Hard News: Just shoot me
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I think an elephant that behaves thusly has rather forfeited its right to privacy. On the other hand, the poor elephant (if it indeed existed) was allegedly in a state of, shall we say, hormonal rage, and was thus not guilty by reason of being completely off its nut. Complicated situation.
Latest from David Garrett: the musth defence is an insult to victims, we're too hung up on animal rights, and the elephant's early death is a win for the community. New "Three Strikes On Your Mahout" bill will give delinquent elephants something to really remember.
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Oho. Next they'll be trumpeting pachyderm rights. It's political correctness gone mad!
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I actually think Packer's right -- if you're going to claim authority (whether it's through your persona as a fearless teller of "unpleasant facts" or having your musings printed in a major metropolitan daily) then you don't get to sex your copy up (to coin a phrase).
That's what's bugging me about the inaccuracies in Underbelly:Mr Aisia - they didn't need to sex it up. The true story is amazing enough.
The premiere last week is a reasonable dramatic piece of fiction, but I'm with Pat Booth - you can't call it a true story if it didn't happen.
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Interesting piece by Booth, Mark, but once more I had to cringe a little on reading stuff like this:
Why begin the torment all over for parents who see their children vilified once more, as if their original grief was not enough, or rebrand someone stupid in the past but who has rehabilitated themselves since?
I can't imagine Pat Booth ever suffering from an irony-deficiency...
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You may very well think that, I couldn't possibly comment. ;-)
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Correlation is all it is. What is true is that those users who go on to develop Schizophrenia tend to use most heavily, which is most likely an attempt at self medication.
I wasn't suggesting cause and effect. Only that he may be a heavy user because he's ill. It would be a sad thing if drug use and the attendant fuss led to lack of recognition of other health issues.
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By the Myersons' own account, they decided that it was Jake's fault her novel was ailing, and that therefore he should be co-opted in to fix the narrative -- kicking, screaming and consulting lawyers if necessary. I think she quite clearly lied about the degree of consent obtained.
This is pretty bizarre and cruel, and I think will be quite hard for their son Jake to forgive.
And if this doesn't qualify the Myersons as bad parents, I don't know what does.I don't doubt Jake was acting like a difficult, angry teenager, who by the sounds of it, was also depressed. But if a kid is angry and depressed, there will be reasons why.
I thought it was kind of sad that in Jake's interview he described how good his mother had been to him when he was little, as she'd "given him wonderful presents". Wonderful presents mean rich parents, not good parents.
Parents are there to teach their children how to be adults. When I think of the best things my parents did it's more to do with how gentle or sensible they were as the situations required, not all the great bikes, ski equipment and electronics they bought me.
When boomer parents complain of their lazy, dishonest children I tend to think if they failed to teach their children to work hard and be honest, then it's far better the parents cope with the results, rather than flatmates, employers and society at large.
Many boomers complain bitterly about their kids, but they tend to be people who didn't impose limits or teach consequences. A full blown toddler tantrum was met with soothing and trying to meet the "demands" of a screaming two year old.
Two year olds don't need their demands met, they need their needs met. And if they are throwing a tantrum they need to be ignored until they get the message that tantrum throwing will not get them what they want. I can't believe these people who appeased tantrums for years are now surprised their adult children are still throwing tantrums.
While none of my friends violated their kids' privacy by writing personal and damaging things about them, they often acted as though their kid was a toy or pet or something. I can remember being uncomfortable when one friend would always insist her children kiss guests goodnight, and I'd always feebly suggest this should surely be left up to the child to decide? And others who would invite me to feel their child's soft hair, and I'd think, gee, they are bound to be an actual person who might not want their head stroked by some random lady. These people who are most bitter now were always the same people who were most in love with the idea of being a perfect parent with the perfect child, and they approached their role with a mixture of over-sweet praise and fussing and an attitude that the kid was somehow not inhabited by a sentient being that might have feelings of its own. It made me think of a line in that JD Salinger story, Teddy about a 10 year old genius who narrates the story, saying something like "my parents have no idea who I am, but they have a very clear idea how they want me to be, and beyond that they have no interest in me at all as a person".
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It made me think of a line in that JD Salinger story, Teddy about a 10 year old genius who narrates the story, saying something like "my parents have no idea who I am, but they have a very clear idea how they want me to be, and beyond that they have no interest in me at all as a person".
I no longer order the chicken and chips, largely because I am now vegetarian — our children have never tasted meat, though we all eat fish. Giving up meat was the first step on what has become, for the Myersons, a manifesto to eat well. We believe that our children’s future lives will be moulded as forcefully by their eating habits as by their education. We are determined that, along with their four As at A level, they also reach maturity with a desire for fresh food, varied food, healthy food.
Ouch.
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Wonderful presents mean rich parents, not good parents.
Not necessarily. Could just be thoughtful. One of my girls told me she remembered one of her best presents: a homemade pair of jungle print boxer shorts and a matching pair, with tail hole, for Bunky the monkey.
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. We are determined that, along with their four As at A level, they also reach maturity with a desire for fresh food, varied food, healthy food.
Ouch.Well, the guy sounds disturbingly zealous, but I agree with him about the importance of getting kids to maturity with a desire for fresh, varied food. He doesn't sound like they made food very enjoyable though.
But some of the worst boomers parents I know raised very unhappy and now morbidly obese adults who were given anything (literally) they wanted to eat as children. Unfortunately for them, they wanted Boston cream pie and Macdonalds food all the time. As young adults with seriously compromised physical and mental health, they still exist on a diet of sugar, fat and preservatives.
She refused to let us have a lot of food marketed to kids, insanely popular breakfast food in the 1960s.
I thought she was pretty mean not to buy me these, but in hindsight keeping Frosted Pop Tarts, Coco Pops, Trix, Lucky Charms and Cap'n Crunch off the breakfast menu was probably one of the best things she ever did for me.
Though my Mum never, ever made us eat food we didn't want she wouldn't give us anything else either. Eat or starve, we were free to choose. She worried, but as my paediatrician told her, no child ever starved itself to death. That said, he also gave her a stack of recipes (some I still make) designed to fatten up underweight children.
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Well, the guy sounds disturbingly zealous, but I agree with him about the importance of getting kids to maturity with a desire for fresh, varied food.
It was the "along with their four As at A level" that got me more.
Having long since been obliged to come to terms with the difference between parental dreams and real children, that kind of jumped out at me.
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She refused to let us have a lot of food marketed to kids, insanely popular breakfast food in the 1960s.
Er, my paragraphs were in the wrong order there.
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It was the "along with their four As at A level" that got me more.
I'm not quite sure what that meant. Graduating high school? Getting a scholarship? Not sure.
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I'm not quite sure what that meant. Graduating high school? Getting a scholarship? Not sure.
The Advanced Level exam is the elite qualification in Britain's secondary education system. Merely obtaining four A-Levels (the most that can be taken at most schools) would be the mark of a superior student. An A in every subject is ... ambitious.
But no pressure, kids ...
(Yes, I do feel weird casting aspersions on people I've never met and only recently heard of, but ...)
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Two year olds don't need their demands met, they need their needs met. And if they are throwing a tantrum they need to be ignored until they get the message that tantrum throwing will not get them what they want. I can't believe these people who appeased tantrums for years are now surprised their adult children are still throwing tantrums.
That is absolutely true. Years ago we got a new colleague at work, small, curvy and French. She then proceeded to flutter her eyelashes and throw tantrums to try and get what she wanted NOW. The other guy in the lab who was married with a toddler and I, married been there, done that, took one look at this and ignored her. Or course we instantly earned her eternal enmity which we met with studied politeness.
She had no idea what to do with men she couldn't either brush aside or wrap around her little finger. Other women she simply ignored as much as possible. I would blame the parents in spades.
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The Advanced Level exam is the elite qualification in Britain's secondary education system. Merely obtaining four A-Levels (the most that can be taken at most schools) would be the mark of a superior student. An A in every subject is ... ambitious.
Well firstly you can now get A* grades, introduced because the universities complained they could not discriminate with the hordes of applicants with 4 A's at A Level. Many of the Public Schools are now doing things like the Baccalaureate and something else I forget.
Grade inflation or better candidates? Bits of both and lots of teaching to the test which produces students who can't think for themselves. Hell many can't use the language properly, I know, I marked their essays. Also in our seminars we said things, these days they sit there and refuse to respond. If you pick one of them to answer you get 'why are you picking on me?' thrown back at you in a panicky voice. All this in courses you couldn't get into without good grades.
The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence is true when it comes to educational systems as any other thing in life.
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Also bear in mind that the A-Level exams are run by a variety of boards, now all private companies. There may be one curriculum but there are many A-Level exams. So if someone is pushing A-Level exams in NZ it is because they will be making money from it.
One of the consequences of this privatisation is the markers are paid less than they used to be so they get monkeys who can only tick boxes. The youngest once complained that she kept getting the short questions on a Biology worksheet wrong but she couldn't see why. She showed it to me (Biology PhD) and her answers were 100% correct. On consulting the teacher with this she was told that that was all beside the point. Which was that the markers could only mark the 'approved form of words' which had to be rote learned.
It is no mystery why modern students can't think for themselves, they have had it squeezed out of them by a system that measures only outcomes and is not bothered about process or what isn't measured.
Part of it is the drive for so many to go to university, but that is not the whole story. Just beware of assuming anything from overseas must be better.
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The youngest once complained that she kept getting the short questions on a Biology worksheet wrong but she couldn't see why. She showed it to me (Biology PhD) and her answers were 100% correct. On consulting the teacher with this she was told that that was all beside the point. Which was that the markers could only mark the 'approved form of words' which had to be rote learned.
My god, how maddening, how nuts. I was fortunate enough to have a 1st year bio prof who was intent on teaching us the difference between learning and remembering, and would deliberately phrase questions quite differently than the material we learned. So I carefully learned Oparin's theory as proven by Miller, and was completely thrown when faced with an exam question that read: "Describe abiotic synthesis" Huh? I had no idea and lost 20% of my mark. Which I thought was both fair and valuable, even at the time.
My sister was studying physics in her first year of university, and was faced with a question involving a dolly, a gradient and a weight. A dolly she thought? How strange, and poor dolly. Surely a toy car would be better...
Like me she left the question unanswered and also learned a valuable lesson that day... -
It is no mystery why modern students can't think for themselves, they have had it squeezed out of them by a system that measures only outcomes and is not bothered about process or what isn't measured.
Part of it is the drive for so many to go to university, but that is not the whole story. Just beware of assuming anything from overseas must be better.
that answer is CORRECT.
(the metaphor i usually think of involves pulverising natural curiosity and creativity by means of a shoe heel being driven into the dusty ground)
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Jonathan Myerson has now weighed in with a piece in The Guardian.
I'm saying nothing.
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Your problem starts when your child smokes his first skunk.
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Meanwhile, +1 for the Guardian's page impressions from me, one little step closer to more of the same...
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Jonathan Myerson has now weighed in with a piece in The Guardian.
Myerson sure comes across as dishonest, self serving and eager to abdicate his own responsibility as a father.
If he thinks pot smoking is the reason his son is alienated, angry and unmotivated he should read up on people like Kary Mullis and Richard Feynman who managed to combine pot smoking with Nobel prize winning.
Alienated slackers have always existed. Ivan Goncharov created an annoying sofa-bound whining slacker in his very funny satirical novel Oblomov. And of course there is Branwell Bronte, the drunk, opium smoking, self-pitying and unsuccessful brother of the more motivated and successful members of the Bronte clan.
Unmotivated, alienated slackers often wind up substance abusers, but the unmotivated alienated part is almost always the result of being over-indulged as children. Like Branwell they are told they are remarkable, brilliant, wonderful and are never held accountable for their failings and never given any responsibility. When they grow up they have no ability to control their tempers, set goals or apply themselves to work.
Sima Urale has made a wonderful movie Apron Strings that beautifully illustrates the dynamic.
If the Myersons don't like how their son Jake has turned out, they should look at their actions as parents, not try to find reasons other than their own failure to raise their children.
The most toxic thing in that Jonathan Myerson article is the way he blames Jake for his younger children's behaviour. If he's looking for someone to blame for the fact that his son is unable to take responsibility for his actions, then he should have a damn good look in the mirror.
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The most toxic thing in that Jonathan Myerson article is the way he blames Jake for his younger children's behaviour.
Between them, I wouldn't be surprised if the Myersons blamed Jake for global warming ...
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Between them, I wouldn't be surprised if the Myersons blamed Jake for global warming ...
. . . whereas to anyone with the good sense to be born after ca. 1959 it's plain that global warming, along with whatever other pressing issues you might fancy, is all due to the self-absorbed narcissism of those *%#&$ boomers.
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First review of the book itself, rather than just the people involved, at the Guardian.
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