Posts by Keir Leslie
Last ←Newer Page 1 2 3 4 5 Older→ First
-
Hard News: The judge is not helping, in reply to Russell Brown,
But suppose you're a source. You talk to (say) WhaleOil thinking he's a journalist and tell him some things. Turns out (hypothetically) he's actually a paid PR operative on this one, running knowingly defamatory lines for cash. He uses your information to stitch together an attack. How do you tell during the process whether WhaleOil's going to meet the standard for journalism this time round, given it might not be until the end of the process that he himself decides?
-
I don't think Slater is acting as a journalist. I mean, I think it is very clear that Slater has no sense of professional ethics, or any real adherence to standards of behaviour other than his own idiosyncratic (and often repugnant) principles.
-
Legal Beagle: Think it possible that you…, in reply to Jolisa,
“Open-mindedness”, yes, but put the quotation in one of its full contexts: as part of an ultimatum threatening war.
-
Tom Semmens comes from a world where the rich vote Labour and the poor National.
-
Legal Beagle: Think it possible that you…, in reply to Andrew Geddis,
I'm not so worried about the principled argument, because I don't really care, but on the utilitarian argument, I think there's a huge overestimation of how important people like Family First are. When you get down to it, us godless sinners win these fights way more than we lose. Too much of the godless sinner faction lives in a world where we're an weak minority that needs to be perpetually cautious. I don't think "let's not annoy Family First" is anything like a good deal for the godless sinner faction, because even when Family First get angry, we generally win.
Also yeah late captialism unequal power structures the hegemony/patriarchy etc so no sympathy for Willie and JT, but that's surely obvious.
-
For reference, the Labour Policy Platform states at 8.29 that Labour will
Recognise that the problem of personal drug use is primarily a health issue and that the criminal justice system, especially prisons, only makes the problem worse. Labour will reform drug policy so it is evidence based and has harm reduction as its focus.
So I think we can legitimately expect there to be a clear move towards an evidence based, harm reduction approach from Labour.
-
Rachel and Stephen are definitely right on "oh no teh demotion of menz" issue. But it's also true that, over the long term, we can't rely on the list to balance out an imbalanced electorate caucus, and that's (one reason) why chucking female only selections under the bus was an atrocious idea.
-
Hard News: Narcissists and bullies, in reply to ScottY,
In general, defences are, once raised, required to be negatived beyond a reasonable doubt by the prosecution. If the evidence is inconclusive (or even merely tending against them), then the defendant has established reasonable doubt, and should be acquitted.
Exceptions are insanity, regulatory, and when there’s an explicit reversal of the burden of proof in the statute.
[On the actual subject of the matter, to be blunt I have no idea what on earth the cops were playing at here, but there's got be some kind of inquiry into this stuff. The cops/justice system have a crappy attitude towards women and then then they plead helplessness when this results in women not wanting to engage? Nahhh.]
-
Hard News: Mega Strange, in reply to BenWilson,
I think there's two things. The first is that I'm sure you can learn calculus from a fifty year old book, but could you teach it to 300 first years from a fifty year old book?; and, secondly, you'd find a surprising degree of vehemence and anger on the issue of maths pedagogy over the previous century and I suspect there are many mathematicians who'd assert that certain periods and theories produced texts that were totally unsuitable...
I definitely agree textbook publishing's a racket and the prices are outrageous.
-
You know, it's kinda absurd to assert blithely that calculus textbooks today are the same as they were a hundred years ago. Most calculus textbooks these days, like it or not, are part of a much different pedagogical framework than they were even fifty years ago. I agree textbook publishing's a corrupt rort, but let's not over egg it.