Comments for the "The Guardian's "Responsible Journalism" on Child Welfare" ANM Article

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Comments for the "How not to be Moderate" ANM Article

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Breaking the habit of a lifetime.

Ok so it's nearly Christmas, and that's maybe not the best time to be having an operation, especially on my left foot when the other one isn't all that pain free, but when I was offered two dates one before Christmas and one in January, and after nonchalantly trying to take the "after all the festivities" approach for five minutes I just realised there was no point waiting.  I just couldn't use that foot anymore, because it just wouldn't work.  So I've finally (I hope) been and got it done.  Under the plaster, the middle three bones have been sawn through in two places, shortened by about 4mm and now have titanium plates on.

Humanism Is As Humanists Do.

Many of the people I interact

with on Twitter rightly address issues of accountability and lack of it within institutions and especially within the NHS.

On World Mental Health Day

Last year on World Mental Health Day, nearly a year after my mother's death, I wrote a letter of protest to the Deans at Plymouth University which was also a request for help.

Why Whistleblowing Sucks

A chat on Twitter this morning prompted me to jot down a few of my thoughts and experiences in case it's helpful to others trying to define whistleblowing.  There seems to be a lot of back and forth on Twitter about, "oh everyone is a whistleblower now", etc., this is often said in such a way as to disparage someone for looking as if they are seeking to portray themselves as whistleblowing when they are "just" raising concerns, as if whistleblowing is an entertaining new craze.

Comments for the "Skeptical Dilutions" ANM Article

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Comments for the "Can You Spot the Difference" ANM Article

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A Good Fit

The phrase "not a good fit" actually means
 "we expect collateral damage".

A reader of the Stroud News and Journal has asked for my opinion of the building of a new Steiner School for 600 pupils under the free-school scheme.  I wasn't sure my detailed answer would fit into a comment sized chunk I've written my response here.

Comment Massagement

Me, Pat and Steve on 25/09/11
Mum died on 21/10/11.

It's a long while since I've had any time for blogging.  Moving across the world gets you like that but I'm here to post a comment that was left on a blog that claims to be about humanism, although it's hard, given the vitriol and closed-mindedness in evidence there, so see what that might be that is of any use to anyone. I'm posting the comment here simply because three quarters of it was deleted, with the express intention of reputation destruction. (My comment policy is at the end of this post).

Schoolyard Critics

This post is a footnote to my review of Eugene Schwartz' short movie "Recessitation: Bullying in the Waldorf School", which inverts both joke mechanisms and definitions of play and bullying to ridicule the notion of both.

I've reviewed the movie on ANM, because it provides a lot of useful (if inverted) information about Steiner education, and this addendum examines how, in their own critiques of this movie the Steiner critics have continued and extended the inversions used by Schwartz, by which actions they reveal not only a singular lack of ability to self-scrutinise, but also a dangerous lack of awareness of the similarity of their position to the one that they are criticising.