00.002+12:00

I love this post from Not PC, so I pinched it from him and posted here.

A simple point from a master writer

Donald Boudreaux’s letters to the editor are small masterpieces of economic proselytisation--like Bastiat in miniature. Here’s his latest to the New York Times (pinched from Cafe Hayek):

Dear Editor:
Suppose Uncle Sam orders you to raise by 41 percent the price you charge for subscriptions to your newspaper. Would you be surprised to find a subsequent fall in the number of subscribers? If you assigned a reporter to investigate the reasons for this decline in subscriptions, would you be impressed if that reporter files a story offering several possible explanations for the fall in subscriptions without, however, once mentioning the mandated 41 percent price hike?
Unless you answered “yes” to this last question, I wonder why you published Mickey Meece’s report on today’s record high teenage unemployment rate (“Job Outlook for Teenagers Worsens,” June 1). Between 2007 and 2009, Uncle Sam ordered teenage workers (who are mostly unskilled) to raise the price they charge for their labor services by 41 percent. (That is, the federal minimum-wage rose from $5.15 per hour in 2007 to its current level of $7.25 in 2009 – a 41 percent increase.)
Does it not strike you as more than passing strange for your reporter – assigned to help explain why teenagers today have an increasingly difficult time finding jobs – to ignore the fact that these teenagers are ordered by government to raise significantly the wages that they charge their employers?
Sincerely,
Donald J. Boudreaux

Chip Scoop Act 2010

2010-06-01T07:29:00.000+12:00

The following article from Stuff means any one of the following:

a) the local council felt 3,578,356,825 bylaws just weren't enough, so they teamed with The Chip Group to add one more bylaw, while generating membership for the Group;
b) the anti-food brigade decided it would be more effective to control chip scoop sizes, rather than promote a user pays health care system where people would moderate their behaviour through personal choice; or
c) the chip eating market in Christchurch is too stupid to let the market dictate where they buy their good value, tasty chips from; or
d) it was a slow news night, and the events in Gaza are irrelevant when chip scoop sizes vary and the market is too dumb to buy their chips elsewhere.

Christchurch fish-and-chip shops have backed calls to standardise the size of a scoop.

The Chip Group, which comprises industry figures from potato growers to government agencies, has called for a standard scoop to weigh 330 grams before it is cooked.

The Chip Group chairwoman Glenda Gourley said portion sizes could vary wildly.

"When a consumer walks into a chip shop they don't know what quantity to expect," she said.

"Not only will consumers be better off, but chip-shop operators will also be able to better account for the finance side of their businesses if they know more accurately what they are serving."

In Christchurch, a random test of four shops found that scoops varied from 275g to 425g, while the cost varied from $2 to $2.20.

Lyttelton Fisheries served the 425g portion, while a scoop from City Fish and Chips weighed 275g.

Theo's Fisheries manager Yiannis Ioannou supported the standardised scoop.

The Riccarton Rd retailer does not have a standardised portion.

"That would be a good idea because when you have a set amount you can save a few sacks of spuds a week.

"It would keep it fair for customers," Ioannou said. "We try to keep it as fair as possible, but on a Friday night rush you just scoop it in quickly."

City Fish and Chips manager and co-owner Lou Donaggio also supported the standard scoop size.

"A standardised scoop size would be fairer on people, rather than having one place giving you four chips and another giving you 10."

Donaggio said customers wanted tasty chips, but also good value for money.

Lyttelton Fisheries manager Helen Lei said the shop had no standard scoop size.

But portions usually weighed about 350g before cooking.

Connoisseur Ellen Gray said she was happy with the two scoops of chips, pineapple ring and piece of fish she ordered from City Fish and Chips last night.

"We had a good amount.

"Maybe even too much, but we ate them," Gray said.

"They were good."

Gray said the outlet had been her "local" for about two years.

Gourley said a standard scoop size would be healthier for customers.

"In this day of increased dietary awareness by consumers, it makes sense that customers know exactly what they are getting," she said.

The organisation plans to inform chip shops of the recommended portion size.

It also intends to tell them where they can buy the standard scoop.

A veil on libertarian freedom

2010-05-22T11:16:00.009+12:00

(Apologies for the lack of links. Google Chrome doesn't like me today. Which is only adding fuel to my ranting. Will try to repair this asap. The links, I mean.)

If you take a quick scan through the French news websites, you quickly see that Europe is facing some grave economic crises. But still the French cabinet found the time to discuss a draft law banning the wearing of full-face veils in public places. Spain has just slashed public wages and is on the verge of economic collapse, yet the Minister of Work voiced his support to prohibit full Islamic facewear in the streets. Last month, Belgium’s coalition government dissolved and there was talk of splitting up the country, yet the parliament managed to unite 136 out of 138 deputies to vote through a law banning the burqa and niqab.

Why, in such difficult economic times, are European leaders investing such energy in the matter of women’s facewear?

Unless my French has failed me, it appears the burqa-ban laws were introduced with such displays of speechmaking that it is easy to assume the fate of these countries hangs on this single point of principle. One Belgian deputy admitted that ‘the image of our country abroad is more and more incomprehensible’, but said this near-unanimous vote banning the burqa and niqab rescued ‘an element of pride to be Belgian’. A French commission on the veil said the veil was ‘contrary to the values of the Republic’ and the parliament should make it clear that ‘all of France is saying “no” to the full veil’. The Spanish work minister said this clothing ‘clashes fundamentally with our society and equality between men and women. The values of our society cannot go into retreat'.

So how many women in Belgium wear these face-coverings that engaged the whole national parliament at a time of near-dissolution? France has studied the matter and judges that there are 1,900 women in the country wearing the full-face veil. When Denmark passed a law in January limiting full veils in public spaces, there were 200 women wearing the niqab and three women wearing the burqa.

Of course, the niqab is objectionable; it is indeed a mark of women’s oppression and isolation from the public world; it obstructs women’s communication with others, not to mention their vision and general mobility. And yet, at base, this is a piece of cloth. The cloth does not cause oppression, but merely reflects it. The corset and wired skirts did not cause the marginalisation of Victorian women, nor did foot-binding cause the oppression of Chinese women. When English women started to enter the public world, to demand votes and to do jobs, they soon swapped their corsets for the loose-fitting simplicity of 1920s dresses, and then, finally, for trousers.

As Muslim women become liberated, logic tells us they will take off their burqas by their own volition. A programme for the liberation of Muslim women – or immigrants in general – would be a fine thing, and yet this would involve changing their conditions of life and aiding their full participation in society. To ban the burqa is to take on the question of marginalisation at the most superficial level; it is to attack the symbol, to tear off the niqabs and to believe that this is liberation.

These burqa bans do not really ring true as genuine efforts to liberate Muslim women. The measure is less for the benefit of the woman than for the gallant state posing as her protector. In all those high-faluting speeches about their values, politicians reveal the real reason for these laws, which is to create an occasion for their own performance. The draft French law also includes a new crime, targeted at Muslim husbands, of inducing somebody to cover their face, which bears the penalty of a year in prison and a €15,000 fine. And so the state poses as the chivalrous knight rescuing women from their husbands.

There is a new and coercive element to these bans, too, which is the idea that citizens should be visible to the state at all times. It is because of ‘public security’ that Muslim women must show their faces, politicians said in both the French and Belgian parliaments. Who knows what they could be plotting behind those niqabs?

The reason for banning the face veil is illiberal through and through: we must show our faces so that we can be scrutinised by state security. For all the fine talk of openness in social relations, welcoming Muslim women into society and so on, the bans are also a cry of ‘Show your faces!’. A person must show their face so that they are identifiable and scrutinisable. In this sense, the burqa bans share the same impulse as bans on hoods in the Coastlands shopping mall in Paraparaumu on the basis that they might be a ‘security risk’.

Even if you argue that the niqab is illiberal, how much more illiberal is it that the state should tell a woman that she cannot wear one?

Banning is not the answer, to ailments that are either modern or traditional. Banning is never the answer: it is just an excuse for grandstanding and self-justification on the part of the state. Sarkozy may pose as the defender of liberty and equality; in fact, opposing the ban on the veil is the proper libertarian position.

Organogramosaurus

2010-05-05T20:22:00.002+12:00

My life is a complex litany of jargon. Some of it is useful. Most is just annoying or confusing. I feel pained when new jargon is added to my addled brain.

Enter the organogram.

In case you are too uncool to get this one, organogram is a description of a company’s structure. It is presumably a truncation of organisational diagram?

I am assured by people who like to use this word that it is a common business term. But this does not change the fact that it is a travesty of the English language.

For your benefit, I did some value for money empirical research, and discovered that the original spelling was organigram (more correct, but still a travesty), and it can be dated back to 1962. What makes this slightly acceptable is that we seem to have acquired the word from French, in which organigramme has been recorded as long as ago 1952. Oddly, the first example in the Oxford English Dictionary spells it with an o (rather than an i). However, for the next few decades, the i form was dominant.

But, all hail the HR professional. In the early to mid 1990s, someone in the HR business decided that, in order to justify their existence in an era of redundancies, organogram with an o looked sexier than with an i.

This does not mean that you need to use this word. I challenge you to make you life more interesting by never using this word.

It is a confusing word, that looks confusingly like it should mean a telegram on organic paper, or a unit of weight. “Two hundred organograms of my best figs? Coming right up, Ma’am!”

If you are compelled, or forced on pain of the most barbaric death imaginable, to use this word, at least spell it with an i. Suffice to say, I will not be using this word in the hope it faces the same fate as the dinosaurs.

Fluffy ducks

2010-05-01T13:53:00.000+12:00

Homepaddock wins the prize for being the only person today to make me smile.

Three women died together in an accident and went to heaven.

When they arrived, St Peter greeted them then said, ‘We only have one rule here in heaven: Don’t step on the ducks.’

When they entered heaven they found there were ducks all over the place.

It was almost impossible not to step on a duck, and although they try their best to avoid them, the first woman accidentally stepped on one.

Along came St. Peter with the ugliest man she’d ever seen. St. Peter chained them together and said, ‘Your punishment for stepping on a duck is to spend eternity chained to this man.’

The next day, the second woman accidentally stepped on a duck. Along came St Peter. With him was another extremely ugly man. He chained them together with the same admonishment he’d given the first woman.

The third woman observed all this and, not wanting to be chained for all eternity to an ugly man, was very, very careful where she stepped.

She managed to go for months without stepping on any ducks. But one day St Peter came up to her with the most handsome man she had ever laid eyes on.

St Peter chained them together without saying a word.

The happy woman turned to her new companion and said, ‘I wonder what I did to deserve being chained to you for all of eternity?’

The bloke replied, ‘I don’t know about you, but I stepped on a duck.'

Political compass

2010-04-25T01:00:00.003+12:00

I had a play for the first time with my political compass (http://www.politicalcompass.org/test) this evening.

Economic Left/Right: 5.50
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -3.49

Authoritarian

LeftRight

Libertarian

The analysis shows that my dot is sitting on Milton Friedman's dot. That's not a bad thing - I could do worse.

I have no idea what to make of the analysis. Or what to do with this information. So I have decided to be pleased with the results, and to continue to call myself a passive libertarian until I have a lightbulb moment. Or a blogger tells me that I'm brilliant. Or otherwise. Or compares their political compass with mine.

0100hours is never a good hour to analyse these tests.

Eyjafjallajökull isn't so hard to say

2010-04-20T22:08:00.000+12:00

Pride is overrated

2010-04-17T18:14:00.001+12:00

Just when I was starting to feel like my work colleagues are like one big, happy, loving family, I had to go and shame myself. Due to a delightful combination of a migraine and a virus, I decided to faint at work. In front of all my colleagues. Including those who work around the corner and not right next to me. And my boss. And the Director. Erk.

Having never fainted before, it was all a bit of a surreal experience, knowing that I was sitting at my desk one minute and then finding myself lying on the floor (quite well vacuumed, I noted) staring at a colleague's knees. Then looking up and staring at the senior management team. Oh my pride. Shot.

But, that aside, again I find myself startled at the extent some people go to help others. One of my colleagues, who I know has a busy workload at the moment, and who probably had better things to do on a Friday night, put all that aside to be with me in the ambulance to the hospital, and in a cubicle in A&E until I was discharge quite a few hours/tests later. It was lovely having her there, and I quickly learnt that the only person who cares about how I look when I'm at my worst is me.

This is the (at least) second time this year that I have been the recipient of such wonderful acts of human kindness. And my gratitude is such that I find it so hard to articulate just how deep that gratitude is.

Life is good.

Creative banking

2010-04-14T23:22:00.002+12:00

Unlike most New Zealanders, I’m actually not that fond of banks.

I am unable to get funds out of this one particular bank, for reasons that remain mysterious to both myself and the bank. Let’s call it Eastpac, because I’m sure if I used its real name I’d be charged a fee for it.

I found out this week that I’d been charged a $35 missed payment fee on my credit card.

This was of some surprise to me as I only have one fixed term deposit account with them (which keeps mysteriously getting renewed regardless of my instructions and without my permission, but for me to break it, I will have to incur a fee), and I don't have a credit card.

Being a naturally curious person, I rang the bank and asked why, when I don't have a credit card, there was a missed payment charge taken out of my forever-fixed deposit account.

"Well sir," said the pleasant Bangalorean (who of course happily lives and works in the Palmerston North call centre), "you failed to make a payment after we issued your statement."

"But," I cheerfully pointed out (still puzzling over the "sir" reference), "I don't have a credit card with you."

"Yes sir," the nice woman said, "but after you receive the statement you have to make a minimum payment of $10."

I thought perhaps I was not making myself clear, so I sought to explain my position further.

"Yes, but I do not have a credit card with you."

"Yes, but it wasn’t a payment. You were retiring debt."

"Isn’t that what a payment is?" I asked, out of a genuine desire to know.

"No. A payment is what you do after you get your statement."

"So anything I pay before I get my statement is not a payment?"

"That is correct sir."

"Even if I don't have a credit card with you?"

"Thank you for calling Eastpac. Please call again, sir. Beep beep beep beep beep beep....."

I have long accepted that the world is stupid and I try my best to accommodate this. Except when a bank refuses to give me my money back, and then steals bits of it for no reason.

And, no, I don't like it that the government does the same thing to me.

In both instances, I also don't like that I am totally powerless to stop the theft.

And I particularly don't like that I am now $35 poorer.

Statistkick me

2010-04-09T22:56:00.005+12:00

I thought you might like to know how I scored in the cognitive tests. I still have no idea if my inner psycho was too evident in the interview, but my tests scores and explanations are as follows:

For the verbal reasoning, you completed all 44 questions within the time limit and scored a total of 32 correct responses, an accuracy rate of 73% overall.

Hooray! I hear you shout in community spirit. But, wait! Tame that enthusiasm.

When compared against our New Zealand norm group of several thousand graduates and managers who have previously sat this test, your score places you in the 50th percentile. This means that your score was higher than 50% of this norm group and conversely, that 50% of this group has scored higher than you did on this particular test. In other words, your score is in the average range compared to your professional peer group.

That only took me about 10 minutes to understand. I think it's basically saying that I did reasonably well, until I compare my marks to everyone else, in which case I'm just average common schmuck.

Now, keeping in mind that the reason I never became a mathematician is because maths is not my strongest skill, I was thrilled to find out that I scored 54% in numerical reasoning! I passed. Er, not quite.

In comparison to our norm group, this score places you in the 18th percentile, meaning that your score was higher than 18% of our norm group and conversely, that 82% of this group has scored higher than you did on this particular test.

Ok. I feel so very stupid now.

But, wait again! It seems that those who do this particular test are in the top 2% of....something.....I'll say the population of New Zealand because that's quite a nice feeling in the circumstances.

Which means, the 50th percentile of the top 2% is pretty damn good. As is the 18th percentile of the top 2%.

Shame I don't have the mathematical ability to calculate what that means. If anything.

Kick me

2010-04-07T22:03:00.001+12:00

Do I look like I want to be humiliated, challenged, wrung through the proverbial washing machine? Because I'm starting to think someone's stuck something on my back that says as much.

I've spent my afternoon being subjected to a psychometric test that was so awful and a cognitive test that was so challenging that I am now oh so tempted to just withdraw the application for this job. Note that this is not a CEO job, or even a management job.Of course I want to do exceedingly well in it, because that's just the sort of person I am. But I really have to question the long, demanding, drawn out process for a role that is, really, insignificant in the scheme of jobs. So far, the process has involved an initial interview with HR, followed by a panel behavioural interview, followed by a written exercise, then a psychometric test, then a psychometric interview, then a reading cognitive test, then a numerical cognitive test, followed, possibly, by referee checks..... by which point I wonder if I will still be standing with the exertion.

And as for that "psychometrician". Get a real job. That is not a job. The irony of you giving yourself a fancy, meaningless title, analysing information spewed forth by a computer, and then throwing inaccurate labels at me is not lost on me. No one but you has ever called me a passive polite procrastinator. The reason for this is because I am not passive or a procrastinator. I guess for someone who makes up his job title, 1 out of 3 isn't a bad hit. It's actually not so inconceivable that a person can be polite and decisive. The fact that you then started throwing various titles in my direction in an effort to fish until you got a bite completely discredits you.

Sadly, though, you are still a vital link in my quest to get this job. How badly do I really want this job? Not so badly after today.

But, honestly, I wouldn't hire myself after those cognitive tests. Usually, I excel at reading comprehension and maths, but today the words just swam around the page and I, oddly, forgot how to calculate ratios. What happened there?!? And, somehow, I think I shouldn't say I screwed up because the psychometrician pissed me off.

The world would be a better place if HR and HR-related psychologists just stepped out of the recruitment process. In fact, the world would be a marvellous place if HR and their psych buddies just sacked themselves. I'll be happy to do it for you. Then we'll see who's the passive, polite procrastinator.

Where is Wino?

2010-04-05T22:38:00.000+12:00

I don't mean to pry, but I haven't heard from Kismet Farm for a while. I know she's going through a rough time lately with her health. I tried to get in touch with her by posting a comment on one of her posts, but haven't heard anything. I've never met her, but, like all my blogger friends, I like her. I'm worried.

This is a long shot, but if anyone is in touch with her, can you let me know how she is and if she needs any help? And also give her my love and hugs.

An update

2010-04-01T23:10:00.000+13:00

Where are my manners? When I found the time over the last few days to overcome my hiatus and resurrect my blog, the one blog that I should have prioritised was an update of my life, especially for all those bloggers who kindly and selflessly helped me out when I was at my lowest.

The financial and emotional help was a turning point for me. I was able to settle some IOU debts, invest in a cheap but decent suit, nice work shoes, a few shirts, damn lawyers fees. And then I hit the job market before hitting rock bottom again.

And life hasn't been still since. And I have never been busier.

I am now working full time, in the office doing many hours on the days the kids are with their father, and working from home when the kids are with me. It's wonderful to be in the workforce again, and be recognised and needed for my intellect and my grown up social skills.

Don't get too comfortable now. I am still struggling to accept the betrayal around the marriage break up, and I am still struggling with the resentment that comes with only seeing my children for half of the week. And I am struggling with the challenge of juggling work, kids, and ageing parents. And I have frequent crises of confidence.

But, on the whole, life does feel like it's looking up. There is a lot to smile about and laugh at, and it helps that I work with such naturally positive and caring people. At times, the sense of impending clinical depression never feels too far away and I have to make a conscious effort to smile or laugh. But I remain hopeful that in time the effort involved will diminish and it all becomes automatic and totally natural.

I remain thankful - so very thankful - to all who helped me out, and to the many people who are still helping me out in their own wonderful way.

Battery crème eggs

2010-04-01T23:02:00.003+13:00

What is this disgusting abomination that is passing off (passing away???) as a crème egg?

A small confession might be relevant here. I have actually only consumed two crème eggs in my lifetime. The first was in 1998. The second one this afternoon.

I didn't enjoy the 1998 crème egg. That sickly sweetness remains ingrained on my taste buds.

I only subjected myself to today's crème egg because I was curious to taste if they had improved at all.

I found the 1998 experience disgusting. But I never recalled them being this revolting.

Forgive me now for going into crème eggs in more detail. The chocolate tasted like baby milk formula (those familiar with baby formula will identify with the stench that I refer to). The texture of the chocolate was soggy and oily, and left a powdery substance (anthax? Gib dust?) on one's tongue that refuses to wash away. And the filling…..ugh. That's the best description I can provide. The consistency was of curdled milk (or perhaps rotting yolk) with undissolved granules (sugar? Gib dust? Anthrax?). And the sweetness was worse than I remembered.

No drink or food consumed since the fateful crème egg error of this afternoon has removed the flavour coating my mouth and relevant digestive organs. Not even toothpaste and mouth wash.

I am stunned that there is a market for this horror.

On the plus side, I know my hips are safe from further crème eggs, and any weight gain from this point on will be due entirely to water retention.

It's the end of the world. Again.

2010-03-28T00:56:00.003+13:00

This year, I didn't do any rebellious excessive lights on exercises as my snub to ridiculous Earth Hour. This year I forgot. Not that it made any difference, because I quite like celebrating my lightbulbs. At the scheduled time of mass hysteria, I think I was in a restaurant in Mt Victoria, or walking down Courtenay Place, and there wasn't a dangerous candle in sight and all the lights were blazing. I thank all the bars and restaurants for their thoughtfulness in ensuring no one killed me, or they didn't burn down their premises, or I didn't break my ankle on the way back to my car.

I drove home, via the brightly-lit supermarket, well within the allotted Earth Hour hour, to a house blazing with lights (haha, fooled that burglar), and, once again, I gave my thanks to Mr Edison. At that point, I did turn off all the unimportant lights, but only because I care about my power bill.

I read a vacuous pro-Earth Hour comment from a friend on Facebook, but chose to deal to it with a deft piece of mental taekwando, using a stance that was fluid, flexible, and centred.

I then decided to get myself a drink of filtered water from my non-efficient fancy fridge. I couldn't be bothered turning on the lights, not in any deference to Earth Hour, but because I am lazy. However, tonight was different to most nights. Tonight, I discovered that my neighbours are Earth Hour freaks, or they were all out, because there was no neighbourly light streaming into my kitchen. I found my way to the fridge with the help of my shin bones and toes. I think I may have broken every bone in both legs.

I did get to my fridge, but instead of having a drink of water, chose to empty all the contents from my freezer to use as ice packs.

I blame Earth Hour.

Time management

2010-03-27T17:44:00.000+13:00

Oh how strange it has felt to not be physically, or mentally, able to have any time to blog! Between working in a role that is already intellectually exhausting, looking after children.... ok, I know you all manage to juggle it all. But HOW?!?!?!? You're all superhuman! All I seem to have time to blog about right now is how I have no time to blog.

But, on the plus side, this is a blog post. And I am hoping that the very act of posting a new blog will be enough to get me into the blog obsession again. It's not that I can't think of anything to blog about, but by the time I get around to actually blogging, it's all old news. So I simply read what everyone else has to say, and log off.

Not good. Time to get my priorities sorted!

Celebrating pain relief

2010-02-26T11:27:00.000+13:00

There's an interesting stoush taking place between some of my very different friends on Facebook. Just to demonstrate the shallowness of some people, these friends have never met each other, but are arguing over personal choices made by others relating to the birth of a child. This should be a happy event - as I've said in the past, the only satisfactory outcome is a live baby and mother - and yet some people take the opportunity and use it as a platform for their own agenda.

The stoush started innocently enough - someone said they had just given birth, and the congratulations were numerous. Then someone asked what sort of birth they had. The word "epidural" was mentioned, and now I am choosing to no longer look at my Facebook account, other than to send messages of sympathy to my now beleaguered friend. It is clear that there is a warped line of logic that believes a person's individual choice demonstrates the apparent subservience of women to men. The name of an obstetrician in the UK, Dr Denis Walsh, has been thrown around as providing some sort of wisdom on this topic. In return, the less than intelligent comebacks have focused on the lack of uterus of Dr Walsh, and therefore his lack of credibility, to make such a statement.

I stare at these comments, and all I can come up with is the deeply intelligent and articulate, "What the ....?"

Birth pains are nothing to celebrate, and I would take a guess that it was degenerate feminists, rather than ignorant men, who first argued that childbirth should be a painful rite of passage.

Dr Denis Walsh is a Professor of Midwifery, who argued that birth pains help mother and child bond. He criticised women for their "antipathy to birth pain", and criticised the "epidemic" use of epidurals.

Oh dear.

There are many reasons to criticise Walsh, but the fact that Walsh is male is not one of them. Yes, it is true that Walsh will never give birth, and so will never experience the pain of delivery (although a part of me does hope that he will perhaps experience the pain of kidney stones as some consolation), but that does not explain his apparent lack of understanding and empathy. Most men and women will never suffer pain because of, say, nerve degeneration, cancer, or travelling kidney stones, but that does not mean they cannot understand such pains and provide sympathy.

There is no reason why anyone should be expected to endure pain from an acute trauma such as childbirth. Nobody expects victims of car accidents or those undergoing surgery to just "withstand" the pain. Modern analgesic procedures mean that pain relief can be readily provided, and the patient can be rendered both more comfortable and more likely to make a full recovery. No procedure is entirely risk-free, of course, including painful childbirth, and women should be made aware of the risks associated with an epidural so as to make an informed choice. But the risks can easily be exaggerated, as Walsh does in his article, to scare women away from what is an essentially safe, effective and routine procedure.

Walsh is not alone in his crusade against pain relief during labour. There is a widespread belief that childbirth pain - but not other pain - should be endured, and even celebrated. A good reason not to get overexcited about Walsh being male is that the origins of this idea lie in feminism. Having failed to secure equality, around the mid-1970s, feminism took a degenerative turn towards praising the special virtues of women and attacking maleness.

Women were presented as having special empathetic and nurturing qualities that made them less destructive, and put them into closer contact with nature. Their ability to give give birth, and their experience of the painful process of giving birth, were held up as evidence of their inner, female wisdom. Business, politics and medicine were seen as problematic because of male domination. Thus, for example, it is argued that the Enron debacle might have been avoided if only there were more female CEOs and accountants, Governments would be less corrupt and destructive if there were more female MPs, and medicine would be more humane and less arrogant if there were more female doctors.

Rubbish.

Women can be destructive and arrogant, just as men can be empathetic and humble. It might be true that medicine in the 1970s was excessively arrogant and paternalistic, but that had little to do with the male character of medicine and more to do with the high esteem in which medicine was held within the profession and by society at large. This is certainly no longer the case, and modern medicine is, if anything, now too diffident and understanding at the expense of making tough clinical decisions. That's partly why nonsensical discussions of "natural" childbirth and pain control techniques (such as yoga, hypnosis, water baths, massage, acupuncture, moxibution, to rattle of just a few) now dominate childbirth discussions. Non-pharmacological techniques might have their place for some women, but effectiveness is limited and the doctors know that. As it happens, so do many women. The use of epidurals during childbirth is known to be increasing because epidurals work and women demand them.

And rightly so. There is no reason why any woman should endure an entirely preventable pain if she doesn't want to. The fact that there is a choice available should be what is celebrated, not the personal decision that was made.

WARNING: food is a choking hazard

2010-02-22T22:13:00.001+13:00

How about just putting warning labels on everything. Including the danger that a warning label can present.

This piece of pointless drivel from the NY Times:

Pediatricians Urge Choking Warning Labels for Food

Published: February 22, 2010

CHICAGO (AP) -- When 4-year-old Eric Stavros Adler choked to death on a piece of hot dog, his anguished mother never dreamed that the popular kids' food could be so dangerous.

Some food makers including Oscar Mayer have warning labels about choking, but not nearly enough, says Joan Stavros Adler, Eric's mom.

The American Academy of Pediatrics agrees. The nation's largest pediatricians group is calling for sweeping changes in the way food is designed and labeled to minimize children's chances for choking.

Choking kills more than 100 U.S. children 14 years or younger each year and thousands more -- 15,000 in 2001 -- are treated in emergency rooms. Food, including candy and gum, is among the leading culprits, along with items like coins and balloons. Of the 141 choking deaths in kids in 2006, 61 were food-related.

Surveillance systems lack detailed information about food choking incidents, which are thought to be underreported but remain a significant and under-appreciated problem, said Dr. Gary Smith, director of the Center for Injury Research and Policy at Nationwide Children's Hospital in Columbus, Ohio.

Smith is lead author of a new policy report from the pediatrics academy that seeks to make choking prevention a priority for government and food makers. The report was released Monday in the journal Pediatrics.

Federal law requires choking warning labels on certain toys including small balls, balloons and games with small parts. Unless food makers voluntarily put more warning labels on high-risk foods, there should be a similar mandate for food, the pediatrics academy says.

Adler, a Warren, N.J. attorney who pushed for more warning labels after her son died in 2001, says she hopes the academy's efforts will work. Several efforts to pass federal legislation for labels have failed in Congress.

The group also urges the Food and Drug Administration to work with other government agencies to establish a nationwide food-related choking reporting system; and to recall foods linked with choking.

Adler considered herself educated about children's safety. Her son had eaten hot dogs before without any problem.

Hot dogs are ''almost as American as apple pie,'' she said. ''You really don't know how horrible it can be.''

Perhaps it is not the food that requires the warning label?

The BNP gains a voter UPDATE

2010-02-15T10:15:00.005+13:00

Australia has woken up this morning to the news that one of its anti-immigration advocates has decided to, er, emigrate. Pauline Hansen has chosen the path of least media resistance and disowned her people - well, Queenslanders living in Oxley, anyway. It appears Australia has failed in not embracing the Oxley-moron's controversial views on race, her naked photo shoots, her failed attempts to incite paranoia over her non-disappearance, and the lack of interest in her autobiography "Untamed and Unashamed".

ANTI-immigration mouthpiece Pauline Hanson is packing up her bags and emigrating. She is departing for a new life in the UK, claiming that Australia is no longer the land of opportunity. The former One Nation leader has told Woman's Day magazine she is selling her Queensland home.

"I'm going to be away indefinitely," Ms Hanson said.

"It's pretty much goodbye forever. I've really had enough. I want peace in my life. I want contentment, and that's what I'm aiming for.

"I will miss my children and close friends most of all."

The mother of four - who in 1996 made world headlines when as a new federal MP she blasted multiculturalism in her maiden Parliamentary speech - told the magazine Australia had changed too much for her liking.

"Sadly, 'the land of opportunity' is no more applicable," she said.

She acknowledged her Parliamentary days were behind her, having failed in her latest bid to enter the Queensland Parliament, in March last year. "I know I will never be given a chance to enter Parliament again," she said.

The former fish-and-chip shop owner rose to national prominence 14 years ago when she won the federal seat of Oxley in Queensland. Originally endorsed as the Liberal candidate for the seat, she was cut loose by the party because of her controversial views on race.

In 1997 she formed the One Nation party with David Ettridge and David Oldfield.

Ms Hanson lost the seat at the 1998 election and then tried a further four times to be elected to Parliament. While she became an independent, her former party collapsed and is now a shadow of what it was when she was at the helm.

The alarming rising success of the BNP aside, I'm intrigued that she has chosen the UK as her choice of country to escape to from Australia. If she has the right to emigrate to the UK, then of course that's fine, assuming her criminal record and time in jail won't be an issue. But for someone so opposed to a multicultural society, I have some doubts that the UK is the best choice.

Having said that, I'm not succeeding in suggesting an alternative country for her to consider. Partly because I can't think of any country that has a population of entirely white Australians, and also because I can't think of any country that I think deserves to be inflicted with her. China is a largely homogeneous society, but the problem with China for Pauline Hansen is that there are too many Chinese people living there. India, too, is largely homogeneous, but she may have some trouble acclimatising there, as well. Zimbabwe has embraced policies that she may be proud of, but in the wrong order.

Pauline, perhaps, in time, you will realise that Oxley, Oueensland, is the ideal place for you, but, while I have nothing against the UK (in fact, I feel a little sorry for the UK right now), I do hope that you are happier in another country and that you stay there. Don't let the door hit you on the way out.

UPDATE: I am contemplating adding "psychic" to my CV.....

Top Ten Rock Albums as decided by...... The Vatican

2010-02-14T11:15:00.001+13:00

Apologies, but I am unable to find the order just yet:

Michael Jackson: "Thriller"
Pink Floyd: "Dark Side of the Moon"
The Beatles: "Revolver"
Paul Simon: "Graceland"
Carlos Santana: "Supernatural"
David Crosby: "If I Could Only Remember My Name"
Fleetwood Mac: "Rumours"
Donald Fagan: "Nightfly"
U2: "Achtung Baby"
Oasis: "What's The Story Morning Glory"

I clearly need to upgrade my collection.

Another lesson in perspective

2010-02-14T11:05:00.000+13:00

Blogger PM of NZ has drawn attention to interesting articles in today's NZ Herald (perhaps I found them interesting given my personal circumstances at the moment).

All very sad stories about marriages destroyed because of infidelity, and the war that has ensued over assets, with children caught up in all the animosity.

But one comment stands out. A lawyer, Geoff Harrison, has said financial pressures had hit the marriages of the wealthy.

No problem with that comment, except why restrict the pressures to the wealthy here?

But then, with his two feet firmly in his mouth, he unfortunately tried to also stuff his knees in by continuing (my bold and italic):

Often they end because the relationship has gone financially bust."

For some, the loss of wealth was "not unlike when there has been a death of a child".

How utterly offensive and disgusting. Yes, a marriage breakup, and the financial pressures that inevitably arise, are stressful. Extremely stressful.

But nothing - NOTHING - can ever be as horrendous as losing a child.

Unless he can prove convincingly that his comment was taken out of context, and at this moment I am struggling to see how such a statement could be taken out of context, I won't be hiring that insensitive, thoughtless, callous lawyer in a hurry. To put material hardship ahead of the value of the life of a child suggests he is unsuited to a career in family law.

Anaptyxis

2010-02-13T14:55:00.000+13:00

Driven to boredom by the big news networks (CNN and BBC), I have lately resorted to watching Sky News. This is not because Sky News is an improvement, but rather because it was the only one left that didn't annoy me with its either screaming-aint-news-sexy CNN-style delivery or mumbling-half-asleep BBC-style delivery. And I can't work out what the NZ newsreaders (sorry, "journalists") are trying to say.

But, alas, my patience has been pushed to the point where, as of today, all my news will be from the print media (although this, too, is trying my patience - a blog is likely to follow in time), and fellow bloggers who have a higher tolerance level than me.

My first warning to Sky News came when I stopped watching the sports news on the basis that the accents of the sports news readers was uncultured and grating. They all come across as brash, cocky, arrogant and, in urgent need of elocution lessons.

My second warning came after I started noticing glaring spelling errors in the pop up info, and in the annoying little news ticker tape thingy at the bottom of the screen that keeps distracting my attention. Initially, my good nature gave them the benefit of the doubt and I simply assumed it was fast-typing errors (but a spell check doesn't take long). Sadly, I was misled. The errors were, in fact, due to a lack of literacy. Noticeable frequent errors include (correct spelling in parentheses in case anyone from Sky News is reading this): creul (cruel), Indain (Indian), Minster (Minister), alot (a lot), thankyou (thank you), occassion (occasion), liquify (liquefy), wierd (weird), and, the final straw for me, Feburary (February).

Today, I gave up Sky News for good following several versions of anaptyxis. For those readers now wondering why I have given up on Sky News because of an apparent allergic reaction, anaptyxis is the incorrect insertion of a vowel to break up a troublesome consonant cluster, as in the common mispronunciation "mis-chee-vee-us" (mischievous is correctly pronounced "mis-che-vus").

Anaptyxising has its place, of course. In French, for example, Parc des Princes (a big stadium in Paris) as is pronounced par-kuh-des-princes. And the Japanese borrowings of English words often involve anaptyxis, such as "hottu doggu" for hot dog, and "Macadonalado" for McDonald's.

But, and here's the key, French and Japanese are not English.

I have been patient with Sky News, but, to date, I have collected nine examples of anaptyxis. Enough is enough. The following words must forevermore be pronounced correctly in my presence:

WORD	RECOMMENDED	CARELESS
athlete	athlete	ath-e-leet
burglar	bergler	berg-a-lar
battling	batling	bat-e-ling
disastrous	dizastrus	disaster-us
film	film	fillim
grievous	greevus	gree-vee-us
lightning	lite-ning	li-ten-ing
remembrance	remembrance	re-member-ance
umbrella	umbrela	um-bere-la

And, while I'm on this rant, where did the word "hospitalised" come from? Am I correct in understanding that a footballer was turned into a hospital after breaking his ankle?

Spam me kangaroo down, sport

2010-02-09T11:20:00.002+13:00

Nearly six months ago, I entered a brave new blogging world, through something called "the Internet", that was apparently invented by Al Gore.

I was a bit apprehensive at first. I knew my otherwise intelligent mind wasnt being fully utilised as a stay at home mum, and there were so many things I needed to rant about to take my mind off a difficult personal life.

But then I realised that blogs can also be used as a force for good. One particular blog commenter stands out. Unfortunately his voice has been somewhat stifled from appearing in my blogs by my obsessiveness with keeping out spammers, but here is a selfless person who deserves some recognition.

Enter Gary Green, a councillor from Rockdale, NSW. I could tell you more about him, but I think it's better if he tells you himself.

Councillor Gary Green has lived in the City of Rockdale for the past 15 years and is a successful businessman in the field of Self Development.

Councillor Green is a Peak Performance Coach and 5th Dan Taekwondo Master (MAIA) with formal qualifications in Performance Psychology (ACAP), Technical Analysis (ATAA), Clinical Hypnotherapy (NSWSHS), Coaching (ASC), Workplace Training/Assessment (ISA), Retail Management (ISA), Ego State Therapy (Mac.), and a University Masters Degree in Counselling (Psych. UWS).

He teaches Taekwondo classes at Narwee and was selected to represent Australia in the sport. Councillor Green is also a Clinical Member/Supervisor with the Australian Counselling Association, Clinical Member of the Counsellors and Psychotherapist Association, Full Member of the NSW Counselling Association, and long term member of the New South Wales Justices' Association. Councillor Green's hobbies include hang-gliding, playing piano/keyboard, anaerobic/aerobic training and ongoing study.

I'm not going to say anything critical about this because Gary knows taekwondo.

But I will say this: it is clear that, when he's not hang-gliding or playing the keyboards or anaerobic/aerobic training, Gary spends all his time helping others. Who is there to help Gary?

I am.

I am touched that I can help Gary by letting him spam my blogs. No need to thank me, Gary. I care for your wellbeing and am so pleased to be able to help you.

Appeasing Hindu Guilt

2010-02-09T10:50:00.001+13:00

These last few days have been one of the most enlightening I have ever experienced.

One month ago, my father was negotiating working for longer (he's almost 70), and I was selling stuff so that we could pay the first lot of legal fees, on top of standard living expenses. The next lot of legal fees (hopefully the last of it) is due soon - at the same time as school fees, stationery fees, kindy donations, the need to buy work clothes for me, and ongoing living expenses. But the pressure of money is definitely relieved enormously with your show of kindness, whether financial or emotional. There does reach a point where I wonder if I have thanked people enough already, but then I lapse into old habits of feeling so grateful, that nothing I say or do is enough to satisfy me.

One of the emotions I have been battling with is the curse of Hindu Guilt, which I have referred to in the past, and which is, I believe, superior to Catholic Guilt (yes, it is a competition). This is particularly problematic and puzzling for me because I am not actually Hindu. My parents are, but not me. I don't know why I am feeling so guilty through all this. Perhaps it's the thought that, even though I have no issue with the provision of welfare for short term emergencies, I never expected I would need to be a recipient of the hard earned tax money of others. Or perhaps it's the knowledge that there is probably someone out there worse off than me who hasn't benefited from the kindness of others because they didn't happen to have a blog that happened to be read by generous people. Regardless of the reasons, I've spent a large amount of my time trying to work out how I can appease this peculiar sensation of guilt.

Guilt is as inescapable as death and taxes. If you have a conscience, you have guilt. The feeling of guilt or remorse is exclusive to humans. No other animal has this. Dogs may look guilty, but that’s just dread when they’ve done something they know will upset you. The dog has no trouble sleeping at night.

Perhaps my term “Hindu guilt” is code for mocking the workings of a healthy conscience. As close friends and family reminded me when I was bemoaning this to them, I have helped people out enormously when their luck has deserted them (I even moved my life to the USA on one particular occasion), or when they just needed a friend. I volunteer most of my spare time to various charities (mainly the kindy). And I have realised that I am as embarrassed at receiving gratitude as I am at giving it!

I am getting a lot of comfort knowing that what goes around comes around.

Seeing life from a new perspective

2010-02-08T10:58:00.002+13:00

One day I will eventually stop gushing my effusive gratitude to you. Thanks to Lindsay, I'm starting to see things through a new perspective. I'm loving these lightbulb moments. Thank you AGAIN!

The kindness of bloggers

2010-02-06T23:57:00.000+13:00

I wasn't going to look at the computer tonight, having spent much of the day shifting far too many cubic meters of rocks in the hot sun. Exacerbated by the stress of having to reverse a trailer.

I did actually draft, in my head, a blog that ranted on the impossibility of reversing a trailer.

But, when I decided to type out the frustrated, trailer-reversing diatribe, I stumbled across an email, then a blog by Lindsay Mitchell, and all trailer-reversing thoughts detached from the proverbial tow bar.

My last blog was a form of stress release, where I detailed the humiliation of finding myself in a position where I need short term financial help. I know I will get a job soon, and that job will be well over the minimum wage - well over. But this doesn't help me in the short term.

I never intended that blog to be a cry for donations. It was only intended to be a rant about the unfairness of the welfare system.

So, imagine my utter surprise when I read that other bloggers have followed Lindsay's call to financially help humble little (well, kind of little) me, and have so generously offered to help me cover my shortfall. It's hard to know what to say, or how to articulate the depth of my astonishment and, more importantly, my gratitude.

I suspect part of my problem at not being able to just take the money and be gracious at the same time is Hindu guilt. Catholic guilt seems feeble in comparison. Not that it's a competition. Or perhaps it is.

I've always been taught that there is always (probably) someone worse off than me. This is undoubtedly true. And I hope that I too can help them in the same way that people - in my case, complete strangers, only united by blogs - have been so kind to me.

I know today's blogging event provides an important lesson to me, but I am ashamed that this lesson hasn't yet broken through the shock of the kind gestures. When it does, I will definitely be blogging the revelation.

In the meantime, I must remember that while I may feel utterly lost, depressed and alone after a number of humiliating experiences, the reality is far different. I have my good health, my loving family, my beautiful children, my non-judgmental friends, and a community of the kindest bloggers anyone could wish for.

For the first time in a long long long time, I have a feeling I will be sleeping a little better tonight. And smiling a little more for my children tomorrow.

Thank you. I love you all, and I will wait for the day when I can either repay your kindness, or shout you a drink (which is also a kind gesture, I suppose!).

What more can I sell?

2010-02-05T19:06:00.001+13:00

It's now just over three months since my marriage/family breakup. In that time, the kids' father and I have worked out a so-far successful 50/50 arrangement, the kids seem happier, the old house has sold (for a crap price, but sold is sold), I'm settled into my childhood home again, one child has started school, one is now at a new kindy, and one is now sleeping happily in two houses.

But I need money to make ends meet. Although my parents aren't complaining about having to support me again, I feel enormous guilt that I am being a financial burden to people who have worked so hard for so many years and are having to spend their hard-earned retirement money in this way. I am actively looking for work, and have a few promising options looming, but it doesn't resolve my short term financial crisis. The ex is being belligerent, and to fight for any support from him, no matter how short term, ironically involves spending money on legal fees to obtain. A rock and hard place sandwich.

So, on the urging on well-meaning friends, I took a deep breath, swallowed my already damaged pride, and went to a WINZ office.

"What have I got to lose," I tried to justify to myself. "I've already sold my confidence, self esteem, security, stability, family cohesiveness. Might as well sell my dignity while I'm at it. Wonder how long it will be before I'm in a position to buy some depression?"

Up until my recent, life-changing events, I was critical of the welfare state. I refused to accept most arguments for its existence, beyond a degree of assistance to help those in short term strife.

But, for me, it was not to be. Having completely surrendered my dignity by walking into a bloody WINZ office, I was then humiliated. Forgot that was free.

It seems I should have no trouble finding a job (yes, I know that, but it doesn't solve my problems until I GET that job), and that maybe I should rethink my decision to break up the marriage. Is there, by any change, I can try and resolve the issues with my ex? Because there are apparently people out there who need financial assistance more than me.

Perhaps being open about my situation was my very downfall. Perhaps I should have lied about my background and my education and my past career. Perhaps I should have stayed in an abusive marriage. Perhaps I should have said that I intend to not look for a job, that I intend to reproduce wantonly, and that I intend to stay on a benefit forever.

Would that have made me a more worthy recipient?

Do they honestly think I actually wanted to walk into their office in the first place?

Hell, I was even prepared to consider paying it back once I got a job.

Instead, I am now essentially begging, and relying on the goodness of friends and family to help me pay the shortfall through interest free loans. The new lifestyle is hardly hedonistic. I no longer use the car, there are no luxury items on the grocery list, and the biggest treat for the kids last week was a $1 DVD borrowed from the library. I am baking most things for the lunchboxes, and the kids haven't had new clothes since Christmas. Any clothing and shoes for the kids is coming from friends, The Warehouse sales, and op shops. This is life on the cheap.

The reality is what I am seeking to make ends meet is only around $75-100 per week. This is considerably less than what I have contributed to the NZ government coffers in my working life so far. As a crude calculation, I estimate that ~~I have contributed~~ the government has stolen from me about $346,500 in taxes alone.

But I don't get any short term help, even though my intentions are good. And yet I am expected to continue my contributions.

Where is the incentive to work?

Shark Unionists and the food chain

2010-02-03T12:55:00.002+13:00

My teeth gnash when Shark Unionists try to challenge something that is patently true. These are the people who will tell you that sharks don't mean to kill people. That sharks are misunderstood because they were abused as kids (no doubt because their parents were bloody sharks). Or they are just curious. Or they are just defending themselves from deadly boogie boards. Or that sharks actually use their teeth as hands.

A state government in Australia even got in on the pro-shark PR, relaunching the grey nurse sharks as the "labradors of the ocean". Awwwww. Let's scratch the tummy of the cute grey nurse shark, now.

Let's take a closer look at these assertions.

1. The shark's intentions
We all know that the best intentions can go astray. The problem with a well-meaning white pointer is that one of your limbs is likely to go astray as well. I am making an assumption here that you are unlikely to care whether it was an accident or not when you're one leg short or a biped in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.

2. The somewhat mystical contention that "sharks use their teeth as hands".
Clearly, in this instance, the sharks have hired their lawyer through Legal Aid. What sadistic, murderous animal uses its teeth as hands?

3. The shark is just curious.
There is the often raised argument that sharks do not seek to eat humans, because they don't really like how we taste. This only adds insult to injury. And, if it is true, bearing in mind that everything a shark eats is washed down with pints of salty sea water, surely anything would just taste like spam anyway?

4. "Labradors of the Ocean"
The worst risk I have ever faced with my past labradors has been chewed slippers. My limbs generally remained resolutely unchewed.

Sharks have happily, uncomplainingly, binged on surfboards, old boots, and helicopters (see the documentary Jaws 4: The Revenge). We are not referring to fussy eaters. You won't find a great white popping into The Fat Duck to ask Hester Blumenthal for a touch more wild thyme jus.

The shark is evilness itself. There is no love in the shark's eyes. Why is it necessary to excuse the violent behaviour of the shark? Perhaps the pain and shock of losing a beloved limb results in delusional statements from the recent amputee. Having never fed myself to a shark, I cannot relate. But this does not distract from the fact that their statements are irresponsible and not very helpful. The solution is to send the Shark Unionists into the sea first, thus ensuring the sharks are not hungry when we have to go for a swim later.

Celebrity, heal thyself!

2010-01-30T13:53:00.000+13:00

The world can barely contain its excitement! Just when life was getting boring, along comes a disaster in a country populated by black people! Bring out the chosen ones, with the most finely honed rescue instincts: The Celebrity.

Haiti's earthquake has brought out the tweeting, singing, dancing, cheque signing, hand-delivering aid celebrities from around the world. The George Clooney-led Hope for Haiti Now telethon is estimated to have raised $95m in just two hours. Oh, the lure of celebrity endorsement!

It is tempting (and I admit that this analysis is based on snippets caught on the news) to be cynical about heartstring-tugging fundraisers, especially when they include Alicia Keys performing "Prelude to a Kiss" to a backdrop of weeping Haitian babies , and Beyoncé changing the lyrics of some song called "Halo" to include the words "Haiti, we can see your halo, you know you're my saving grace."

It is easy to mock pop star celebrities' earnest remarks, and to snigger at their heo antics, when the likes of John Travolta (at least I've heard of him) showed up in Port-au-Prince in a private jet packed with ready-to-eat-without-a-microwave military rations, and medicines, and accompanied by the most important emergency rescue resource of them all: a herd of Scientology ministers.

"But, OM," you might say, "so what if it's all a bit cheesy? At least these celebrities are Doing Something. Isn't that the important thing now to get aid over to Haiti, where hundreds of thousands are reported to have died and one million are now homeless, as quickly as possible?"

Yes, I agree it is important that we try to help if we can, and it is heartening that people around the world have been moved to donate millions to help Haitians rebuild their lives. But it is also worth taking a hard look at just why Haiti has rocked up to the position of The Top Cause For Celebrities, and what consequences this might have.

Is the road to hell paved with crooning celebrities? Past experiences show that fundraising frenzies inspired by emergency situations tend to to little to improve the lives of people "over there", but these earnest initiatives do a lot to lend some meaning to life over here.

Just like with past causes célèbres, such as Ethiopia and Darfur, the earthquake in Haiti has quickly become more to do with about well-to-do Westerners than catastrophe-struck Caribbeans. It is news that allows celebrities and politicians to keep a flattering spotlight on themselves (always making sure they wear casual clothes and no (or little) make up), and chance for celebrity reporters, such as Mike McRoberts to take a little girl to a hospital shelter in time for the evening news bulletin. For politicians who are desperate to score some easy points with their electorates, Haiti is the place to be. Who can disagree with a statement that the earthquake was tragic and was a devastating event and that Haitians deserve help?

Over the past week, the celebrities have elevated themselves into selfless heroes, and turned themselves into intermediaries for our sympathy, as if we can only really care about Haitians if we know that movie stars and pop singers are personally affected and touched by their fates. We are encouraged to follow and interpret what is going on in Haiti through the concerns and emotions of the stars. Haitian-born singer, Wyclef Jean, wraps the flag of his native country around his neck, sings a Creole tune, and tells telethon viewers that he has just returned from Haiti, where he pulled his countrymen out of the rubble, carried the bodies of mothers, fathers, children to the cemeteries. We are encouraged to feel for the former Fugees member as much as for his Haitian friends.

Admit occasional good news stories of people being pulled out alive from beneath the rubble, we have also learned that the disaster is helping to bring some of our most popular celebrities back together, with some selfless stars leaving old quarrels aside in the name of helping Haitians. The juiciest gossip of all is that Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston were spotted chatting backstage at Clooney's telethon. And this just as news spread that Pitt is separating from Angelina Jolie, whom he left Aniston for five years ago. Will Brad and Jen become an item again? Will Haiti bring them together?

Once the televised pitythons are over, and the realities of delivering emergency relief set in, who will really benefit from all this feelgoodness? Who will really get the money?

In the world of celebrity humanitarianism, the Live Aid concerts of the 1980s, initiated by Bob Geldof and Midge Ure, are seen as the hallmark for bombastic fundraisers. The charity they created raised over $300m over the next 20 years and caused a wave of sympathy for emaciated Ethiopians who dominated the television screens and front pages of the newspapers in the mid-1980s.

But not only did it imprint an image in Westerners minds of Africans as fly-stalked, wide-eyed, helpless and childlike creatures, it also did very little, if anything, to help. Few of the suffering Ethiopians saw the cash, which instead helped to boost the coffers of the Mengistu-regime and prolong the war and suffering in Ethiopia.

Now it is the turn of Haiti to attract the mass descent of aid workers, diplomats, journalists and celebrities. Self-important, sanctimonious aid agencies might claim to have the best of intentions, but they are actually contributing to the tragedy and catastrophe with an obsession with box ticking procedures and distrust of the Haitian people. A UN peacekeeper nicely summed up the disdain and loathing among the rescue workers when he said of the fellow human beings he is meant to help: "Whatever we do, it doesn't matter - they are animals."

Reports from the earthquake aftermath have oscillated between portraying Haitiains as desperate, helpless victims and desperate, marauding savages who can only be saved and tamed by caring Westerners. Because Haiti is poor, lacking in infrastructure, and has a political regime widely regarded as illegitimate, Western figures can easily portray themselves as a new hope for the country, and can justify placing themselves in loco parentis. In this sense, Haiti is well suited as a place where celebrities and politicians can come together or reunite their romance.

Of course, as with the 2004 tsunami, the suddenness, force and scale of the destruction in Haiti has meant the earthquake has become a global concern, as it should be, and no doubt many celebrities, politicians and aid workers are sincere in their desire to help. But while celebrities have helped raise impressive sums of money in a short time, the message being sent out here is that those black, pitiful savages over there should be grateful that a who's who list of global celebrities are getting together to rescue them, not just from the rubble, but also from their ineptness.

The last thing Haiti needs is to be turned into a stage for attention-deprived celebrities.

Topical epicurean adventures UPDATE

2010-01-10T11:22:00.004+13:00

When I was younger, I was easily swayed by hype, and was thus on the side of the whales. With the wisdom of a few more years, and having watched many antics of anti-whalers, I have now developed a taste for whale meat.

Much to the dismay of Greenpeace, the recent war on the high seas between Greenpeace and Japan has only piqued my interest in edible marine mammals.

A Joint of Whale Meat Steeped in Red Wine Marinade would be very nice, but I might pass on the Cape Flattery Whale Mincemeat Pie. I hasten to add that my decision to pass on the mince whale meat has nothing to do with Greenpeace and everything to do with a dislike of the consistency of mince.

The Sea Shepherd’s Chief Plankton, prior to this week’s ocean reality tv, has said that “The Ady Gil gives us the speed necessary to catch and stay with the Japanese whaling fleet.”

But, oddly, when it really mattered, it appeared to not have speed to avoid getting hit by lumbering, very heavy whale ships. From the outset, I was disturbed by the design of the Ady Gil. As I am no boat builder, I will refrain from offering constructive advice, and just say that I thought it looked weird. I often wondered if there was something wrong with her. Now I know Greenpeace thought the same (oh the shame of sharing a thought with Greenpeace) and they decided they needed a new chase boat, hopefully paid for by insurance (that bastion of evil capitalism), so that’s why they shoved her under a whale ship’s bow.

The Sea Shepherd’s mother ship is registered in the Netherlands and the group’s lawyer, Liesbeth Zegveld, feeling left out of the international blubbering, said the group had filed a complaint there too.

This particular ship that attacked the Ady Gil was at a close distance all the time since they left the Australian harbour.

It was sent out and equipped for following and harassing the Ady Gil.

The whaling boat in question, the Shonan Maru 2, has a top speed of 12 knots. The Ady Gil, which holds a record for global circumnavigation, can streak along at 45 knots. Is legal counsel conveniently missing some pertinent points?

The video coverage shows the crew of the Ady Gil sitting around congratulating each other on how awesome they all are. Then the Shonan Maru 2 appears in the background, sounding an audio alarm. The crew’s dismissive response ("I’m so scared!” “Somebody get me out of here!") indicates a certain lack of concern for their situation.

We were just idling. My guy driving tried to turn to starboard at last minute but was too late.

Maybe it wouldn’t have been too late if you moved earlier, when the Japanese warned of their approach.

Also had a wave pick us up which carried us another metre or so into danger. In the end we had right of way. They were on our port side and they were also overtaking. So it is up to them to steer clear of us regardless.

So now it’s the fault of a wave, made more convincing by the use of non-nautical terms in increments of one metre, this is following the casual placement of said boat in the general path of a 500-ton vessel making its way through rough seas.

Now will these littering envionazis clean up the environmentally-polluting greenie mess they left behind? I’m too scared to suggest this directly to Greenpeace, in case they choose to voice their protest against me by running their car under my SUV, or defacing my house, abseiling down my trees to unfurl a banner, shrieking into their cellphones while Geoff Robinson tries to talk to them, or burning an effigy of me.

But, like most things, a good thing has come out of this incident. The Ady Gil, that maritime monument to green hypocrisy, is not very seaworthy at the bottom of the sea. Building a speed boat out of autoclave-baked carbon fibre and powering it with a poor country’s food supply isn’t going to help the planet or humanity.

Disregard that last paragraph. I mistook Greenpeace for people who care.

UPDATE Nobody says it quite like South Park (thanks to Oswald Bastable).

As if childbirth and child rearing isn't scary enough

2010-01-04T20:42:00.000+13:00

I am offended by this truly sickeningly obnoxious blog written by a Canadian midwife. Her disgusting post provides us with a 7-step recipe for creating an autistic child. If I can bring myself to give her some credit (deep breath, OM, you can do it), she has at least changed the name of her blog posting to "7 step recipe for scrambling the brain of a baby". But that wasn't her original intention and only happened after comments were posted.

If you have always wanted your very own autistic child, and never knew how to get one, read on!

1. Allow ultrasound technicians to "date" your pregnancy, see if you have twins, check the growth of your baby. Even one ultrasound affects your baby’s brain. Multiple ultrasounds will move cells in the brain around and also affect future generations of your family.

2. Eat whatever you like in pregnancy. Don't take the time and trouble to study the effects of over-processed, high fat diets. Don't worry about buying organic produce and meat.

3. Let your physician induce you. Induction drugs over-ride Nature’s pace of the birth process. They cause prolonged periods of oxygen deprivation similar to holding a pillow over your child's face. Any form of hurrying you into the birth process or, once into it, hurrying the process faster than it goes naturally will damage cells in the baby’s brain.

4. Take pain-killing drugs during your child's birth. Every anesthetic goes immediately to the baby so choose whatever one you like. The longer the baby is medicated, the more brain damage is done.

5. Continue on with the interventions in birth by having a cesarean, forceps or vacuum pull out of your baby. None of these procedures are gentle. All involve incredible traction on the baby’s neck and head. Sometimes all three are used on the same baby. Risks of all 3 are increased when inductions and epidurals were brought into the birth.

6. Once your baby is born, feed him/her solutions made by pharma giants like Mead Johnson.

7. Be sure to inject your baby with every toxic pharmaceutical vaccine that your doctor recommends. Don't do any research. 36 vaccines is the modern North American child's recommended allotment of mercury preserved toxic waste.

Remember that this frightening excuse for a midwife has no specific scientific training. Highly qualified scientists have been puzzling for decades over the cause of autistic spectrum disorders and the latest evidence points to a genetic component. But let's conveniently ignore all of that and instead follow the advice of a dubious midwife.

So, autism is caused by interventions in childbirth. It's all so simple, and I am thrilled that, based on this, I apparently have 3 autistic children (I presume their autistic behaviour will become apparent eventually?). No, wait a minute. Autism is actually caused by ultrasound (lucked out there 3 times too). Wait, no, it's caused by eating the wrong food in pregnancy. Oops, I spoke too soon, it's caused by pitocin. No, silly me, it's caused by epidurals. Wrong again, it's caused by C-sections (why don't I just institutionalise all 3 children now). Or, it's caused by formula. Wait, no, it's caused by mercury in vaccinations. Vaccines no longer have mercury in them? No problem, it must be caused by the vaccinations themselves (my kids are doomed!).

This woman, with her blind ignorance and with no formal training in science, statistics or medicine, has boldly gone where only stupid people have gone before. And, as a special bonus, she manages to be thoroughly offensive at the same time.

She is right about one thing, though. If you hire her as a midwife and your baby dies as a result of her idiocy, it will not develop autism. Somehow I doubt this will be of comfort to the parents.

Translating Indlish into Strine

2010-01-04T00:28:00.000+13:00

Not for the first time, I am puzzled that I somehow came out of the Australian education system with a passing grasp of English.

An Australian, whose day job is - dear me - a teacher, on holiday in India, felt it would be productive to sanctimoniously mock the locals:

As we drove though a mid-sized village I noticed a petrol tanker at a service station bearing a hand-painted sign on the back: “Highly inflammable”. I love Indlish.

Strewth, you plonker. It isn’t "Indlish". The locals are correct. Change your profession. Now.

So, Indians for whom English is probably their third, if not, fourth or fifth language (granted, this is probably 40,000,000 Indians), show up an Australian, for whom English is probably his mother tongue. What lovely irony.

Bring on the Education Revolution.

A fatwa on 2009 UPDATE

2009-12-26T13:48:00.004+13:00

Despite the title, I do want this to be a positive blog.

Wow, I remember blogging. It seems like my last blog was posted...... far too long ago. And far too much has happened in the time between then and now. I've moved to a new place and am trialling shared custody (or whatever the new-fangled word is) of my children. Having never spent more than 2 days away from my beautiful children, this is indescribably hard. Christmas Day was particularly emotional for me, and, truth me told, the spirit and fun of the occasion completely passed me by. Thrown into the mix with this was a particularly nasty falling out with someone (other than my ex), and just the general sense of horror that accompanies a marriage break up unnecessarily exacerbated by falling out with people.

What has been hard for me is the realisation that there are people out there - increasingly, I am weeding these people out of my life - who feel it is their place to interfere and to comment on things that are actually not their business, but they choose to make it their business by imposing their expectations from their own similar experiences. If I do not respond to my experience in the same way that they did, they react with anger, resentment, and take it as a personal attack that I somehow think less of them. They then deign to suggest that I am in denial.

Despite knowing that I should let these people and their reactions just go, I am still left reeling, and in a way that sets me back considerably. I'm not for a second suggesting here that I am perfect, but I do know that if a friend is going through a traumatic experience, I will be there for them, they can confide safely in me, and I will support them through whatever decision they decide to make. Because I know that they are special people who bring their own wonderful perspective and insight to my life and to the world, and for that I love them. But it's a lesson that is little learned from childhood that there are just some people out there who do not subscribe to such an approach.

Having always been very dismissive of therapeutic approaches that choose to categorise people, I don't care for textbook responses to emotional trauma, and, anyway, it is no-one's place to rush me through any of this according to their expectations. This is MY life. If there are people out there who have issues in their life that need to be addressed, these issues need to be addressed through their own life, not mine. Just because I am not seething resentment, hatred, and outward anger all the time does not mean that I don't feel it or I don't care. It means that I am not the sort of person who can physically or emotionally sustain that level of negativity. It's just not my makeup. It also means that I have practical responsibilities in my life, like three so-far-well-adjusted preschoolers, and juggling several jobs at the same time, and living in a new home, and a child starting school soon..... I could go on and on, but I'm trying to say that my life isn't going to stop for me. It means that, for the moment, I would prefer to focus my energy on looking forward and creating a sense of emotional and physical stability for my children, rather than run the risk of getting mired in my idealistic dreams of a past not fulfilled and retribution on those who destroyed that dream. There is plenty of time for me to reflect on what might have been, but for the time being I find it unhelpful and pointless.

While any falling out is painful, it is also an insightful view into disdainful one-sided and disrespectful behaviour. But, I don't mean to sound so glib. It is still a falling out with someone you thought you could trust, and this is a morale destroying moment. In a time as deeply painful as a marriage breakup, the realisation that there are yet more people in my life who cannot be relied upon has an enormous impact, and I am left feeling stunned at the selfishness of others. In my case, it has set me back significantly and I find I am having to rethink who my true, trustworthy friends are. It's a painful exercise, but one that I suspect is less painful done now rather than, once again, finding out the hard way.

It is an unfortunate truth that the number of true friends that we have will reduce over the years. This is either through natural occurrence or specific events, as we realise that the person who we thought and classed as a true friend is in fact not deserving of that title.

So, 2009 has been really hard, and I for one am glad to see it go for good. Had it not been for the discovery of blogging, I hate to think just how dire I would be feeling right now. Blogging has not only given me a much needed outlet and inlet for my otherwise unappreciated brain, it has also provided me with some timely insight into just how kind and generous people can be. And these are people I have never met. But I would drop everything to meet them if given half a chance. When I was feeling really down and desperate, there were bloggers out there who sent me emails or posted comments or added me as a Facebook friend; gestures that were incredibly uplifting, and served to strongly reinforce to me that there exist people who do not strive to impose their expectations on me, and who are genuinely supportive and helpful.

I has made me realise that a true friend is not necessarily someone who I have physically met. A true friend is a little more than a very good friend, and it is entirely possibly to have such a friend if only "cyberly". A true friend will support you even if it hurts their own interest (such as revealing their blogger anonymity). A true friend will understand your motives and needs and will know when not to offer any analysis or criticism (such as giving me a phone number or sending me an email, just to reassure to me that I am never alone, and just letting me say all I want to say without fear of judgment). A true friend will come forward to help without any request and be with you in need without showing it or expecting anything in return. To all the lovely bloggers and commentators out there, if I never called you, don't for one second think it was because I didn't appreciate your gesture. I may yet use it, even if just to personally thank you for being there when I needed someone to remind me that I am actually more than something that can be scraped off a shoe and discarded just because I didn't behave in an expected way. It's a reminder that I am worthwhile. And for that I am so very grateful.

Perhaps, now that I have cathartically blogged about this, I should change the title. Perhaps, in fact, 2009 has been a wonderful year for me. A year where I have had to face some very painful personal situations and learn some important lessons, but where the goodness and the kindness of people has also been very apparent. While a few people have set me back considerably, there have been many more people who have made me appreciate how wonderful human nature can be. As painful as I find each day, I also find the energy to continue purely from knowing that there are people out there who are genuinely compassionate and empathetic.

It's been quite a year.

Let's hope 2010 has perhaps a bit less insight and a bit more enjoyment. And a bit more to blog about.

UPDATE: Thank you so much for your kind comments, directly to this blog, or through your own blogs, or through emails. It's a wake up call to not get mired in the actions of very few and to remember that the majority of people are kind. The loneliness and heartache of only seeing your children 50% of the time, and the sense of injustice that accompanies it, is indescribable at the moment, but I am holding on to the hope that it will get easier with time. Blogging output may increase, if only to keep the brain distracted from the lack of noise. Even though, right now, all topics that would ordinarily warrant an opinion feel unimportant.

But, you've given me the motivation to get thinking again. Thank you.

The need to breastfeed some scientists

2009-12-13T22:54:00.001+13:00

William Feldman, Mark E Feldman, Departments of Paediatrics, Hospital for Sick Children, University of Toronto; and Scarborough Grace Hospital, Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Temboury MC, Otero A, Polanco I, Arribas E. Influence of breastfeeding on the infant's intellectual development. J Pediatr Gastroenterol Nutr 1994; 18: 32-36.

C du V, FloreyV, Leech AM, Blackhall A. Infant feeding and mental and motor development at 18 months of age in first born singletons. Int J Epidemiol 1995; 24: S21-S26.

Morrow-Tlucak M, Haude RH, Ernhart CB. Breast feeding and cognitive development in the first 2 years of life. Soc Sci Med 1988;

These are the intelligent people who came up with the idea that "intelligent mothers have intelligent babies, whether or not they breastfeed. However, intelligent mothers usually breastfeed."

Chicken or egg?

Defending the oppressed narrow-gauge engines and rolling stock carriages

2009-12-11T15:31:00.001+13:00

Thomas the Tank Engine started out as bedtime stories by a loving father for his son. With encouragement from the Lady of the House (am I allowed to call her a "Lady"?), the stories were written down and published in beautifully illustrated little books, well before the TV series. The original children's books accurately describe post world war British railway history, and include accounts of real incidents and events.

In an effort to sensibly use Australian taxpayers dollars, because, clearly, there was too much tax money sloshing around, Professor Shauna Wilton was funded to conduct a study. Not a study into anything sensible, you understand. That would be boring. Rather, this study has helpfully asserted that Thomas the Tank Engine demeans women. Furthermore, she has warned that "such negative messages about society subconsciously gleaned from the show may drive its young fans off the rails in later life."

And I thought they were just trains.

Research has also shown that the pollution generated by Thomas the Tank Engine has been a minor contributor to the depletion of the ozone layer and the environmental effects on the earth, compared to the pollution generated by Professor Wilton.

In reality, what Professor Wilton’s research proves (aside from the obvious proof that she wastes taxpayers money on idle rubbish) is that she has not actually watched any Thomas the Tank Engine episode or read any of the books. The female characters in Thomas are plentiful and hardworking, are no different to the other engines, and are certainly not subservient to any of the males. I can rapidly list Annie, Clarabell, Henrietta, Daisy, Mavis, Caroline, Emily, Molly, Rosie, Flora, Pip and Emma, Catherine, Isabel, Victoria, Agnes, Ruth, Jemima, Lucy, Beatrice, Cora, Ada, Jane, Gertrude, Lady, Lady Hatt, Alicia Botti, The Refreshment Lady, and Mrs Kindley. Professor Wilton’s study seems to neglect the narrow-gauge engines and rolling stock.

Unless I am missing the point that, in real life, broad-gauge engines actually do demean narrow-gauge engines and rolling stock.

Thomas the Tank Engine can now take his place with Noddy and Big Ears and their obvious gay tendencies, and that whore Sleeping Beauty, who possibly had an adulterous relationship with Tiger Woods.

I am now deeply concerned that my sons will develop patriarchal, sexist, he-man, wymyn-hating attitudes and tendencies.

On the other hand, I have just finished a (non-taxpayer-funded, so it must be useful) study on Barney, the big, purple dinosaur. Through my extensive research, I have discovered that the Barney stories only represent a minority of us in the socio-ideological stakes. This is evident by the lack of purple dinosaurs in the community, and is blatantly unfair to the all us non-purple humans. Barney should be forced to conform to our way of life, in the same way Professor Wilton expects children’s shows to fit into her own small world view.

God gave up looking for a parking space

2009-12-11T14:05:00.001+13:00

What a bizarre article in this morning's copycat Herald Dominion Post about an atheist advertising campaign about "no-god" billboards on the side of buses.

So what? But, aside from that, what I find most bizarre about this is that there have apparently been multitudes of complaints to advertising standards boards by, obviously, those who have religious sensitivities and are unable to turn away when they see advertising on the side of a bus. I am astounded that there are people out there who pay attention to advertising on the side of buses, but, instead of complaining (and thereby draw more publicity to that which they find so offensive), I generously offer these sensitive religious groups some advertising campaigns they can use for free. That must lead to good karma, surely?

Taoism
Bus will come.

Agnosticism
I don't know if bus will come.

Calvinism
Bus won't come because you don't work hard enough.

Buddhism
If the bus comes, it really isn't a bus.

7th Day Adventist
No buses on Saturdays.

Zen
What is the sound of of a bus coming?

Hedonism
There is nothing like a good bus coming.

Hinduism
This bus has been here before.

Islam
The bus will come, Inshallah.

Protestantism
Let the bus take me rather than someone else.

Catholicism
The bus will come because you deserve it.

Hare Krishna
The bus will come, rama rama.

Judaism
Why does the bus not coming always happen to us?

Rastafarianism
Let's smoke on this bus.

Jehovah's witness
Knock knock, bus driver, open the door.

TV Evangelism
Send more buses to God's own bus terminal at 90-1234-005679-123, and smile, smile, smile with buses in your heart (credit card payments can be made through PayPal).

The font of stupidity

2009-12-08T11:11:00.001+13:00

Some things are a matter of opinion. Some things are a matter of fact. This is fact: Comic Sans is evil incarnate. I am not unique or original in this view, which as mentioned isn't actually a view but a fact, but it is worth pointing out here because for some reason, not everyone is aware that Comic Sans is evil incarnate.

Comic Sans is a font. A typeface. A Microsoft standard font released in 1994 to ape comic book lettering for kiddie stuff. For no reason at all, the world went entirely mad when they saw it and fully-grown, seemingly professional adults started using it for formal communications. At work. For business. This includes businesses that involve children. Even though the communication is directed at the grown ups.

This forced what was a perfectly fine cute and wacky' font to become the most hated thing in design since clipart, and rightly so. There are situations where it is simply not appropriate to communicate using a font whose personality is childish, immature, and incapable of making robust, rational decisions. If that is the personality you are trying to imbue into your writing, then go ahead and use Comic Sans. Just bear in mind that using Comic Sans gives exactly the same messages as! using! an! exclamation! mark! after! every! word!!!

For those of you not familiar with it, you might not think that such an innocent-looking font could possibly give off that much "this communication is FUN!" evilness, but you must bear in mind that the font is now so well-known, it labours not only by its 'cute and wacky' looks, but under the weight of its reputation. Here are some web resources expressing the level of hatred for Comic Sans:

Ban Comic Sans website.

A web comic.

A message from some cartoons.

Loads of great examples of inappropriate Comic Sans use on Flickr if you search, but this is my favourite.

And if you are not sure when it is appropriate to use Comic Sans, here’s a handy flow chart.

The 'sans' in Comic Sans refers to it being a 'sans serif' font; that is, without extra decorative lines like Times New Roman etc. 'Sans' simply means 'without'. So a literal definition of Comic Sans could simply be NOT FUNNY.

I concede that blaming the inventor of Comic Sans for its misuse is like blaming Einstein for nuclear bombs. Remember kids: Comic Sans does not annoy people; people annoy people.

On the other hand, he created a monster. He must die. Or at least give a hundred dollars to everyone who has to look at their work Christmas party invite, created by the token office compulsory fun organiser, which has Comic Sans, clip art, PowerPoint 'word art' styles, and plays a tune and opens a broadband-bandwidth-depleting You Tube video without your prompt.

An often ignored necessity in houses

2009-12-03T22:19:00.002+13:00

Can I tell you something very quietly?

I don't want to make too much of a fuss about it because it possibly sounds a bit wanky, but I'll soon be moving to a two-storey house, having loved living in a single storey house, and ...... I want to put a lift in.

Just something simple and subtle (if there is such a thing when it comes to lifts). Given that I am likely to live in this house until I shuffle off this mortal coil, the lift idea makes sense.

The smallest lift is My Lift. It fits easily into a house, is big enough to take a wheelchair and another person, is quiet and doesn't look like a lift. The doors, which come in different styles of frosted glass, look more like a door to a room than a door to a lift. Just quickly take a deep gulp and brush over the cost, and you will come to realise that over the lifetime of the house, AUD50,000 is justified in terms of keeping the whole of the house usable for the rest of our lives. And just think how enjoyable it would be to help the economy by hiring a lift attendant (with uniform).

Or so I'm trying to convince the owner of this house. I suspect this might be a work in progress.

Race based politics zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

2009-11-30T11:35:00.001+13:00

I was trying to decide if I had anything insightful to say about Hone Harawira, or whether the numb skull deserves my blog space, but then I heard that another hui has ended without an outcome and I fell asleep.

Could this get any more boring? What a poor lesson in leadership and management for our "future" (which I will forever consider myself a part of, regardless of my age, thank you very much). Can someone please respond to my suspicion that hui end when the food finishes and reconvene when the supermarket has enough stock again? Because the impression that's left is that hui have nothing to do with reaching conclusions and agreements in a timely manner. And everything to do with an opportunity to get together for a chat and a feed.

We all know that as long as hate-based race-based politics is allowed to continue in NZ, no censure will befall Hone. As much as we would like it to, and as much as we know it morally should. So stop pissing around with the hui, get off the benefit that allows you the freedom to take weeks off to attend hui and pay for all the food, and do something useful for a change. If you're going to insist on politics based purely on tribal lines, you might feel more at home in Africa. It's surprisingly easy to come up with policies that are intelligent and not divisive. It's takes much more effort to call people mofos and to play the victim card. Perhaps a hui is needed to talk this through. I'll get the potatoes.

Accept PDTs and move on

2009-11-28T22:11:00.000+13:00

Only twice in the past have I found myself in public places with a child who is on the verge of meltdown. Three children later, I have come to know what it takes to avert most PDTs (Public Displays of Tantrum). So I confess it's hard for me to watch other parents struggle without rushing up to them and giving them a sympathetic hug (I'm not into PDAs either).

But some parents seem to deserve it. Having had to up to the proverbial with Sanctimummies, it was bad karmic pleasure to witness a well-known Sanctimummy offspring collapse into a violent, toy-flinging heap at - of all places - The Warehouse this morning (the jury is still out as to why the Sanctimummy was at The Warehouse).

Back around the turn of the Millennium, a young, beautiful woman lived in the banana groves with her husband and her three unassisted-birthed, unschooled, natural-fiber clothed babes. She claimed to have healed herself of pancreatic cancer, and, when her family weren't roaming the plantation, eating fresh bananas straight off the palms, her family ate their raw, organic vegan meals at a low, Japanese-style table.

She generally enjoys her role as a mother. And her children are not bad children, but the label "laid back" doesn't apply to them either. They are boisterous, loud, and very curious; in short, they are normal. One day, one of the kids, used to getting his way all the time, didn't know how to respond to rejection and started screaming. Not wanting to miss the fun, the other kids joined in the group scream. As she frantically tried to quiet the tumult, she noticed the searing glares of the other shoppers, oblivious to the irony that it was a judgemental look that she had many times inflicted on others. One man nearby muttered loud enough for all to hear: "If I had five minutes with those kids they would behave themselves."

She was humiliated. She felt like the worst parent ever. How could this happen when she stays away from artificial fibres, only conceives according to a basal moon chart, doesn't vaccinate, reads all relevant books, sends her children to the Steiner school, and only eats organic vegan foods? With horror, she wondered if her children were, in fact, autistic, having consumed processed food at a birthday party last month.

I cornered her at her car after she ran out in deep shame, and, after providing appropriate soothing noises about children testing us and the science behind autism, I tried to explain to her the following basics of child behaviour:

1. It is Not Your Fault

2. It is just A New Developmental Phase

3. How You React Matters:

ignore the show;
avoid Public Humiliation;
if you can’t avoid, distract; and
coat yourself in Teflon

She wasn't buying any of it. There is clearly a belief that there exist some parents whose children don't throw temper tantrums. Their children are always polite and kind to animals and happily eat all their raw vegetables on their plate. They always sleep through the night and their cloth nappies never stink. In fact, they don't wear nappies, and instinctively knew how to use the toilet from birth. These are the people that make the rest of us insecure. Even thought they may think it is their great parenting that caused this child to be so angelic, I can assure you that it has very little to do with them. It's the luck of the draw.

I sometimes wonder if these are the people who write books on parenting. These people are the weirdo parents, not the parents whose kids melt down in public. Their kids (assuming they exist) are aberrations, not yours. Just forget that they exist. They probably don't.

Kamusta Maligayang pagdating sa Telstramalinaw

2009-11-26T17:26:00.000+13:00

Or something. Apparently that's Filipino for "Welcome to TelstraClear", but I concede a free internet translation thingy may not be accurate.

I'm bemused (for those who think that means "happy", it actually means bewildered and confused) at the article in today's Kapiti Observer on the rumours of TelstraClear's call centre in Kapiti potentially closing down and upping sticks to Manila, or some country without a minimum wage and many willing workers, anyway.

What is bemusing me with this article isn't that there is concern about potential job losses, or the impact on Kapiti's economy (although I did laugh at that one), or the loss of New Zealanders answering phone calls from New Zealanders. What is bemusing me is that there is actually a TelstraClear call centre. In New Zealand.

I had no idea. Whenever I have tried to ring TelstraClear, I am faced with a suicidal voice "recognition" system, where the only phrase that gets you connected to an operator is "FARK OFF BEFORE I KILL MYSELF" (I give you permission to use this phrase without fear of copyright), and then the person who answers comes with one of the following names: Jamal, Karim, Abdul, Mohammad, Satish, Ravi, Kamahl, Shoshanna, Malik..... and has an accent that is very hard to decipher. And from the advice provided, their location is questionable, but is presumably not New Zealand.

The fact that they are possibly overseas, though, doesn't bother me if the quality of advice provided is adequate. In TelstraClear's case, it never is.

What does this call centre do, exactly? Clearly, from the comments by the call centre workers in the Kapiti Observer, it is possible at some point in the TelstraClear chain to be connected to these people who apparently care enough about their jobs to "improve customer service and maintain its competitiveness". And here I was thinking that the majority of Kapiti TelstraClear customers are only so because calls to Wellington are free with TelstraClear and are toll calls with Telecom. If there's a secret voice recognition code for this good customer service, I want to know it.

And, as for the quote in the article (verbatim follows):

I always thought TelstraClear were good and cared about their staff but in reality now it comes down to it they don't. We are just a figure and they're just after profit.

Quite. And so they should be. TelstraClear is a business, not a welfare agency (or, clearly, interested in improving literacy). Yes, it's an awful feeling to have just taken out a mortgage only to now find yourself redundant. But that's just the way things are. As the person paying the phone bill, I want to know that the company is doing what it can to ensure its costs to me are minimised. If this means the company has to move part of its business to a country with a cheaper and more efficient call centre operation, then so be it.

I wait with baited breath to see if the Filipinos can offer a superior customer service. They won't have to try too hard. Or perhaps I should start learning my Filipino swear words.

How to stop global warming

2009-11-25T20:31:00.002+13:00

I'm bored with climate change now. I resent that I should feel guilty whenever the sun shines. When the weather is lovely, I want to enjoy it, dammit.

Not that I ever paid much attention to the global warmingists.

The usual free-range communists and fair trade hippies continue to berate us for having fun, and that methane is 21 times more powerful as a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide, and that farmed animals are doing more damage to the climate than all the world's transport, power stations, and sunken lightbulbs put together. What's more, demand for beef means forests are being destroyed, and pressure is being put on our water supplies. Oh my god. We are doomed.

Plainly, then, the solution is to kill anything with more than one stomach. Maybe I should shoot my sheep? No, happily what the free-range warmists are actually saying is that you can keep your petrol-run SUV and your walk-in beer fridge, but you must stop eating meat.

In fact, you have to stop eating all animal products. No more milk. No more cheese. No more jellybeans. You must become ...........shudder ...........vegan.

Now of course if you don’t like the taste of meat, then it’s perfectly reasonable to be vegetarian. It’s why people who don’t like non-Maori join the Maori Party. At least vegetarians don't shun animal products. However, I can think of nothing I’d like less than being vegan.

Of course there are certain weeds I like very much. Broccoli, asparagus, basil, rocket and leeks in particular. But the idea of eating only a broccoli, without even so much as a blue cheese sauce or parmesan topping, fills me with dread.

There are wider implications, too. Let us imagine that the world decided today to abandon its appetite for joints of beef, and for meat-infused Mars bars. What effect would this have on the countryside?

What would you find in the fields that were once filled with grazing cows and truffle pigs?

Hardcore free-range vegan warmists like to imagine that the land would be returned to the indigenous species, that you could go for a walk without a farmer shooting a rabbit, and that you’d see all manner of pretty flowers and ferns and lots of once-extinct creatures. Moa, for instance.

In fact if animal farmers were driven away, the land would be divided up in two ways. Some would be given over to the growing of potatoes, and the rest would be bought by rock stars.

Plainly, the best thing we can do if we want to save the world, preserve the countryside and continue eating meat, is to work out a way in which animals produce less methane.

Scientists in Germany are working on a pill, but apparently this has a number of side effects. These are not itemised, but I can only assume that if you trap the gas inside the cow one of the drawbacks is that it might explode. And scientists in NZ (AgResearch?) are trialling grasses that produce less methane inside a cow

But these ideas, while intelligent, are in fact unnecessary. Cows need a new foodstuff: something that is rich in iron, calcium and natural goodness.

Vegans.

Remembering what's important in life

2009-11-18T11:20:00.001+13:00

You know you want a dream lifestyle block! http://www.nz.open2view.com/Property/214121.

Inane utterings about toothbrushes

2009-11-17T20:44:00.000+13:00

At the moment, I am in a short-attention-span frame of mind. So it was a mistake trying to buy a toothbrush. Has the toothbrush industry been taken over by a Marketing 101 class doing a spoof exercise?

Take the Access, for example. It promises not only a rubber handle with superior grip, but also claims it "reaches behind back teeth". In order to....????? Clean tonsils? Then there is Colgate's micro-sonic power brush, which promises outstanding sonic cleansing because it "combines high-speed sonic vibrations with multi-angled bristles". My brain equates "sonic" with "boom", which seems disappointingly unlikely in this case since the brush is powered by a single AA battery. Reach has the "dualeffect" brush, with "massaging fingers". Not in my mouth, thanks. Johnson & Johnson offers a brush with an "antibacterial microbe handle" – surely a great relief for all those avid toothbrushers who worry about microbes on their toothbrush handles.

After carefully reading each packet, I decided to select my toothbrush using the same criteria - no, criterion - I used when I selected my car. Colour.

Food brutality

2009-11-13T21:44:00.001+13:00

I've been very absent for the past three weeks. Not that I haven't been thinking about blogging. It just took a backseat to some personal upheavals, and I found, much to my surprise, that I get blogger's block when I'm feeling happy. And when I'm feeling anxious. And there haven't been any other emotions happening.

But today, I witnessed an outrage that finally put the blogger block to rest. In what feels like a past life, I travelled the world, and witnessed much public kindness and much public brutality. So much so that I feel pretty hardened now. But, there are two images that continue to haunt me. I like to think that it is merely coincidental that both were witnessed in New Zealand in the last 5 years.

My sons and I were standing in line at a bakery, behind a young mother who ordered a lovely, fat, pink finger bun for her toddler, its lush coat of icing spangled prettily with hundreds and thousands. The child reached up expectantly. My own cavities hummed with excitement.

It was then that the act of violence occurred. Ignoring the child's outstretched hand, the mother grabbed a napkin and vigorously scrubbed the icing off the bun. The poor child looked on bravely while I looked on horrified. He accepted the ruined treat humbly, and, I thought as I glanced down at my boys, with surprising grace. He was clearly used to this.

I still don't get it. Isn't the icing the whole point of a finger bun?

That mother would get on well with the group of parents I used to sometimes, despite my best efforts, bump into when I was walking my nannying charges through Central Park in New York City. These mothers banded together to oppose ice-cream trucks. One mother admitted:

I feel kind of bad. I want my three-year-old, Katherine, to have the full childhood experience and all. But it's really predatory for ice-cream vendors to be right inside the playground.

Is that really easier than just saying "no"? One mum insisted to her son that the ice-cream van was a "music truck". Perhaps sent as a public service for people with an uncontrollable craving for Greensleeves? She complained:

As a new mother, everyone advises you on toilet training, but the ice-cream truck, nobody ever mentions that.

In their ideal world, parents would discard the ice cream, and present their children with the stick.

I thought of these mothers when I witness the other brutal, haunting event that occurred when I was pregnant with my first child. Now, when reading this, bear in mind that I am not a clucky person, even when pregnant, even after having three children. When I meet other people's children, they generally have to work pretty hard to earn my friendship, let alone any smidgen of respect. The same ruthless approach tends to apply to parents. And I have no qualms admitting that, while I am undeniably supportive, I do judge other parents (to myself), and take smug pleasure when my judgements prove correct (which is often).

At a crowded food court at the policy-wonk end of Lambton Quay one busy lunch hour, a very large woman, with her very large husband and very large child (I guess he would have been around 4 years old), ambled into the food court and found a seat. Nothing significant in that, and I was so engrossed in selecting my sushi that I barely registered their presence, other than hearing the kid scream.

To this day, I do not know what made me look, but I glanced across and noticed the woman trying to breastfeed her child. Being pregnant with my first child, and still quite career-focused, I shuddered at this prospect and wondered if I would be this woman in 4 years time. The kid refused a feed, so, with evidence of much practice, the woman reached across to the next table, picked up the sugar bowl, dipped her nipple in it, and then offered a feed to her son again. Naturally, now that the item on offer was now sugar-coated, he accepted with less restraint this time.

One of the side effects of the personal upheaval of the last three weeks is that I seem to suffer from amnesia. I'm not sure why I share that last story with you, other than to suggest you never use sugar bowls in cafes.

When inanimate objects attack

2009-11-03T12:47:00.000+13:00

Rage against inanimate objects is on the increase. Do not bother telling me to buy a Mac because I cannot afford it, but I do know that between my PC and me, one of us has to go. In short, my computer is suffering from a bipolar condition where it can be perfectly normal in the morning and completely “shutdown” in the afternoon. Sometimes.

I have tried to be compassionate but in a fit of angst (unfortunately for the computer, compounded by a marriage break up), I Googled "inanimate object rage" and discovered over 250,000 entries. I am not alone. Global bloggers unite in inanimate object fury.

"Inanimate Objects Hate Me!" shrieks wittandwisdom.com. "This past weekend, while attempting to mow the lawn, I had what I’ve patented as a Witteurysm, which is when one blows a part of his brain out of his earhole due to the actions of an inanimate object."

There was a story in the paper recently about a Japanese man who got so angry at the new apartment block next door overshadowing his house that he got a gun and shot the building 12 times. That will teach the building to block his sun.

In New York, it is common to see people attacking taxis with umbrellas and fists because the taxi did not stop. In Singapore, I witnessed elevator rage, with someone becoming so furious at the lift, which stopped at every floor, he began thumping the wall (obviously, as this was Singapore, he was arrested).

The loss of self-control is overwhelming as we scream at these uncaring objects that glare back with vacant expressions and no remorse for the pain they cause.

Krapiti Coast Hypoocrasy

2009-11-02T19:44:00.002+13:00

It must be obvious now that I do not enjoy living in Krapiti. Yes, I have made many wonderful friends here who I hope to remain friends with for many years to come, even when I shortly move back to Wellington. Yes, the climate has provided us with a wonderful garden and memorable trips to the local beach. Yes, there is a sense of close, caring community spirit here that you really notice in times of need that I don't believe is so evident in the bigger cities like Wellington.

But, there are many many many negatives with Krapiti. The road, the random wasting of ratepayers' money on proposed aquatic centres, the politics of personal agendas. And, now, I find myself having a sanctimonious rant on poo.

Every walk I have had with my children over the last few months has been noticeable in the lack of dog poo ruining our shoes and pram wheels. The council effectively addressed that issue (but the fact that it was necessary to impose a bylaw with fines, rather than persuasion, does rankle with me). But brickbats to the council for being hypocritical on its poo stance. While the dog poo may have reduced noticeably, and the numbers of people carrying highly useful plastic bags has increased, a remarkable amount of horse manure remains on footpaths, on the side of the road, and all over the beaches. To the point where it is just preferable to not go for a walk or go to the beach at all, just to avoid the massive quantities of horse poo. For a while, I was collecting it in large sacks for the garden, but that novelty soon wore off when all I wanted to do was walk from kindy to the beach and not have to scrape shoes and pram wheel ever few metres.

So, although I said I detest bylaws and fines for something that should be a point of personal pride and respect for the area we all live in, I rang the council to ask if there were any rules on the dropping of horse poo in public places, like there is for dog poo.

The response:

Horse poo isn't as bad as dog poo because horses are vegetarian so their poo composts down without risk to human health.

True. But does that mean vegetarian humans are allowed to defecate on public property? Does that mean I should be encouraging my children to play in poo? Tell me, Oh Irritating Call Centre Dufus, would you let your child play in horse poo? I realise that horse poo may not be toxic or harmful to humans, and is in fact very good for the garden, but it is still a waste product and it is aesthetically unattractive for a suburban district, unappealing to step in, and revolting to witness children playing in it.

Having said all this, one of the greatest floors I have seen was in a house in Waipukurau where they made their conservatory floor out of cow poo (the difference between this floor and the Krapiti situation, of course, is that the floor was hard and looked clean and tidy).

The council keeps trumpeting its green horn about how attractive life is on the Krapiti Coast. Horse manure coated roads, footpaths, cycleways and beaches is a green step too far for me. I am a poo prude. It is not an attractive look, and leads me to conclude that there are a significant number of residents in Krapiti who might like their open spaces, but are arrogant and inconsiderate in how their behaviour might impact on others.

Seeing victims everywhere

2009-10-31T00:54:00.001+13:00

(This is not an anti-feminist rant! Far from it. It is more a rant on how some women are letting the side down! So start showing some blog etiquette and bloody read the blog before going off at me. )

She has a look on her face as if she's perpetually confronted by the ghost of Benny Hill. She is convinced that at least one half of the population is out to get their filthy hands on her. That she herself has nothing to fear is not just ironic, but the heart of the matter.

The Constitutional Feminist is a new creature. Germaine Greer is not a Constitutional Feminist, for she can provide opinions that are intelligent. By contrast, the Constitional Feminist feels it her duty to stick her stupid beak in wherever a woman is so much as a bit player in the game. Routinely passing herself off as a "researcher", an "academic" with a "special interest" (that special interest being "women"). She is no different, in reality, to a horny teenage boy - not interested unless there are girls involved. Had she been moved to write anything at all on the events of September 11 2001, it would probably have been a lament for all the dead women, along with a diatribe toward al Qaeda for not trusting females to carry out the hijackings. She views the tale of humanity as nothing more than Adam vs Eve.

A little while ago, one such individual blogged a tense piece, outraged that she was unable to buy clothing for her daughter that was age-appropriate. (I don’t want to tell you who this blogger was because the author drives me to murder with the useless diatribe. I refuse to give the blogger any marketing. But it involves an appendage at the end of a limb and, ironically, a receptacle to observe one’s sexiness). This is normal as the Constitutional Feminist is always ready whenever the issue is the "sexualising" of women (women looking sexy, presumably with the aid of a shiny reflecting receptacle). She has a big problem with females who appear sexually alluring, and it's an opinion one might have thought she herself would surely be too embarrassed to make public. When the anti-sexy lobby is at long last championed by one who is, herself, gorgeous, that is the day I will begin to consider that maybe this isn't all about jealous little girls.

Not that I am unsympathetic. I have strong memories of what it was like at fourteen (indeed, sometimes even now), when I wished my features were as beautiful as those on display in the magazines. My escape hatch, rather than wearing "sexualised" clothing, was bizarre clothing and dyeing my fringe bright red (punk rock from a respectable family), a scene where looking ridiculous was the very point, and from beneath such a deliberately ugly facade I scowled at the "Beautiful People", as if they were somehow lesser than me for simply having won nature’s raffle. I grew out of it – very much so – extraordinarily so - but the ghost of that childish envy still visits me occasionally, when I see Halle Berry and re-imagine my life with her looks upon it. A psychologist might observe the clothing I wear these days - drab, quaint, or boringly sensible - and conclude that such clothing serves the same purpose as the robes of punk. It is an exemption from the contest I know I can’t possibly win, disguised as my personal preference, which, of course, has nothing to do with vanity, and everything to do with the difficulties of cleaning off dried vegemite.

The Constitutional Feminist is evidence that "adulthood" is largely an urban myth, that one never fully abandons the desires and insecurities of youth, but simply learns to camouflage them among more serious matters and motivations.

Whatever else she might be, The Constitutional Feminist cares very much about the impression she makes. It follows that she cares about how other women are perceived beside her – her daughter, for example - but one shouldn't be fooled into thinking such concern is at all intellectually noble. It is the rage of teenage envy, fermented by years and fortified by time, and therefore seemingly mature, but not. Maturity has nothing to do with years. It is earned, gradually, with each acceptance of little injustices that the young cannot understand. The Constitutional Feminist scratches those itches with feminism, a notional factory that takes sour grapes and turns them into principles. One doesn’t have to grow out of feminism as one must grow out of punk, or a childish inferiority complex.

But the other irony of a life lived in theatrical indifference to the male species is that The Constitutional Feminist does not know men anywhere near as well as she thinks. It wouldn't occur to her that when a man sees a sexy picture of a women he does not necessarily presume her to be without intelligence or honour. Nor would it strike her that men are less likely to objectify the person in photographs than The Constitutional Feminist is likely to disrespect them - that many men, unlike herself, seem to know the difference between a magazine and a woman. It would be totally beyond The Constitutional Feminist to imagine such a thing as a man who doesn’t judge a women by her livelihood. She presumes everyone to be like herself - a freelance magistrate, narrow and shallow, dismissive of those who don’t play by her morals.

Too often, Constitutional Feminism is an opening for a type of politicised evangelism. Take the Australian Women’s Forum, for example. Dig beneath the veneer of feminism that dolls up their website and you find a solid god-fearing bedrock that looks less of a feminist think tank than a conservative Christian lobby group whose overriding priority is to criminalise abortion. Such people masquerade as academics and concerned intellectuals when in fact they are more like products of a politicised nunnery, blindly enslaved to an ancient text and angry at the knights who never came knocking.

Which wouldn’t be worth mentioning if The Constitutional Feminist was a fringe dweller, or just a sister doing it for herself. But feminism has become the bogus justification of power for the thick and envious.

Waiting at the yellow light

2009-10-30T16:29:00.000+13:00

I was going to suggest that the dearth of blogs from me lately was because of my devastation at my marriage collapsing, but the reality is I was stuck in traffic.

Submissions close today for the Kapiti highway options. An interesting press release from Chris Turver marked the event:

More than 3,000 individual submissions on the government’s plans for a four-lane expressway through Kapiti have been received by the New Zealand Transport Agency – and staff are still counting.

Chris Turver, an advocate for the expressway to be constructed on the existing Western Link Road road route between Raumatiu South and Peka Peka understands the total is a record for a public consultation process on a government roading plan outside Auckland.

He says the response reflects the huge interest in Kapiti in getting it right and he hopes the majority of the 3,000 responses to date will be in favour of the Western Link Road which has already been supported by a 2,100-signature petition.

The petition, organised by Mr Turver and KCDC Councillor Ann Molineux, ran for just three weeks and was delivered yesterday to NZTA Board chairman Brian Roche, with a copy to Transport Minister Steven Joyce.

Interesting times.

Sweeping generalisations

2009-10-29T17:33:00.000+13:00

Because the above intellectual is clearly in the USA, I will guess he is not a supporter of the Melbourne Moran gang family. Even so, I fear for my children.

There are people in the world whose intellect will remain at a child's level forever because they weren't born to parents who encouraged them to read, who simply weren't sufficiently interested in the world around them to do any more than make excuses for what they don't know, rather than summon what little curiosity they possess and research things for themselves.

As quoted on the National Geographic Magazine site:

over 80% of Americans have not read a book since high-school;
over half of Americans can't find any given state on a map;
nearly all Americans interviewed could not find most foreign countries;
almost half of American teenagers have no idea what the Second World War was about, and don't bother asking who won, when it was fought, or any of the details;
nearly half of Americans believe the sun revolves around the earth;
nearly one-quarter of Americans do not know that the United States landed a man on the moon in 1969;
almost half believe you can drink antifreeze if you're stuck in the desert; and
over half believe the earth is 6,000 years old.

Ten unusual playgrounds from around the world

2009-10-28T23:59:00.001+13:00

Playgrounds have come a long way since the early days of hot, steel slides and open-backed infant swings. Safety is a big issue on today’s playgrounds, but, thankfully, so is imagination and ingenuity.

1. Nishi-Rokugo – Tokyo, Japan.
In Japanese, Nishi-Rokugo means Tyre Park. The Kawasaki plants are located not far away, so it’s possible they donated the 3,000 tyres that make up the dinosaurs, monsters, bridges, slides, swings, and all the loose ones there for kids to stack and hop on. But this sand-bottom park is hardly just for kids. Parents can haul tyres up specially designed tyre steps and tube down wide concrete slides.

2. The Fruit and Scent Playground –Liljeholmen, Sweden
A banana slide, strawberry spinners, a pair of cherry swings, an orange see-saw and a watermelon jungle gym are all part of this unusual, small park in the south of Stockholm.

3. Clemyjontri Park – Fairfax County, Virginia
Not just the name is unusual. This is one of the few playgrounds in the world where children with disabilities can play side-by-side with able-bodied children. The entire park is equipped with ramps for wheelchairs and the ground surfaces are specially designed with a non-slip material. The park is named for Adele Lebowitz’s (a major donor) four children: Carolyn (CL), Emily (EMY), John (Jon), and Petrina (Tri). Mrs. Lebowitz and her husband were also sponsors of a local children’s television show, The Pick Temple Show, in the 1950s. The star of that show, a clown named Bozo, was played by Willard Scott. Bozo, who later morphed into Ronald McDonald.

4. Pruessen Park – Berlin, Germany
Is this the only playground in the world created specifically for seniors? Anyone under 16 is not allowed inside Berlin’s Pruessen Park, nicknamed the “Playground for Grown-Ups.” The equipment is specifically designed for people over five feet tall and caters to Germany’s fastest growing age demographic.

5. Zabeel Technology Park – Dubai
Dubai’s Zabeel Technology Park has two zones featuring futuristic technology and alternative energy exhibits, a series of high tech interactive displays, and a maze modeled on the solar system.

6. Takino Hillside Park – Sapporo-shi, Hokkaido, Japan
The Children’s Playground in the Takino Hillside Park in Japan borrows ideas and images from nature. Varied lighting and sound conditions create a unique sensory experience for kids. Check out the cool net play tool in the rainbow nest dome. You can see how a lot of the park is built into, and under the hill.

7. St. Kilda Adventure Playground – Adelaide, Australia
St Kilda Adventure Playground is one of Australia’s best known parks and covers 4 hectares along the beautiful South Australian seafront (not that I am biased). The park opened in 1982 and recent upgrades include a wooden castle, a small maze, and a submarine, nicknamed “The Yellow Submarine.” The park's biggest attraction is the beached pirate shipwreck, which is especially popular with dolphins and other sea wildlife.

8. Teardrop Park – New York City, NY
Located between residential buildings in Battery Park City, and built for a whopping $17 million, the park features prominent rock outcroppings, geologic formations, a secret path, a bluestone ice wall, a humongous, almost dangerous looking slide, sandboxes, water play areas, a reading space with rock seats, and places to rock hop.

9. Yerba Gardens – San Francisco, California
The rooftop at Yerba Gardens in San Francisco is home to one of the most elaborate playgrounds ever constructed. Aside from the ice-skating rink, bowling center and the 130,000 square feet of open space to play in, the playground includes a beautiful 103-year-old hand carved carousel. The Zeum carousel was constructed in 1906 but could not be installed in San Francisco as originally planned because of earthquake issues. It was eventually housed at Luna Park in Seattle, where it was the only piece of equipment to survive a horrific 1911 fire. The city of San Francisco bought the carousel from a collector in 1998 and restored it to its original condition. It now serves at the centerpiece in Yerba Gardens

10. Playground – Boadilla del Monte, Spain
Spanish architects Eduardo Navadijos and Csaba Tarsoly designed this stunning modern playground with the intention of giving children inspiration to pursue their dreams in an airy and cool environment.

Return your failed genius to sender for a full refund

2009-10-28T23:41:00.001+13:00

As any suffering parent knows, for the past decade DVDs ingeniously called "Baby Einstein" flooded the market and the presents under the Christmas tree. Some parents embraced the freedom to shove their little budding university educated 2 year olds in front of the television, without any guilt that they might turn their children into television-addicted zombies. Who needs the commitment of a Montessori education when you can just turn on the television and put in a DVD with the word "Einstein" in it? Brilliant! (Let's conveniently ignore that Einstein himself was apparently not an obvious genius as a child.)

After a while, it dawned on some parents that - Shock! Horror! - watching shapes, annoying songs, colours, and badly drawn cartoons did not guarantee their child a place in university at 5 years old. So, naturally because this happened in the USA, now Disney (who foolishly bought Baby Einstein in 2001) finds itself having to offer refunds to any parents who bought its Baby Einstein videos and found their babies did not become instant geniuses the way a name like "Einstein" might possibly suggest.

Baby Einstein sells USD200 million worth of products a year. About a third of all American babies/infants apparently owns one of its DVDs. Giving their parents refunds represents a quantity of money that might rival Obama's healthcare package, and a lot of embarrassment. What made Disney budge? According to the Times:

Last year, lawyers threatened a class-action lawsuit for unfair and deceptive practices unless Disney agreed to refund the full purchase price to all who bought the videos since 2004. “The Walt Disney Company’s entire Baby Einstein marketing regime is based on express and implied claims that their videos are educational and beneficial for early childhood development,” a letter from the lawyers said, calling those claims “false because research shows that television viewing is potentially harmful for very young children.”

Did anyone force these parents to buy the DVDs? While it may be appropriate to remove "educational" from the marketing, surely Disney has no responsibility to refund money. Parents asking Disney to refund their money on infant entertainment because all of a sudden "research shows" that TV is bad for children (hasn't it always been bad? This is hardly new) is basically the parents asking Disney to take the same kind of helicopter-style care of them that they are taking of their children. How can there be any claim of raising children capable of critical and independent thought when lawyers are pushed to sue a clever marketing plan? Doesn't the very fact that this lawsuit was brought in the first place constitute the parents' admission that they bought the DVDs because of what the marketing said without giving it any thoughtful consideration of their own?

Now I need to put in a little waiver here. Those who know me are aware that I don't have a television in my house - well, I do, but it lives in a cupboard only because it just doesn't look good in my newly decorated house. But I have no objections to children watching television. I don’t think watching a little TV is going to turn any kid into a dullard. But to think that watching TV is the key to education, rather than, say, reading a book, letting the kid dig in dirt, splash in the tub, discover that sand tastes bad, or bang on a pot is a sad indictment on those parents who believed the Baby Einstein DVDs were going to make a difference to their child's education. While a "little TV" might not turn anyone into a problem child, it does go against how the brain develops. We live in a 3D, not a 2D, environment. A child is not, or should not be, a passive inhabitant of their 3D environment.

So, now I wait to see who is going to ask for a refund on the basis their child is not a genius? Picture the scene in the crowded Walmart (screamed in an American accent, possibly from the midwest): "Look at my kid! Did you ever see such a dumb, thickarse excuse for a human being? I gave him this "genius" dvd with the word Einstein in the title, and what do I get? Braindead Thicko Boy! I want my money back!"

Protecting children from evil will not make the world less evil

2009-10-26T22:34:00.000+13:00

Once upon a time, in a far away land called EwwKay, a a parenting site polled 3,000 parents about the stories they told their children. A significant proportion of them said they refuse to read certain traditional fairy tales to their Precious Widdle Darlings, finding the stories either too ominous or not politically correct enough.

Quoth The Telegraph:

Favourites such as Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Cinderella and Rapunzel are being dropped by some families who fear children are being emotionally damaged.

A third of parents refused to read Little Red Riding Hood because she walks through woods alone and finds her grandmother eaten by a wolf.

One in 10 said Snow White should be re-named because "the dwarf reference is not politically correct"

Rapunzel was considered "too dark", and Cinderella has been dumped amid fears she is treated like a slave and forced to do all the housework.

It is horribly sexist to tell little girls that their greatest happiness can be found in marriage to a handsome prince. Moreover, do we really want to scare the kiddies with stories of grannies who turn out to be big bad wolves? Should Cinderella not be rejoicing in the fact that her father married more than once - and how very lookist to notice that the two awful stepsisters are ugly.

More than a quarter of the parents surveyed now reject fairy stories in favour of books such as The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle. I have nothing against this book, which is a good preparation for life in today's obese-obsessed world. It is a charming book, in which readers are invited to open flaps and see that the caterpillar has consumed a list of sensible fruit and vegetables. However, having read it about 250 times to my children (multiply all figures by three), I can say that it is extraordinarily boring and utterly unmemorable.

I am, however, happy to read fairy stories to my children for hours. Who are these parents who think that they are helping their children by withholding knowledge of Little Red Riding Hood and her grandmother's fascinating teeth, of Hansel and Gretel, of Cinderella or Rapunzel? These stories, which are replicated in almost all the cultures of the world, have been part of the shared experience of childhood for generations.

Many of them were collected up by the ingenious German brothers, the Brothers Grimm, during the time of the Napoleonic Wars. The Grimms were interested in the origins of European languages. However, in the course of their research, they realised there were rich folk stories handed on from generation to generation in the country districts of German-speaking Europe. They found much which horrified them, just as it would shock social workers today - incest, child murder, bullying, abuse of all kinds. They found many stories of babies abandoned in the Black Forest villages, teenage pregnancies, and many abusive parents or grandparents among the boot-faced Teutonic peasantry.

The point is that the stories were not a way of covering these things up. They were a way of articulating fears and coming to terms with them.

Our national cultures, our sense of who we are as groups, are sustained by great myths. Our religions are a set of shared stories. Fairytales are also an absolutely vital part of our shared life together - only this time not as big cultural or national groups but in the most basic group of all: the family. Twenty-first century women have advanced beyond the fantasy that they are kitchen drudges who will one day turn into princesses by capturing the heart of the most handsome prince in the world, but that does not mean we would live richer lives without any knowledge of these stories whatsoever. The lessons given out by fairy stories are not bad ones, whatever some timid parents might feel

Goldilocks was idiotic to invade the three bears' house, and learnt a useful lesson about other people's property in the process.

The story of Snow White, even when sentimentalised by Walt Disney, remains one of the most enchanting ever told, but it is also useful. The apple offered by the witch versus the drug offered by a friend before a night out clubbing.

Rapunzel is, if I can use a tired word, "empowered" by her lovely long hair. The envious older woman tries to hold her back. How many daughters know that to be true when they think of the possessive part of their own mother's love for them? By literally letting her hair down, Rapunzel escapes and finds happiness. That is not just a fairy story for millions of girls who have escaped the constraints of a tyrannical mother/witch. It is what really happens.

Children are born into a world of fear. We do them no service by trying to eliminate that from their lives. Denying the existence of evil is never healthy – children can come up against the real thing all too soon. How can you teach your child to avoid bad people if such terms are not even in their lexicon? How will these parents deal with their preteen wanting to read J.R.R. Tolkien’s books?

I would like to think these parents will come to their senses and we will all live happily ever after. However, I suspect this is but a fantasy.

Dr Seuss, the Blogger visionary

2009-10-22T22:50:00.001+13:00

I always knew Theodor Seuss Geisel (Dr Seuss) was a man ahead of his time.

The following excerpt is from "Scrambled Eggs Super", published in 1953.

Previously in the story: Peter T. Hooper is travelling everywhere to track down eggs for a miraculous breakfast he's planning to make..........

I went for the kind that were mellow and sweet
And the world's sweetest eggs are the eggs of the Kweet
Which is due to those very sweet trout which they eat
And those trout ... well, they're sweet 'cause they only eat Blogs
And Blogs, after all, are the world's sweetest frogs
And the reason they're sweet is, whenever they lunch
It's always the world's sweetest bees that they munch
And the reason no bees can be sweeter than these...
They only eat blossoms off Beezlenut Trees
And those Beezlenut Blossoms are sweeter than sweet
And that's why I nabbed several eggs from the Kweet.

Recommended new blog

2009-10-21T23:26:00.001+13:00

Very interesting blog here about the virtues of alcohol and what we lose if governments restrict ("Return to Prohibition?") its sale because of the actions of a few individuals. It's written from a the viewpoint of a food and wine lover who worked in the wine industry. Well worth a read.

Socialist seduction techniques

2009-10-21T16:13:00.002+13:00

Again, certain people have chosen to ignore blog etiquette. This morning, an unnamed councillor (nah, bugger it, it was Lyndy MacIntyre), somehow worked out who OM is, and contacted OM directly to discuss Ostrich Economics.

Sigh.

Ostriches and bad blog manners before I've had my (non-organic, non Free Trade) coffee? Bad. Very bad.

The far Left ostriches in Kapiti have a deeply immature habit of using rhetoric and subtly manipulative language to push its causes. Start with a literal truth steeped in emotion (or make it emotive: "think of the children!/trees!/environment!") that most sane people will agree with. Then, hide the substantive truth.

Where is the intellectual rigour to lift the cloak on this dishonesty? That democratic voice is suppressed.

When discussing the Western Link Road and the expressway options put forward by the Government, phrases are used by the Kapiti ostriches, such as "we care" about the environment so "we want to lead" the roading decision. An assumption is made that people want the Council to "do something".

See how the literal truth conveys the substantive untruth. The literal truth - "we care" about the environment - is used as a bait. If you accept that bait, you will therefore accept the rest of it. It is true that many people care about the environment. The substantive untruth is that the Council should be out in front, leading this roading issue, and ergo, presumably seeing itself as leading the world on climate change with ambitious targets to reduce carbon emissions.

Statements such as, "the people of Kapiti don't want it, so the Government should accept that," are untrue, or at the very least, completely untested. There is no evidence that Kapiti Coasters (or Kapitians?) support any particular option in overwhelming numbers. No poll has been taken. The Council and the likes of Lyndy MacIntyre assume support when it is nothing more than turn outs to meetings held by high profile individuals pushing one agenda to orchestrated campaign activists.

At the same time, they remain opposed to hearing views that do not support their stance, particularly those steeped in intellectual rigour. To hell with democratic voice. Of course, you will never hear them utter that literal and substantive truth.

Sustainable Economics vs Ostrich Economics: the apparent confusion

2009-10-20T03:01:00.000+13:00

As a trained economist, I should know by now not to read anything put forward by people claiming to be "sustainable" or who believe in "peak oil". And, sure enough, today there is more head-in-the-sand/we-want-standstill-traffic-every-Friday-and-public-holiday/more-than-one-anecdote-equals-data/cow-pat-economics press releases from a councillor (with a union background - but of course!!) in Kapiti. This from Lyndy MacIntyre, a ward councillor.

The road to nowhere

Last week, two months after the Minister of Transport announced he would ram a motorway through our community whether we want it or not, councillors voted on a KCDC submission.

You mean, after the council wasted decades of time and money on building a road that was supposed to take traffic off the state highway, but ended up looking like a goat track? After the council allowed its decisions to be driven by the personal politics of a Mayor and the preferences of property developers? After the Government made it very clear that the state highway north of Wellington is a road of national importance and the council still did nothing?

Perhaps some people in the community are sick of traffic sitting at a standstill every Friday, every public holiday, and every time there is an accident on the narrow two-lane bridge into Waikanae. Perhaps there are some evil capitalist businesses that want to move their freight more efficiently on a roading network.

Determining the KCDC position has been a hard road to travel. Councillors were faced with responding to a Ministerial edict that is not about benefiting our community, but all about getting from Wellington to Levin 12 minutes faster, and accommodating the trucking industry.

It was only a "hard road to travel" because the Mayor and her councillors decided this would be an opportunity to push their preferred views, did not bother to talk to people who may have a differing view to them, and based their opinions on the views of a vocal view, rather than those who are DIRECTLY affected. For many people and businesses who make the regular trip between Wellington and Auckland, 12 minutes off the travelling time to Levin would be brilliant when calculated over a year.

And, anyway, the edict was never about tourism to Kapiti. It is about creating an effective roading network and identifying the roads of national importance. The entire purpose of this exercise is to move traffic through Kapiti. You always go on and on and on about how you want to retain Kapiti's small town, community feel. Ensuring people don't stop here is a very effective way to do that.

The council submission concludes that building a motorway through Kapiti is a total overreaction to our transport issues. Even Opus, the company tasked by Government to develop the state highway plan, identifies the issue as "peak traffic demand".

Oh, so you actually WANT the traffic to be sitting at a standstill ever Friday/public holiday/whenever there is an accident up the line! Dumb me! Here I was, thinking that because you call yourself "environmental" you would prefer that traffic moved, rather than sit still for hours on end with engines idling.

Remind me again what it is about you that is "environmental"?

The submission, endorsed by councillors in a seven to three vote, takes a much-needed sustainable approach. It demolishes the NZTA argument for a motorway and concludes that peak congestion issues can be addressed by investing more in public transport, building a two-lane Western Link Road and making incremental improvements to the state highway. I supported this recommendation with the amendment that four-laning SH1 would happen "as and when is necessary".

What's sustainable about it? The council has now endorsed four-laning the current state highway, which would result in 400+ homes being fully or partly demolished, over the Sandhills Motorway option that would result in 40 homes being affected, but these people knew about the designation anyway. PLUS the forging ahead of a two-lane Western Link Goat Track, the purpose of which is....... er........ gosh, I don't know. Please tell - the purpose of the Western Link Road was to take local traffic off the state highway. If a highway is upgraded, it is unlikely locals are going to choose to travel on a meandering suburban street over the quick route.

And I would happily wager a bet with you that "making incremental improvements to the state highway" would end up being astronomically expensive, and a complete waste of money when the whole thing could just be sorted out once.

Four-laning SH1 has huge implications for the Paekakariki community. In this whole debate there has been no discussion about what happens in the southern end of the district. Many Paekakariki residents have asked me what will happen south of McKays Crossing if there is a four-lane highway through the entire district? The answer of course is a massive bottleneck, and the same issue arises if the entire SH1 is four-laned.

And this is based on what traffic modelling? Of course, this would not be an issue if/when Transmission Gully is ever built. Or if the residents of Paekakariki just faced reality, concede they live on State Highway 1 and not a back road, stopped trying to reduce the speed limit through the district, and allowed the road to be four-laned. Or considered the merits of a local road that linked it with Kapiti through Queen Elizabeth Park (shock! Horror! The poor native trees that apparently cannot be replanted!).

We can make immediate sensible improvements to SH1 to address traffic flow and safety issues, but we don’t need to create a defacto expressway on SH1.

From this comment, I can only assume that you have never travelled on the State Highway through Kapiti. If you had, you would have noticed the many houses dotted all along its route, with driveways that end directly on the State Highway. You would have noticed the many fast food outlets that have drive-through facilities and with entrances and exits on the State Highway. You may notice the local roads, lots of them, that have Give Way intersections with the State Highway. You have also possibly noticed that the road is, in parts, narrow and winding and is terrifying with the quantity of trucks at times. And, finally, it may have also escaped your attention that a combination of all the above, plus a demographic that is largely elderly and terrified when driving in tiny cars around large trucks, culminates in traffic jams for hours every Friday night, at the start and end of every public holiday, and whenever there is a frequent accident at the Waikanae bridge.

So, in response to your vacuous comment, you actually do need to create an expressway through Kapiti. Your proposed safety improvements on the current road will never be sufficient, and in fact are outdated already.

We should give the rail improvements and the Western Link Road a chance to reduce peak-time congestion, while incrementally making improvements to SH1. Improvements could include an underpass at Te Moana Road, replacing traffic lights with roundabouts, slip lanes for properties with SH1 entrances, left in and left out onto the highway, tidal lanes, and four-laning where appropriate.

Ahahahaha!!!! That's so funny! What rail improvements? Do you mean the train carriages that would make some communist states laugh at the antiquity? Do you mean the double tracking of the track to Waikanae. Remind me, are we talking about the same rail service that is being increasingly shunned by people because it is not always a cost effective alternative to fuel and parking in Wellington, and is so unreliable that people fear for their job security when they catch it? And are we talking about freighting goods on this rail network that currently travel by road because this is a more cost effective and quicker option than rail? And always will be?

I see you have probably never worked as a roading enginner. Granted, neither have I. So perhaps the glaring gap I'm seeing here is a complete and utter lack of common sense. This is not "sustainable". It is extremely unsustainable As always, economic naivety and a lack of English ability, masquerading as sharing, caring policy, is alive and well in Kapiti.

A second motion supporting council’s fallback position of an eastern motorway was passed with the mayoral casting vote. I did not support this motion as I believe it offers support for an unacceptable motorway proposal, and undermines the council’s preferred package.

Over the past few weeks I have talked with hundreds of residents from my ward.

Presumably you only spoke to those residents who agree with your stance. I, for one, have been actively collecting petition signatures and can vouch that there are also several hundred residents in your ward who think your views are, well, "s***" (as stated by a 90 year old resident who you didn't talk to).

I really appreciate those who take the time to contact me to share their views and talk over these hugely important issues. The overwhelming view is that motorways are not the solution and we can and must find a more sustainable solution. But it is true that people feel powerless in the face of a Government determined to have its way.

No, again I must differ. The Government, you may recall or have possibly conveniently ignored, initially presented two options. They then listened to the concerns raised by affected property owners and tabled a third option - a brilliant option: The Sandhills option, which affects far fewer properties and goes along an existing roading designation, is the cheapest to construct and is the quickest to construct (yes, sometimes upgrading an existing road is not the quickest or cheapest option, but your lack of economics nous probably didn't realise this).

Conversely, the Council has had decades to construct a road that would take local traffic off the State Highway. Instead, it has chosen to delay the process by small minded, private agenda politicking. The Council has repeatedly ignored the rights of private property owners over the rights of property developers and the school of choice for Mayoral grandchildren.

The only way these affected resident have been able to effect any change to council decisions, and the only way the residents have been privy to private discussions between council officers and property developers that directly affected their properties, has been through official processes, such as OIA requests, complaints to the Ombudsman, complaints to the Auditor General, judicial reviews, press statements to national media, repeated meetings with Ministers of the Crown and MPs. This is what being powerless in the face of government is. Your ratepayers should never have to go through this.

I don’t underestimate the power and confidence of this Government. But that doesn’t have to mean saying yes to something that is wrong for our community, wrong for New Zealand and wrong for the planet. Let’s say no to motorways and let’s say yes to a sustainable solution.

Again, I LOL and PMSL. While you are at it, let's also say a resounding YES! to longer traffic jams! YES! to more accidents along dangerous stretches of roads! YES! to more people leaving Kapiti in a quest for a place that is more accessible to Wellington's CBD! YES! to economic disaster as businesses fold due to an inability to efficiently transport goods through the capital city to Auckland, and vice versa!

You are deluded if you think your views are "sustainable". Learn the meaning of the word as a first step. To assist you, I can immediately think of three definitions:
1. (Economics) capable of being sustained;
2. (Life Sciences / Environmental Science) (of economic development, energy sources, etc.) capable of being maintained at a steady level without exhausting natural resources or causing severe ecological damage; and
3. (Economics) (of economic growth) non-inflationary.

None of your ideas achieve any of the above. The only thing I can think you possibly mean is sustainable means do nothing? I think, perhaps, you are confusing "sustainable" with "ostrich"? I can think of two definitions that might aid you:
1. A large, swift-running flightless bird (Struthio camelus) of Africa, characterized by a long bare neck, small head, and two-toed feet, and a tendency to spend long periods of time with its head in the sand.
2. One who avoids reality by refusing to face it.

A question for train platform designers

2009-10-19T22:19:00.000+13:00

Witnessed today at the Paraparaumu Railway Station: a person in a wheelchair turned his wheelchair to face the doors of the approaching train. The wheelchair suddenly lurched forward - I'm not not sure if brakes were on or failed - just as the train came into the station. Thankfully, the actions of about five people who threw themselves at the wheelchair, and prevented the man from falling under the train. It was all over in less than 10 seconds.

Between today's incident, and the sickening footage of the baby in Melbourne, I would like to know why these platforms must slope towards the train?

Strungling with global warming denialism

2009-10-18T22:26:00.009+13:00

I do not want to share this with anyone I respect.

Historian and apocalyptic climate scaremonger, Robert Manne, has rewritten history:

In recent times, the phenomenon of denialism has come to be called, in Australia at least, the phenomenon of scepticism. This change in language seems to me to be both dangerous and wrong.

He appears to be saying that initial warming doubters were first dubbed "denialists", and that the sceptic tag came later. I would argue that he has this the wrong way around.

Scepticism is in general, as it should be, a positive word, denoting scientific or humanistic curiosity and in particular the presence of an open mind. That is not the mindset of those who are now denying the reality of climate change.

Behold the presence of an open mind. Manne also acknowledges, and fully supports, a Holocaust connection to the "denialism" slur:

Denialism, a concept that was first widely used, as far as I know, for those who claimed that the Holocaust was a fraud, is the concept I believe we should use.

So he’s not a denialism denialist. Among other highlights, Manne claims that the threat of climate change is greater than that presented by WWII (and more difficult to overcome) and that how we deal with global warming will “determine both the human future and the future of the earth".

Manne also invents the word "strungle".

Don't bother reading any of it.

Global Warming Melted My Homework

2009-10-18T21:16:00.000+13:00

From an article in a newspaper from Jakarta. Link to come....

Cirebon School Ceiling Falls on Students' Heads

Dozens of elementary school students in Cirebon, West Java were injured after the ceiling of their classroom collapsed on Wednesday. The two-floor building was built with state funds and had been in use for just three months. However, the cracks on the ceiling had been noticeable for some time. The steel beams used to support the ceiling had expanded over the summer. School headmaster Sukhemi blamed the contractor who built the school, and said the builder should take responsibility for the accident. Dedi Windiagiri, the head of the Cirebon school board, denied that the contractor was to blame. Climate change, he said, was the true cause of the accident.

Why stop at one fisk?

2009-10-17T23:38:00.005+13:00

My apologies to Liberty Scott. He very rightly, and very brilliantly, fisked Sue Kedgley over an issue that is literally on my doorstep and that has dominated my life, and pretty much destroyed a lot of it, ever since we moved to the Kapiti Coast.

The proper thing for me to do would have been to quickly add weight to Liberty Scott’s blog. But in my defence, I am just so very depressed over the Kapiti roading issue now, having discovered that the Mayor has resurrected an entranceway proposal that would go through my house (despite the council repeatedly voting against it) and whenever the Mayor and her loyal friends and former lesbian girlfriends speak up, I am reduced to a crying mess. A useless state to be in when I am also trying to get on with my life.

But Liberty Scott’s fisking was brilliant. Why stop at Sue Kedgley? Ever since Jenny Rowan, the Lady Worship Mayor Of The Ugliness That Is Kapiti, came into power, the obnoxious view is that it is acceptable to disregard advice provided by council to its ratepayers, and to demolish homes and ignore any principles of natural justice. It is never about the people. It is all about the kanuka trees and the Mayor’s grandson’s school. By the way, that’s the kanuka trees that would never be there had the Sandhills Motorway been built decades ago. And the school that knew about the roading designation when it purchased the land. Hypocritically, these people also brag about their union credentials and their people-hugging past.

Life isn’t easy for people in Kapiti who purchased their property based on council information, who are not lesbian and former girlfriends of the Mayor, and who do not send their children to the same militant Steiner school that the Mayor’s grandson attends. While the sanctimonious greenies have their estates protected by the mayor and her council slaves, reasonable greenies - who, let it not be forgotten, also have mortgages, care about their children’s future, don’t necessarily use disposable nappies, and – most importantly - pay rates - are directly and devastatingly affected by the peculiar greenie tenet of putting the environment ahead of people. The salvation of a few kanuka trees overrides any personal property rights, a concept that is surprisingly difficult to explain to those who call themselves green, but who are actually just thick. They have yet to explain to me how demolishing homes is environmentally superior to constructing a road on a designated route.

I cannot reconcile the principles espoused by the greenies involved in this when so many people’s properties will be affected by what they are proposing. The roading designation for the Sandhills Motorway option has existed longer than many of them have been alive. The people who have purchased their properties along (or, in some stupid instances, on) the roading designation, have done so knowing full well that a roading designation exists. So why penalise the sensible people among us for this?

The current move by the Kapiti council furthers this hypocrisy. Rowan, backed by Sue Kedgley, and Winnie Laban (let’s ignore the point that most of the affected part of the district is not in Winnie’s electorate) is now supporting four-laning the state highway (a move that will result in around 400 people being directly affected) AND a two-lane Western Link Road. The whole point of the Western Link Road was to take local traffic off the state highway. If you upgrade the state highway, people are going to choose to travel on that over a 50kph goat track. Why create further local roads when perfectly adequate roads for local traffic already exist? Do one or the other. Not both. Oh, but I forget – you must waste money! In that case, this idea of yours will achieve that. You thieving, unethical excuse for a Mayor.

By utilising Sue Kedgley, the Mayor has ensured journalists will receive moral direction and sensational copy. This means that rather than holding the council to account, Kedgley has allowed the council to go without scrutiny or criticism.

I am now going to send off my submission and hope NZTA sees beyond the rhetoric of a vocal minority who have access to bored Green MPs, and does what is best for Wellington, for Kapiti, and for traffic travelling through the district – build the Sandhills Motorway, and build it soon. It is the safest, cheapest option, that – get this greenies – has the least impact on people and property. I am also going to take a moment to cry over what I had hoped would be a lovely life on the Kapiti Coast, but what in fact has turned out to be a soul destroying nightmare.

I'm sure there must be a council in NZ that doesn't treat its ratepayers with such disdain? And may Kedgley, Laban and their respective parties stay well out of power for many years yet. Their breathtaking disregard for people and their families and homes is disgusting. They should be ashamed of their hypocritical stance that puts people last.

Goodnight Kiwi

2009-10-15T22:31:00.001+13:00

Am I the only one who missed the news that two New Zealand zoos (Wellington and Auckland) want to import two tumour-free Tasmanian devils? Don't zoos in New Zealand have a habit of letting animals go walkabout, and taking a long time to recapture the escapists?

Strewth! Tell me you are kidding?!? Yes, I know extinction is sad (sometimes), but tell me you don't honestly want to develop a breeding programme for these beasts? Have a closer look at the name. (Hint: the devil might explain a lot.)

Wellington Zoo’s Simon Eyre says New Zealand wants to assist in protecting the vulnerable marsupial in any way it can.

Sounds like a worthy plan. Take them out of Australia. Good idea. I support that 100%.

Problem is, though, I now live in New Zealand.

Earnest New Zealand zookeepers, I offer you a warning: if one of these ugly devils manages to escape - just one - fear for your pets, your ankles, and the future of New Zealand's meek, defenceless wildlife (what there is of it, anyway). It won't take one long to enjoy a large tucker. They’re aggressive, heartless, cold-blooded, bloody ugly (even before facial tumour) killers. They have very few redeeming features, other than that they are unique to a certain geographic location.

Goodbye cute, cuddly little Kiwi birds.

The REAL story behind the proposal to ban P

2009-10-15T21:45:00.000+13:00

I have some inside knowledge.

The Chief Science Advisor, a charming man wearing a neat bow tie, welcomed the Prime Minister into his office.

"We're engaged in a major programme of research on the genetics of degenerative disease in child bearing turkeys with the common cold following prolonged used of pseudoephedrine. It's an important topic," said the Chief Science Advisor, and the Prime Minister nodded, as if to convey that he, too, was heavily involved, and had read the briefing paper and so understood what his Chief Science Advisor was saying.

"Yes," agreed the Prime Minister. "Very important. Indeed. So important for the economy, in fact. What with Christmas coming up."

The Chief Science Advisor threw him a glance. Now they moved deep within the inner sanctum of the Beehive to the laboratories, where the humming centrifuges and bubbling flasks attested to a high level of research activity.

"MgP2HP20P + HgPSOP4 = P," explained the Chief Science Advisor, pointing to a vat of curiously coloured powder.
"P?" asked the Prime Minister.
"MgPCO2P = P," responded the Chief Science Advisor.
"O," said the Prime Minister. "I....."
"O?" asked the Chief Science Advisor.
The Prime Minister stroked his chin. "Perhaps."
"Definitely," interjected the Chief Science Advisor. "PHP2POP +PNaPCl3P = PPPpppPPPP+PP."
"P?" probed the Prime Minister. "Why?"
"Because PPPpppPPPP+PP," the Chief Science Advisor explained, as simply as he could to a non-scientist.

The Prime Minister exploded in anger. "Will you stop saying P all the time!!! It's getting really irritating!"

"P?" the Chief Science Advisor queried.

In a thunderous rage, The Prime Minister grabbed the nearest beaker and smashed it over the head of his Chief Science Advisor. He then destroyed any evidence of his (now former) Chief Science Advisor with a Bunsen burner.

The next day, a press release was issued from the Prime Minister's office:

The Prime Minister proposes banning pseudoephedrine in the fight against P. The ban is part of a wide-ranging plan to fight P, using the full force of the government's arsenal, as P is wrecking lives, wrecking families and fuelling crime.

The banning of other P-related products will be considered in due course.

A lesson for politicians (esp Jenny Rowan) on investment vs spending/theft

2009-10-15T09:46:00.001+13:00

I no longer have the energy to blog about the Kapiti roading debate. There's not much more to add from me. Sandhills Motorway good. Jenny Rowan get lost. Especially with your latest attempt to compare the Kapiti roading issue with the Samoa tsunami, you rude, offensive excuse for a human.

OK, so clearly the Samoa reference made me bristle. But I bristle further when politicians, especially, it seems, the likes of Jenny Rowan, throws us a dangerous word, that is little understood by the masses: investment.

So, here is today's lesson. Listen carefully, Rowan, for if you make this mistake one more time, I may be moved to more libelous activity.

Having just spend $281,000 of ratepayers' money on developing an engineering submission, that was then rejected by Council itself, we are told that such "investment" is necessary for economic analysis.

So, if it is an "investment", presumably I will get a return that has increased my investment's original value?

Of course not. The problem lies in that I did not get to choose how I invested my own money, where or how I invested it, and I have no say in whether I reinvest it. And, even if the Council stuffs up the "investment" of my money, it faces no financial penalties or hardship.

But, unfairly, I do.

If I had a say on my investment, and I chose to invest it in this way, I would admit that I made a mistake, and I would learn from this for future investment decisions. But, Jenny Rowan, you gave me no choice as to how my money would be invested. Is it fair, then, to penalise me for your misuse of my funds? Funds that were never intended for investment? No, it is not. It is theft. But you get away with it because you know I have no right of compensation.

Jenny Rowan, and most other politicians, display zero understanding of basic economic terminology. "Investment" is not the same as "spend". When you, Jenny Rowan, buy your fags, you are not "investing"; you are spending. When you buy engineering analysis for a submission (and claim it is "economic advice"), you are not "investing"; you are spending. When the government (hopefully) builds the Sandhills Motorway, it is not "investing"; it is spending.

Get it right. Stop lying to me about how you are using my money, and stop this dishonesty. You have clearly demonstrated that you do no know the principles of investment, and, therefore, you do not know what is best for me or the other ratepayers in this district. Your use of ratepayers' money is corrupt.

Sadly, economic illiteracy won't go away when I vote Jenny Rowan out of office (not that I ever tried to vote her in), because politicians conveniently ignore the difference between investment/spending/theft.

Let's keep it unreal

2009-10-14T17:27:00.003+13:00

Karl Lagerfeld has a point.

Naturally, there was outrage when fashion icon Karl Lagerfeld recently said only “fat mummies” object to skinny models on the catwalk, but I think his point about the growing pressure to put “real” women in magazines and fashion shows wasn’t so off the mark.

It's not supposed to be real. And that applies to men too.

If you want to look at a “real” woman or man, stand in front of the bathroom mirror, then ask yourself, “Do I belong on the pages of a fashion magazine?” I’d hazard a guess the answer is a resounding, “Oh Good God, No! At least, not with a little tweaking, anyway.”

That doesn’t mean you’re not gorgeous, beautiful, handsome, very sexy even. It just means that on the odd occasion we fork out $10 for a glossy, if we’re stuck looking at people just like us, it's a waste of money.

Body image is obviously a sensitive subject. There are those who will try to argue that the fashion industry is responsible for an epidemic of eating disorders. Some say yummy mummies put too much pressure on women to lose weight after pregnancy, or teen stars are why ten-year-olds want a bra - the "sexualisation" of children.

Give me a break!

There are arguments to support all these perspectives, but if you're going to argue that it's as simple as skinny = bad/curvy = good, or fantasy = bad/real = good, then you are kidding yourselves.

Last month commentators, including Mia Freedman, sang the joys of emancipation when American Glamour magazine published a picture of a woman with her belly hanging out. It did not have the same effect on me. I do not feel a strong need to see my own flab, let along another woman’s.

I’m probably not the only one, which might explain why the picture was on page 194.

Lagerfeld’s fabulously bitchy comments were in response to the announcement by a German magazine that its January issue would feature only non-models.

He said: "These are fat mummies sitting with their bags of crisps in front of the television, saying that thin models are ugly." I grant he could be wrong on that point - there’s a world wide, intelligent debate underway about body image and how to deal with it.

Lagerfeld went on to say fashion was about, "dreams and illusions, and no one wants to see round women." It’s an inelegant argument but it shouldn’t be immediately shouted down.

Imagine if our entire internal lives were all about reality. No dreams, no aspirations and no fantasies. For all but a few of us it would get pretty old pretty quickly.

When I shop for lipstick, I do not want someone reminding me that it isn't going to make me look even a tiny bit more glamorous and sophisticated. And don’t even bother trying on that dress because the best you can hope for is "real".

How you were treated you as a kid, what your friends look like, how they act, and how your partner treats you, has a much greater influence over how you feel about yourself than any amount of photographs of Heidi Klum you may be exposed to.

Fantasies are not a bad thing. Mothers who worry about the effect they might have on their daughters just need to teach them there’s a difference between real and unreal.

Removing the fantasy altogether won’t change a thing.

216 years per stab, to be served concurrently.

2009-10-13T16:56:00.001+13:00

Not sure how coherent this blog will be. I am rarely so angry that I wish death on anyone, but I am raging at the news item that the psycho Clayton Weatherston (my god, I can't even type that beast's name without feeling sick) is appealing his conviction - not the length of the sentence, but the actual conviction. All attempts at a non-emotional blog are out the window. I just can't be calm. I would like to think that his lawyers have advised him to appeal in the secret hope that the sentencing judge will not be Justice Potter, and that the Devil Incarnate (there, that's better) will instead be locked away for even longer than the original sentence.

Or am I being too charitable to his lawyers? Alas, I fear it may be more a case of respecting the rights of murderers over victims.

But I am speculating, particularly given the lack of detail in the news item.

Under what conceivable circumstances could the original conviction be thrown out? Especially as Devil Incarnate took the stand to defend his own actions, never addressed the questions put to him, and prolonged the trial. He spoke for himself. He provided his justification for his actions. He was witnessed committing the murder, and admitted it to the police and in the court. It was heard by a jury, who deliberated, and reached a verdict. I cannot think of ANY reason why it is necessary to appeal this conviction. Other than both he and his lawyers are deluded that he was provoked to manslaughter, rather than premeditated murder.

My heart goes out to her family. My anger with all this is heightened by the Devil Incarnate receiving legal aid for his defence, and Sophie Elliot's family having to remortgage their family home, among other financial burdens that they had to incur to meet their legal expenses. Then the trial was delayed. Then it was shifted to Christchurch.

Enough with their suffering!! Enough with everyone's suffering!! (Except, clearly, Devil Incarnate and his lawyers.) And enough with the legal aid. To appeal is disrespectful to the court, to the jury, to the public who may have to live with him, and to the public who have paid for his legal fees.

I cannot bear to have this drawn out any longer.

I wait with baited breath to see if the Court of Appeal denies him leave to appeal.

If not, I wait with baited breath to see if reports of a bounty on him are true.

Nobel Peace Prize for Potential [update]

2009-10-10T14:33:00.003+13:00

In case there was any dispute on the politicisation of the Nobel Peace Prize, Barack Obama has been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for 2009. Let us take a moment to reflect on Obama's glorious efforts for peace.

1. Stability in Iraq
......um....... no, let us move on from that one.

2. The flight against terrorism
.....um
...........er.... should probably say something here........
The wars still drag on with no end or even promise of an end in sight, and there has been some sabre-rattling over Iran from his administration lately. So, can't find an example there, either.

3.The elimination of nuclear and germ weapons
........oh this is very hard.

Perhaps to qualify for a Nobel Peace Prize, all one has to do is not blow anything up for a year and you are best pals with Gandhi.

What a cheap prize this is. Obama took office less than two weeks before the 1 February nomination deadlines, and, despite that not being reason enough to disqualify him, he has not made the kind of exceptional effort that something with the prestige of the Nobel ought to reward.

The Nobel Committee Chairman, Thorbjoern Jagland, has responded to the criticism:

If you look at the history of the Peace Prize, we have on many occasions given it to try to enhance what many personalities were trying to do.
Before he took office, the situation was so dangerous. Step by step, he has given the message to the world that he wants to negotiate on all conflicts, strengthen the UN, and work for a world without any nuclear arms.

And so far, he has achieved.......... actually, if the purpose of the Prize is to talk, he has achieved a lot.

Perhaps there were no other obvious candidates? Except, maybe, Zimbabwe "Prime Minister" Morgan Tsvangirai, jailed Chinese dissident Hu Jia, the Afghan women's rights activist Sima Samar.......Take Jagland's justification for why Obama won the prize, and it is easy to apply the same principles to these people (with some words changed, obviously) and reach a different conclusion to Obama as winner.

Initially I was puzzled that Obama didn't also win the Nobel Prize for Literature. But then I remembered: he's written two books.

All my favourite bloggers have blogged well on this, but my award goes to Oswald Bastable

Rewarding for expected behaviour

2009-10-09T00:16:00.000+13:00

I caught a snippet of information on the radio just now that police in Auckland have offered over $800,000 in rewards in the past few years in an effort to solve some crimes, but have not paid out a cent. (Apparently this came from the Herald, but I haven’t been able to find a link.)

I usually despise the idea of rewards for such purposes. If someone has information that could help solve a crime, then it is up to the person to determine if it is in their moral duty to divulge this. And, without wanting to get into a deep and meaningful on morality, my view is that this duty to divulge exists if the liberty of others – personal or property - is at stake.

Unfortunately, the snippet of information didn’t get into the detail that I was interested in: why has not a cent has ever been paid out? Did the police solve all the crimes without anyone coming forward? I doubt it. If not, how many crimes that had rewards attached to them were solved, and how were they solved? Or can I cynically wonder if people came forward with information, but the police found a loophole to avoid paying out?

Rewarding for desired behaviour is nothing new, whether it be in a parenting capacity, training an animal, supervising staff (although the management one is dodgy territory that is perhaps better saved for another deep and meaningful blog), or rewarding for information.

A while ago, we had six sheep that frequently escaped from their paddock. I found a happy home for the three ringleaders, but that still left me with three sheep who now had a taste for freedom. One day, a neighbour witnessed an escape, and returned the sheep to us. I thanked him by giving him some chocolate brownies. Despite extensive fence improvements, this continued for three days in a row. Returning runaway sheep always resulted in a small plate of brownies. As soon as I could, I went to the farm shop and got some serious “real-farmers-use-these” fencing supplies, but while I was out, the sheep escaped again. Again, the neighbour returned them. But, because I was out buying proper fencing stuff, my husband was at home and, not knowing the procedure, no brownies were forthcoming, no alternative reward was provided, and no explanation was given. My husband was a little perturbed at the neighbour’s reluctance to leave despite the profuse thank you and sorry and reassurance that the fence would be mended that very day.

When I heard this, I wondered if the neighbour would return the sheep the next time they escaped. He might be disinclined to, but what if there had never been any reward? Would returning the sheep not be the right thing to do?

(Before anyone throttles me for chanting off research even though I ranted in a previous blog about how I hate people who do just this, I am justifying me doing so here because I am in no way stating that the research given below is conclusive. But I concede that I am using the research to my advantage to illustrate my point.)

Some clinical psychology studies (for references, see Warneken, F., and Tomasello, M. (2008) Extrinsic rewards undermine altruistic tendencies in 20-month-olds, Developmental Psychology, 44 (6), 1785-1788 DOI:10.1037/a0013860) assert that children as young as 14 months old will spontaneously help others for no reward. Conversely, a 1973 study of 3 to 5-year-olds (Lepper, Greene and Nisbett (1973)) claimed that these kids spontaneously drew pictures, however, if they were given a reward for drawing pictures they would not do any further drawings unless a reward was offered. Which begs the question all parents will now be asking, and one I am also asking in the context of the police unpaid rewards: does offering a reward actually suppress the natural inclination to do good things?

In the Warneken, F., and Tomasello, M. study referenced in the previous paragraph, 48 German toddlers (aside from the fact that all German toddlers are well behaved, I believe the results are still relevant) averaging 20 months of age were put in a room (one at a time) with a parent and an experimenter. The experimenter sat at a table in the corner, apparently doing an unrelated task like placing balls in a basket or clipping napkins together. The experimenter pretended to drop one of the objects on the floor, and reach for it while looking at the toddler, waiting up to 30 seconds for the toddler to help her by picking it up. Eight of the children refused to leave their parent (possibly immigrants?), and ten did not complete the task (ditto? Apologies, but I have never witnessed a disobedient German child), but 36 became reliable helpers, returning the object to the experimenter five times.

Of the 36, each time they helped out, 12 were given no reward or praise, 12 were thanked verbally, and 12 were rewarded with a cube they could use to activate a fun toy.

Next, the children were tested to see if they would continue to help the experimenter without a reward. Since the 36 toddlers were very reliable helpers, the task was made a little more challenging. Before the experimenter dropped her object, the toddler was presented with an exciting new toy. He would have to leave this toy in order to help out, and no reward was given. This was repeated nine times. Nearly all of them were willing to help even when they had a new exciting toy to play with.

However, the response from toddlers who had been rewarded previously was different. When no rewards were offered, these children helped only about 50 percent of the time:
Percentage of children helping with no praise = approximately 90%
Percentage of children helping with praise = approximately 80%
Percentage of children helping with reward = approximately 50%

Children who had previously received rewards helped the experimenter significantly less often than either the group that received only praise or the group that received no praise.

Warneken and Tomasello concluded that rewarding children for altruistic behaviour causes them to be less likely to be altruistic in the future.

The study bothers me a bit, and I would make some points in the toddlers' favour.

1. They had learned to play a game where both they and the experimenter had clear roles. The child helped out, and the experimenter gave them a prize. However, halfway through the game, the rules changed for the kids, and suddenly the experimenter was not living up to her part of the bargain. Was it the reward, or the betrayal that caused the child's behaviour to change?

2. Would the results be different if a different experimenter was used for the second (no-rewards) part of the test? Someone who was not part of the original "pick up object = get reward" game?

Obviously, the ideal would be for children to feel that altruistic behaviour is a part of peaceful co-existence with others, and that they will learn that it is in their long-term interest. If they do nice things to another person, they will be seen as kind, and others may help them in return some day, but if they don't, that's no big deal and shouldn't be the motivator for helping someone.

Surely, the key is:
a) whether the altruist perceives that they're being taken for granted (for me, that's when the neighbour takes no action; for the toddlers, it's when they get less than the expected reward; for the person with crime-solving information, it’s perhaps the fear of the process that follows); and

b) whether it matters to the individual (on poppy day appeals, there are people who will buy a poppy but refuse to wear it; for the person with crime-solving information, it’s determining whether they feel a moral duty to come forward).

I don’t expect my neighbour to run after my sheep. But at the time, I felt a plate of brownies politely conveyed and acknowledged the gratitude. I just overdid the rewards. I am guilty of overdoing rewards with my children too.

I am only speculating without knowing the full reasons behind why the police have not paid a cent of reward money out, but are people lured to reveal their crime-solving information if a reward is on offer? Or has the reward carrot been dangled too often without paying out, thereby diluting the effectiveness?

Is it possible that by introducing a reward, you introduce the idea that the activity is not pleasurable or expected, but difficult and burdened? For example, I am typing this blog out of my altruistic desire to share my vast knowledge with strange people who read blogs all day. If you pay me to type this blog, then I am being compensated for having to think of something to post, to type it, to check that the spelling and grammar are correct, for the fact that my eyes get tired... and I doubt you would ever pay me enough.

For the person with crime-solving information, will they come forward out of an altruistic desire to share their knowledge, or will they decide that it is all too hard to go through the system and any retribution that may follow, and let karma prevail?

Is it a poor message to reward people, whether they be adults or children, for what they should be doing anyway?

Sometimes parenting is not rewarding

2009-10-08T21:34:00.000+13:00

Bollywood dancing, anyone? Or is Finance for Females more your thing? [update]

2009-10-07T20:40:00.003+13:00

I posted this ages ago, but am reposting it in light of Labour's hand-wringing over the end of taxpayer funded night classes (http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/education/2941606/62-schools-to-stop-offering-night-classes).

As my children get older, and money gets rarer as they start to eat more, grow faster, destroy everything, I thought I would be inventive and do community education classes in sewing. I've missed out on getting into the course every term since the middle of last year; even though I tried to enrol well in advance, the classes were always full.

So I'm perplexed that the classes have now been suddenly cancelled, apparently solely due to the cut in the Government subsidy for community education. In fact, all the classes have been cancelled. On enquiring, it seems that no one running the classes thought to ask the enrolled participants if they were willing to pay more and to keep the classes going. The classes were always over-subscribed. There was always a waiting list. Surely there would have been a few participants who would have been prepared to pay a bit more to keep the classes going?

But it seems there are also a fair number of previously enrolled participants who are assuming that no subsidy should equal no classes, rather than taking the view that the classes be repriced to meet the market demand.

The expectation that "the Government will provide" is deeply ingrained in the average New Zealander's psyche. And there is a high level of economic naivety from the socialists that the Government can afford to provide a high quality of healthcare, infrastructure, justice, welfare, and education (well, clearly not economics education, but I digress), and still have enough money left over to enable us all to do courses in intensive Russian and Rock Climbing for Women.

At any point, have those doing the heartfelt bleating considered that their lessons were being paid, in whole or in part, by other people through taxes?

Is there honestly an expectation that it is acceptable for people who, say, reconstruct the brain and face of a road crash victim, or clean up the operating theatre afterwards, pay their taxes so that other people can enjoy a few night classes in concrete shell mosaics?

I admit I'm only giving the extreme examples of the courses available (I'm not lying. See http://www.cecwellington.ac.nz/home), but surely those running the courses that are well attended, such as sewing for beginners, or introductory Spanish, can be in a position to price their fees accordingly. Yes, the price may go up slightly, but then, over time, there is a possibility it may well go down, and people are presumably getting what they pay for.

I've vaguely paid attention to the pleas on various media. "Let the subsidies continue," they all say. "I really enjoyed the Intensive French for First Time Travellers night classes that I was taking ahead of my holiday." I remain unmoved by your plea. You want it, then you pay for it, or you learn to live without it. It's surprisingly easy to do - maybe not as satisfying for you, but I'm sure the operating theatre cleaner will be happier knowing his/her money isn't going towards your French lessons.

UPDATE:
In a moment of inspiration, it took me all of 2 hours to find 14 other dedicated people who were committed to learning to sew, to meet a couple of tailors to discuss the proposition of holding classes, to confirm a venue, numbers, day, time, and fees, and even collect most of the money from people up front. And, here is the most interesting thing: after paying the tailor for tutoring costs, basic sewing threads and fabric for each student, and venue costs for one day a week for the next 8 weeks, IT IS LESS EXPENSIVE PER PERSON THAN THE NIGHT CLASSES. Granted, people offering their services, equipment, or facilities were willing to do so at a reduced rate in the hope that this would be the start of something more profitable down the track. But it was damn easy to arrange because there is enough demand for the classes.

So stick that in your spool and sew it, you socialist whingers.

Ladies and Gentleman, we are experiencing some turbulence

2009-10-06T14:22:00.000+13:00

Have a read of the following news item from this morning's Dominion Post, and then be grateful the same flight crew was not in charge of this Boeing 747 landing at Kai Tak Airport (Hong Kong's old airport) Landing at Kai Tak Airport....

A mid-air scuffle between pilots and crew of an Air India flight at the weekend did not endanger the 106 passengers on board, said a spokesman for the airline which has ordered an inquiry.

Two pilots and two crew members have been grounded following the incident on a Sharjah-Lucknow-Delhi flight, said Jitender Bhargava, which began as a heated exchange on a charge of sexual harassment against the pilots by a crew member.

Blows were also exchanged in the scuffle that spilled into the cabin late on Saturday night, according to media reports.

"At no stage was safety compromised. It was a clear case of indiscipline," Bhargava said.

"Our report is still awaited. We will decide on the course of action when it is ready," he said, adding that Delhi police were also investigating.

Mmmmmmmmmmmmm. Lettuce.

2009-10-06T12:21:00.004+13:00

From Meet Britain's new healthy eating guru on www.stuff.co.nz today:

Forget all the pizza and doughnuts - the British government wants fans of The Simpsons to ditch junk food and eat more healthily.

The Department of Health is spending £640,000 to sponsor episodes of the long-running US cartoon series broadcast on Channel 4, as part of its Change4Life campaign.

Before the start of the sponsored shows, cartoon characters pretending to be the members of the dysfunctional animated family are shown sitting on a sofa tucking into ice cream and chips which then morph into more healthy alternatives.

The government hopes that viewers will realize they should follow that behavior, and not the beer-swilling, doughnut-guzzling diet of Homer Simpson and his family.

Public Health minister Gillian Merron said the aim was to produce new and innovative ways to reach the target audience..

The Simpsons are a much-loved, close-knit family facing some of the everyday challenges that modern day families go through," she said in a statement.

"Whilst they certainly make some questionable choices about how they go about things, they provide a popular and engaging way to get the message to real-life families about simple ways of improving their diet and activity for a healthier lifestyle."

Memo to British Government: it's a CARTOON. The whole joke is that Homer Simpson does not eat healthy food. This is why he is overweight and has regular heart attacks and has no physical stamina whatsoever. If Homer Simpson lost weight, that would be the end of the show. If you bothered to watch The Simpsons, you would see that it is already very effectively pushing the healthy eating message. You are preaching to the converted.

Give the £640,000 back to taxpayers. That would be a more constructive use of the funds.

The plural of anecdote is not data

2009-10-06T12:06:00.004+13:00

A fundamental problem with the world today is the arrogant use of research findings to suit one's ends. To take an education example (because that’s what I have just been subjected to and what has me riled now), just because you might choose a different approach to mainstream education does not make you or your children "better" or "superior" (and how ironic that you think like this), and will not necessarily make the children better human beings at the end of their education experience. Just because I choose to send my children to a state-run school does not make me a bad parent, and does not mean I don’t care enough about my children's education.

Don’t come whimpering to me with claims that "research shows" why alternative education is better for whatever reason. If that's what people want for their children, then fine. I detest that these same people can’t see beyond their blinkered view on life and see the same thing from another perspective (again, the irony is not lost on me). Instead they are just so sad and disappointed that you are selling your children’s education short.

Before you inundate me with why alternative schooling is the only way to go, I will give a brief statement as to why you shouldn’t bother. Homeschoolers and Steiner people can just go away. I've looked into them as options and rapidly discounted them. I’m no longer interested in what they have to say, but – here’s the thing – I still respect your right to do what you want, just don’t expect me to accept it for me or my children. For some reason, the Steiner people, at least those in Kapiti, are militant. I have enormous respect for the Montessori style of education because the literature I received from them showed strong scientific analysis from different viewpoints for and against Montessori education, and relied on the parent making their own intelligent assessment of the information. It was refreshing. Having said that, my children do not go to a Montessori preschool, but only because I would ideally like to continue with it beyond preschool and there is no Montessori school anywhere near us. Instead, I have chosen a state-run kindergarten where the teachers have acknowledged the Montessori principles in education.

My respect for anything diminishes rapidly when people throw vacuous statements at me. Today, I learnt that "research shows that longer school terms and shorter term breaks are beneficial for parents and children". How convenient. So am I harming my child by not letting them have longer terms and shorter breaks? No. The statement only shows a limited understanding of analysing and evaluating conflicting scientific research. If, in fact, it is scientific, as in many cases it comes down to a belief that more than one anecdote equals research. I can also point to research and, if it is more helpful to you, many anecdotes, that show that there is actually nothing wrong with the New Zealand state run education system – it’s what you make of it, and some children may in fact benefit from shorter terms and longer holidays, or may not be affected by it at all. Perhaps the statement should be rephrased to: "research that supports our particular philosophy shows blah blah blah."

Statements about "research" are so often used in an arrogantly cavalier manner. I'm also not saying that observational data does not have a place or is not meaningful. But there is rarely, if ever, any evidence shown of harm, just a great deal of information that points to the possibility of harm that leans heavily on untested hypotheses.

It's completely possible to find research that suits whatever objective you are trying to push. Such as vaccines lead to autism, epidurals lead to c-sections, formula rather than breastfeeding leads to food allergies, longer school terms lead to better children. I can easily find research that counters your claim, or at the very least pours scorn on your assertions. Until you can back your research with scientific evidence for and against, I regard you as being nothing more than a cult.

Dreaming of the Rosenbaum House tonight

2009-10-05T23:24:00.003+13:00

A rant with a difference tonight, and I'm treading on dangerous ground because I am not an architect, and have never pretended to be.

I've just been poring through the real estate magazines, looking for somewhere reasonable for our family. But nothing compares to what I think are the greatest houses ever built, both by Frank Lloyd Wright - Falling Water and, my personal favourite, the Rosenbaum House. Yes, yes, I know Falling Water leaks and has mould issues, and that the original construction was rushed and the concrete cantilevers sagged, but that's not really so different from my current place. I absolutely love the design of the building and have never tired of staring at it for hours. Then I tagged along to an architecture lecture with my first boyfriend, discovered that Falling Water would be the case study for the term, and I was hooked (to the lecture, not the boyfriend, and I didn't become an architect - this is probably a good thing).

I went on a tour of Falling Water when I worked in the United States and decided that I would love it even if there was no water. I had always admired this house. And then, on a whim, I decided to visit the Rosenbaum House in Florence, Alabama. I fell in love. The design is so simple, and yet so appealing with the living areas at one end, the bedrooms at the other end, and a "hub" in the centre with the kitchen - an area where any family instinctively gravitates.

When we looked at building our own place a few years ago, I decided I didn't want a place with as many steps as Falling Water (heavily pregnant with a broken ankle might have influenced this), and I asked an architect if he could create something like The Rosenbaum House, and make it north facing with rammed earth or mud bricks. He laughed at me. This is never a wise thing to do. I paused briefly, puzzled at his mirth but lost interest in pursuing it any further with him when he said he had never heard of it and wasn't interested in looking at it and showed me a prefab thing with a toilet directly facing the front door. That was the end of our relationship with the architect. No love lost there. But that was also the end of our plans to build my dream mock-Rosenbaum House. Two more children quickly followed and our savings disappeared.

So here's my rant. The houses in every Property Press I've looked through in the last 3 years - all of them - are rubbish. They either face the wrong way, or don't have enough windows, or are unimaginative prefab things, or are old and look decrepit, or look like former state houses, or appear to have a toilet directly facing the front door (is this a NZ standard?). The options in Wellington are dire. Guess we won't be viewing any houses this week. Perhaps I need to lower my standards.

So, if you are bored and want to see what proper houses look like, have a nosey http://www.fallingwater.org/explore?to=1 (click on Architectural Tour and begin the tour) and, my personal favourite, http://www.wrightinalabama.com/ and http://www.pbs.org/flw/buildings/usonia/usonia.html (it's my favourite so it gets two links. It's worth two links.)

Risk paranoia

2009-10-05T12:08:00.002+13:00

Not PC has an interesting and thought-provoking blog on "adventure kindergartens" that takes a more rugged approach to outdoor play (http://pc.blogspot.com/2009/10/adventure-kindergartens.html). I commented on his blog, but, as you can see, felt the need to blog further on this.

Compared to the stance taken by many towards our children – sometimes at the behest of the Min of Education and the Department of Labour – the idea of allowing our children to partake in adventurous activities that might toughen them up is radical. Gosh, our children may even come home muddy! (Trust me, this seems to be a big thing.) Or, worse, have a scratch! Poor little Jimmy (name changed to protect identity), came so close to death with that scratch! Imagine if it had become infected? He may have died from septicaemia.

Or not. He more probably just learnt that when he jumps from a high bank onto a piece of driftwood, he may struggle to balance and he may fall. Moreover, assuming he lived through the scratch, next time little Jimmy will know that he either has to land differently, or not jump onto an unstable surface.

I can’t really comment on whether parental risk perception has changed from when our grandparents grew up (and I say that because many grandparents seem just as risk averse as the parents, from my observations), but I suspect the risk aversion is now leaning more towards risk-paranoia. I do not mean to use this blog to boast, but my boys have "free range" of our farm – which has many dangers - but with just one clear rule to ride their bikes everywhere other than the driveway (we live on a busy State Highway, so it is not the place to overshoot the driveway). Aside from that, though, they can do as they like and get as dirty as they like, and they seem to be the better for it. They are active and healthy; they understand their strengths and limitations; they have an insatiable interest in the outdoors, and an innate understanding of how humans and animals co-exist in the same environment. In turn, they and I have always had little patience with parents who rush off to the doctor over the tiniest scratch or bruise. Yes, I get many disapproving stares and comments when I take my bruises/band-aided/scratched boys out, but they are still healthy, energetic and, despite appearances at times, well co-ordinated (they quickly learnt how to catch the cricket ball). These are not attributes that are always learnt in the safety of a well-padded playground or in front of the TV or x-box.

However, the thinking these days seems to be that humans are not good at objectively assessing risk. Psychology Today has a great article about how humans commonly misperceive risk, and are afraid of all the wrong things (http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/200712/10-ways-we-get-the-odds-wrong). Instead of fearing real, permanent damage that may happen during a birth gone wrong, many have a greater fear that little Jimmy might scratch himself, or get dirty. To take this example away from adventurous children for a moment, this thinking extends to not worrying about the catastrophic results of contracting an infectious disease, and instead focuses on the smaller risk of a bad vaccine reaction (or - before you "vaccinations cause autism" people deluge me - the more common, but not severe or permanent risk of a mild complication). It does not help that there is a plethora of books and websites, and bombardment on the news of tragic events, which magnify (intentionally or otherwise) small, hypothetical, or nonexistent risks and minimise real and larger ones.

We are now so used to thinking in terms of preparing for the very worst and the least likely scenarios, that that we do not realise how overbearing and ridiculous our safety measures have become. We are so concerned about safety that we forget what we are giving up for our children: freedom, resourcefulness, learning the value of hindsight and using common sense, or believing that common sense has any value at all.

Instead, we are deferring to government intervention and regulation to spell this out for us. The big danger in this is we think we can avoid all problems, and we end up believing that if something does go wrong, someone is to blame. This is paralysing for parents and children. Yes, I know it is completely normal to worry about your children and to want to protect them at every opportunity – many times I have had to suppress shrieks of horror and look away, and had to restrain my own urge to lock the children in the safety of their bedrooms. However, to do so denies the child the opportunity to learn the thrill of mud, and the art of continuing despite small setbacks.

I look forward to seeing how much support this idea for "adventure kindergartens" gets, especially from the safety wowsers who have dominated playground rules to date. I also wonder if this idea will ever gain traction in countries where civil law suits are more common than they are in New Zealand. The blame and risk paranoia culture is a hard one to break, even if it is for the best.

The US wants your foreskin [updated again]

2009-10-04T23:03:00.004+13:00

The New York Times reported that public health officials are contemplating promoting circumcision for all baby boys born in the United States as a method of controlling the spread of HIV (Medicaid doesn't currently cover circumcision) (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/24/health/policy/24circumcision.html?_r=2&partner=rss&emc=rss). The officials examined studies in Africa that showed circumcised heterosexual men have lower HIV infection rates.

Any proposal is not going to be available until the end of the year, but should it go ahead, I have a problem with this.

As detailed in American Prospect (http://prospect.org/csnc/blogs/tapped_archive?month=08&year=2009&base_name=should_the_cdc_recommend_circu), the problem with the studies being applied to males in the United States is that there is a huge discrepancy between available medical care in the United States and the countries studied in Africa. There is also a difference in the populations most at risk. While heterosexual males are at risk in Kenya, South Africa, and Uganda, homosexual males are more at risk in the United States. The also study shows that circumcision does not affect the risk level for homosexual men. Gay men apparently make up more than half of new HIV infections in the United States, so making circumcision mandatory may not actually result in lower infection rates.

There is a higher percentage of males circumcised in the U.S. than many other countries, primarily because of the influence of Judaism. About 79% of adult men in the United States have been circumcised. Even so, the numbers have dropped off since a high of 80% of newborn boys being circumcised right after World War II. White males are more likely to be circumcised than Black or Hispanic males.

Why should ALL newborn boys be exposed to unnecessary surgery? Circumcision might potentially reduce the AIDS epidemic in Africa, but would it make a difference in the United States? It is reported that the largest 'at risk' population in the United States would not benefit from circumcision. So what is the point of requiring such an intrusive policy?

It would be more useful to provide education on risks and benefits of circumcision, and allow parents to make informed decisions about whether or not to have their child circumcised for religious or health reasons. The money spent on requiring this procedure would be better spent on research and productive preventative medicines.

Perhaps it goes without saying, but the biggest problem I have with this is that requiring something as personal as circumcision decreed by government regulation is state intrusion gone WAY too far. What next? I can't bear to think of any examples. I am hoping the conclusion of this will be to let parents decide l~~et the individual boy decide when he is at an age where he can make an informed decision himself do nothing.~~

Is anyone judging the Judges?

2009-10-02T15:39:00.005+13:00

The papers recently had a terrible story of a student who killed an elderly man following a road rage incident in Auckland in April this year (http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=1060024).

Crusader Rabbit started the discussion on the sentencing of the attacker (http://crusader-rabbit.blogspot.com/2009/09/student-who-killed-elderly-indian-man.html), fuelled in particular by the comments from the sentencing Judge, Justice Judith Potter, that the attack was an "appalling case of what can be described as road rage." She went on to say that the assault was "unprovoked and unjustified."

Yet she sentenced the attacker to just three years in jail.

The outrage is justified. Three years shows a complete disregard for the safety of the community at large, contempt for the victim’s family, and does not reflect the severity of the crime. If this "man" (no offence to real men) is so easily provoked to murder an elderly man over something as insignificant as a traffic incident, he should not be mixing with society.

Sentencing and prisons exist to keep the rest of the population safe by removing the element of harm. The case for rehabilitation is not convincing. You deprive someone of their liberty, whether that is damaging their property or maiming or murdering them, you are a menace to society and have proven that you are not suitable to live with the rest of us. Any "rehab" needs to happen when the anti-social behaviour becomes apparent (perhaps at primary school? Anne Tolley needs to be congratulated). And if this behaviour has only just become apparent, he is too volatile and should be locked up for good, or at least a decent length of time to ensure his medication is working.

However, it would be unfair to claim that this is an inherent problem with New Zealand’s justice system. It would also be unfair to taint all judges in NZ with the same scorn. Some of them have imposed sentences that are harsh, such as jail terms for tagging offences, and indefinite prison terms with no prospect of parole.

A tagger lucked out because he got into Justice Tony Adeane’s court and ended up in jail for a period. The road rage attacker had a good day with Justice Judith Potter as his sentencing judge.

The issue is a lack of consistency between the judges in sentencing, and previous cases are either not used adequately as precedence, or are not adequate sentences in the first place. This is not a unique problem to NZ.

I understand the attraction of giving judges a degree of sentencing flexibility. Offenders are not the same and strict sentencing rules may omit some factors that would lead to a fairer result. Each case needs to be viewed on its unique merits - and given the individuals and circumstances involved, no two cases are exactly alike. Ergo, it would also be a difficult job to judge the judges.

However, flexibility means you sometimes get manifestly unjust results, such as the Auckland road rage case. And presumably (depending on your viewpoint) unjust results in the other direction, too (as no doubt the parents of the tagger felt). What's more, you get unequal treatment. Even though sentencing guidelines exist in NZ, they are too broad to be of any use. Sentences appear to be based on the punishment philosophy of each trial judge. Some believe in the power of rehabilitation and give short sentences. Others defer to the victim and do not. Offenders who have similar backgrounds and commit essentially the same crimes receive widely different sentences depending on the sentencing philosophy of the sentencing judge. And, there are the discretionary judgements that are not immediately obvious, but that may still be factors for the judge (dare I say it?), such as the offender's race, the offender's sex, the degree to which the judge feels social affinity for the offender, or the degree to which the judge feels social affinity for the victim. Our feelings of pity, mercy, and sympathy, as well as our feelings of outrage, are often coloured (perhaps subconsciously rather than deliberately) by such factors, especially when they bear on the connection we feel to the parties.

Is it necessary to remove this broad discretion in sentencing? Do sentences, like the definitions of the offences, need to be made into rules of law, rather than leaving it to the philosophy of the particular judge?

The United States attempted to simplify the sentencing system so that those who committed offences receive similar sentences depending on the way they committed the crime and their criminal records (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Fed...cing_Guidelines). While these federal guidelines have been faulted for being too harsh in many instances (though I have no firm opinion on the subject), at least the guidelines provide an opportunity for deliberation, both democratic and bureaucratic, about what the right settings should be.

These guidelines should include their own minimums modified to the particulars of each offence, such as the offender's criminal history, the severity of this particular instance of the offence, and other relevant factors. There is also a separate debate over what out-clause guidelines should exist for the truly unusual cases or cases with no precedent. My view is it is better to limit judges' discretion, subject to appeal, than to leave the matter entirely to the judge.

Perhaps it might also be useful to incorporate into the guidelines an acknowledgement that people are looking for a degree of punishment in a crime and deference to a sense of justice for the victim, not leniency.

And whoever is judging the judges at this level needs to learn how to manage some of them out.

GFC: Part II. A predictable horror movie

2009-09-30T11:20:00.002+13:00

I'm considering making a movie. It will be a sequel to a much-watched initial movie, Global Financial Crisis that I didn't make, but I know what went into its development. I already have a lot of supporters, those who know that, to promote their economically crippling ideas, the Loony Left conveniently remain oblivious to the reality that free market policies have lifted people from poverty in large numbers. Yet, in the wake of the economic crisis, these Loons are promoting fondness for socialism over capitalism. Politicians, socialist commentators, and Mike Moore talk about social democracy, democratic socialism, and social justice, and look to the cloudless sky as they proudly proclaim that a small group of elites can, and must, create a better world (cue: DPRK national anthem www.youtube.com/watch?v=FERGk9L8lvI).

Their form of "progressive economics", which places government at the centre of the economy, resurfaced with alarming rhetoric at the Pittsburgh G20 meeting, essentially a large group of countries making co-ordinated but wrong decisions based on a flawed set of beliefs.

The latest G20 statement was full of talk about a profound crisis justifying drastic action. Governments are pledging to "do something" (how specific) to discourage excessive risk-taking, keep up the stimulus spending, limit executive bonuses, impose tighter regulation of financial markets. Government must now be at the "centre of the economy" to avoid the boom and bust cycles of the past, say our dear global leaders.

The glaring omission from these grandiose statements is an acknowledgment that government action played a fundamental role in fuelling the boom in the US housing market that turned into a bubble in the wider mortgage market and finally burst across the globe. Successive US administrations mandated taxpayer-funded home loans to those who were clear credit nutcases. The US Government (doesn’t seem to matter if it’s Democratic or Republican, sadly) underwrote two-thirds of the US mortgage market using government creations, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and, assuming a place at the centre of the economy to pursue well-meaning social goals, delivered poor, unintended consequences that largely triggered the global financial crisis. Barack Obama and Kevin Rudd are being ironic and dishonest when they exploit the crisis to demonise free markets. The Left has conveniently neglected to undertake an honest appraisal of the significant cause of the global meltdown.

Despite this fraudulent premise for social democracy, the Left’s cry of social justice is intuitively appealing to those who espouse intervention over personal responsibility. However, there is a reason why no one has been able to articulate the principles of social democracy. The language and rhetoric is deliberately emotional and ambiguous, and camouflages centralisation of power in the hands of a few elites who presume to know what the rest of society wants.

And we’re told the global financial crisis is (nearly) over? Yeah, right. Thanks to the economic illiteracy of Barack Obama (along with Kevin Rudd and Gordon Brown), prepare your children for GFC: Part II.

Prioritising euthanasia over child abuse

2009-09-28T22:07:00.001+13:00

If you put the lead articles of last Saturday's and today's Dominion Post newspapers side by side, the messages are striking (Saturday: http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/2905501/Suicide-pact-accused-dead, Monday: http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/2907770/Top-cop-ignored-abuse-warning).

On Saturday, we were told:

Barry Sutch, 68, died eight days after he appeared in Levin District Court charged with being party to a suicide.

The frail Otaki man, who had prostate and bowel cancer and had about 18 months to live, faced a charge relating to two people agreeing to enter a suicide pact in which only one person survived.

His 63-year-old wife, Jean, who was suffering from a debilitating illness, died last October. Police investigated her death, describing it as "unexplained", and charged Mr Sutch several months later.

Both Mr Sutch and his wife were terminally ill. They decided to end their lives together. She succeeded. He did not. And was charged. Almost a whole year later, the case was finally heard in court. He died a week later.

He did not murder her. She wanted to die. He wanted to die with her. Here are two consenting adults who want to leave this earth together. That's how they want to die. Why should this be illegal?

Of course, there are other questions around the apparent lack of palliative care or medical support. But for me to go into that discussion would be purely speculative, and I feel that would be disrespectful in the circumstances. I don't know what support was offered to them - all I know is that they wanted to die together, but sadly for him, he woke up.

When reading the article this morning, I realised that I actually might support euthanasia. For so long, I never really had a hard and fast opinion on it, other than vaguely thinking that it does seem unfair that we can afford animals the dignity to die in their sleep, but feel the need to ensure fellow human beings undergo a puritan approach to dying. And yet, when I think of the recent cases that have been in the media - and the Crutchley case in Taumarunui immediately comes to mind (http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/453924) - I realise that my support leans with the right of an individual to decide when they want to die, and to seek assistance if need be, without any fear of criminal conviction on those who are left behind (accidentally or otherwise). We give people the right to live as they choose (to an extent). So why are we so scared to let people choose how they wish to die? Of course, my lack of hard and fast opinion is based on the dilemma I face over mercy killing without consent. I don't really know where to draw the line. Or how to draw it.

But this particular case was not so complicated.

My point is, why the hell did the police feel such a need to lay charges against Mr Sutch? If the purpose of applying the law is to punish someone for a crime, and to act as a deterrent to others, this achieved neither. His wife made her decision to die and succeeded. Charging someone who essentially tried and failed to die is pointless and cruel. A person who wants to die should be given appropriate support (and if this support includes their decision to be put to sleep, then so be it). He should not be vilified and turned into a criminal. And entering into a suicide pact with your lifelong partner is not usually a decision that is taken lightly.

This was a complete waste of resources - of taxpayers' money, of police staff and time, of lawyers, the family and friends support networks, medical witnesses and experts, court staff, judges - and it is completely the fault of police, who have shown through this despicable, dogged pursuit of the law that they are incapable of good judgement. Instead, they chose to tie up resources on a case that only served to make an ill man's dying days, already bleak after losing his much-loved wife in tragic circumstances, a total nightmare.

(The lack of judgement shown by the police puts the "guidelines" for CYFS and Police on the "smacking bill" into frightening perspective. But, I digress.)

As so eloquently put by Dr Philip Nitschke:

What a tragedy. You could almost see this as being perhaps a consequence of that rather harsh interpretation of the law, and the pretty heavy-handed actions of the authorities.....
The police should be ashamed of themselves. I think what they did is disgusting.

Meanwhile, in today's Dominion Post, police are upset that they are under-resourced in child abuse investigations.

This doesn't seem a terribly complicated resourcing situation to resolve (especially if you also consider the other areas of policing in New Zealand that only serve to punish people for their potential to cause harm, such as the laws that seem to delight the traffic cops).

In the meantime, the police have shown that they are not capable of applying their judgement sensibly. It's time that the politicians had the courage to discuss and debate euthanasia - it's not going to go away, and it is morally reprehensible that we criminalise people who want to die.

Fish. Chocolate. Together. Try it.

2009-09-28T22:00:00.001+13:00

Picture this taster: a disc of white chocolate, the diameter of a golf ball, but only a few millimetres thick. On top is piled half-a-teaspoon of Osetra caviar.

You are instructed to eat the whole thing in one go.

You look down at your plate. The dish is clearly intended to make the eater feel curious and uneasy. Fish and chocolate? Together? What empty-fridge desperation came up with this (expensive) nightmare (Osetra caviar retails in New Zealand at $512.33 for 125 grams - it's not cheap).

But you've eaten more adventurous things than this before.

You slip the white chocolate disc into your mouth.

The taste is sublime. There is the clean, measured saltiness of the eggs, and the sweet creaminess of the chocolate. And then, a separate flavour, like a salted caramel.

Extraordinary.

Thank you, Heston Blumenthal (http://www.fatduck.co.uk/)

Bolstering union membership - oops, I mean "education"

2009-09-27T15:59:00.000+13:00

Spotted by accident while flicking through The Australian in the local library, I spotted a tiny article claiming that New South Wales is launching a new initiative called Unionstart, run by Unions NSW, where unionists will go into NSW schools to educate 14 to 18-year-olds about unions.

Unions NSW seems positive that this education program will lift union membership. It complains that union membership among young people is "quite low and ... to the point where it is actually declining." It arrogantly puts that down to a lack of knowledge and understanding, something Unionstart will apparently cure.

In horror I pored through the rest of The Australian newspapers and then attacked the Sydney Morning Herald, but there was nothing more on the topic. Has this breathtaking abuse of a school system, and the privileged access unions get to schoolchildren to bolster their membership under the guise of "education", passed without outcry? Dear god.

Young, impressionable minds will receive this union information, and I doubt it will be objective. Even if unions strive to not overtly recruit, students will not receive a balanced message. What’s the bet that any of the following recent news topics in Australia that reflected badly on the unions will not feature in Unionstart’s campaign:

Julia Gillard’s concerns about union men in balaclavas involved in the West Gate Bridge development in Melbourne http://news.theage.com.au/breaking-news-national/gillard-not-in-contempt-says-court-20090605-bxyn.html;

Martin Ferguson’s warnings about union excesses in the middle of a global financial crisis http://www.theage.com.au/national/free-trade-best-for-jobs-say-ministers-20090211-84tq.html; and

the reports and royal commissions that uncovered union corruption and intimidation within the building industry http://www.theage.com.au/national/gillard-cuts-across-sacred-union-line-20090603-bvq1.html

Nevertheless, even if Unions NSW does provide these examples to the students, what right does the NSW Government have to politicise schools? An argument that every child may one day be a worker does not justify unions entering schools. Yes, there is a reason why fewer workers are joining unions. And Unions NSW is too blinkered and arrogant to realise that it is not a lack of education. It is lack of relevance as more workers prefer negotiate their own terms of employment, rather follow a one-size-fits-all union command.

Schools in Australia and New Zealand are supposed to be secular and apolitical. Imagine the outcry if the Employers and Manufacturers Association were allowed into New Zealand schools to teach kids about the virtues of employer organisations. Or if the Business Roundtable explained to children that financial companies are just poor, misunderstood organisations. Not that I'm saying the Business Roundtable would say that; my point is they are organisations that represent a particular political view, and, regardless of whether or not we agree with them, they should not be given access to young minds through schools. There are more appropriate fora than schools for advertising their messages.

When unions dictate government policy, prosperity is always ignored - rich people are stealing from the poor, benefits should be higher, tax the rich, lets have greater subsidies = less money in the pockets for everyone. Somehow, I doubt that will be the lesson taught to NSW school students when Unionstart enters their classroom. I only hope this germ doesn’t enter New Zealand.

Ten Tiny Green MPs

2009-09-25T19:55:00.002+12:00

(Adapted from Ten Tiny Tadpoles, by Debbie Tarbett) (http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/2902138/Anti-smacking-law-Bradfords-legacy)

Ten tiny Green MPs, wriggling in a line. One went smacking children, so that left...

Nine speedy Green MPs, too busy to wait. One went eating junk food, so that left...

Eight playful Green MPs in splishing splashing heaven. One died of a heart attack, so that left...

Seven daring Green MPs smoking up some spliffs. One took a turtle ride, so that left...

Six frisky Green MPs, keen to duck and dive. One produced excess emissions, so that left...

Five lively Green MPs splashing near the shore. One ate inorganic sprouts, so that left...

Four happy Green MPs floating fast and free. One bought a plastic bag, so that left...

Three nosy Green MPs, roaming waters new. One got pissed she wasn't co-leader, so that left....

Two cheeky Green MPs searching for some fun, realised they could not disband because that would leave just...

One lonely Green MP, which would not be co-leading, so they found some egg-throwing students/North Korean sympathisers/global-warming zealots (insert as appropriate) and then there were...

Ten bouncing baby Greenies
Whingeing all day long.
Destroying the economy as
They sang their commie song.

Why I'm not a millionaire

2009-09-25T11:15:00.000+12:00

Why do I never think of these things first?

A bit of a squeeze

2009-09-24T09:13:00.000+12:00

As I cram my three kids into our quite large but not large enough car, I shudder to think if the loony greenies will ever succeed in making these cars compulsory.....

(Apologies, can't find the source)

The Smart Car

The Smorvette

The Smaudi A3 AWD

The Smamborghini

The Smorsche

The Smerrari

The Smustang

Wowser alert! Destroy all those cute photos of the kids!!!!

2009-09-23T08:38:00.000+12:00

Because invariably (at least in my case) the cutest photos seem to involve the kids doing things in stages of undress. Such as playing in a paddling pool, or playing with the garden hose, or playing on the beach, or - and I seem to have a lot of these because it's one of the few times the kids are clean and wholesome looking - playing in the bath.

Clearly, by having these photos of my 3 boys (aged 4, 3 and 1) playing in the bath, I am fulfilling a depraved need of mine to partake in pornographic exploits. If you look really closely, genitalia is exposed. At times, not only is there indecent exposure, but the boys are hugging each other. They are touching and naked.

I'm considering destroying these photos because of this: http://www.abc15.com/content/news/westvalley/peoria/story/Valley-couple-sues-Wal-Mart-after-kids-get-taken/pbLlMgUyukGjWhUsTuCyHg.cspx. A couple in Phoenix, Arizona, had their 3 daughters, aged 5, 4 and 1, taken away from them for a month into child protection care after a Wal Mart employee dobbed them into authorities when he/she noticed these prints when developing the family's holiday photos.

To prove a point, all 3 girls were given medical examinations. Funnily enough, the taking of photos of the children in the bath did not manifest itself in physical signs of sexual abuse.

The children were returned to their parents, but it took a court order for that to happen. And the police, child protection agency, and Wal Mart are unrepentant for their actions. Naturally, the parents are suing the police, the child protection agency and Walmart, and while I normally scoff at the ease with which people sue in the US, I hope they win, and win lots. And the wowsers who put the family through this should be sacked, and forced to watch child pornography videos so that they LEARN THE BLOODY DIFFERENCE.

What the hell has happened to boring old common sense??? When did photos of happy, partly clad children become child pornography? Do people not know the difference between taking innocent photos of partly clad children and taking photos of violated children?

The irony of this is the current Wal Mart television commercial shows a scene where a child is stepping out of the bath into the soft towel that her mother is holding up for her. If you slow the commercial down, you can see a glimpse of the little girls breast. I hope Wal Mart is going to hand itself over to the authorities immediately.

How long do you reckon before this lunacy hits NZ?

Theft....ism

2009-09-22T21:55:00.000+12:00

Inspired by http://pc.blogspot.com/2009/09/roast-him.html

Bill English calls for a person with vision to lead New Zealand out of the certain Armageddon that has befallen us over the lack of understanding over his entitlement.

Surely, we already have such a messiah: Bill English himself begorrah.

So, blow that bugle, Bill: we, the little people, await your clarion call to lead us into a new visionary destiny that forever after will be hailed by awestruck historians as the golden age of Englishism Socialism Perkism Entitlementism Bolloxism Theft.