Posts by Lilith __
Last ←Newer Page 1 2 3 4 5 Older→ First
-
Up Front: One, in reply to Ian Dalziel,
rubble-neckers
I’m surprised there aren’t more crashes in Chch caused by people distracted by earthquake damage. Sometimes rubbernecking can be almost involuntary…you’re going on past and you have one of those “Holy crap! Look at that!” moments. Everything keeps changing. Every time we have a large aftershock, damage gets worse. Some buildings have been demolished virtually overnight, leaving disorienting gaps. It’s no wonder we’ve all got concentration and memory problems, when our environment keeps changing all the time.
I agree with Emma and Russell that until you actually stand in front of the devastated CBD you can’t grasp the scale of what’s happened. Photos and video footage don’t convey the scariness of being there and seeing the size of the wrecked buildings and listening to the silence.
When my sister and brother-in-law came up from Dunedin to fetch me a week after the February earthquake, they’d watched all the TV coverage but were completely unprepared for what it was actually like. The things you can’t see in a picture: the sticky, slippery mud, the constant thudding of helicopters, the stink everywhere of sewerage. And driving around the East, how the devastation went on and on and on: every neighbourhood, every street. We went to check on Mum in Sumner and had to detour up Canon Hill because the main road was closed, and I’ve never seen my sister’s face so white; the damage up there was even worse. And when we got to Sumner the sight of our Mum, frail and disabled, without power, water, sewerage, gas or reliable road access, still bravely smiling and saying she would be fine, refusing to leave her home. These aren’t things you forget.
Things aren’t so dramatic now, but if you visit Chch I don’t think you’ll forget the experience.
-
For anyone who hasn’t seen it, the Ministry of Health has a factsheet about post-earthquake stress which is interesting. Chch folk are well aware of “quake brain”: difficulties with memory and concentration that most of us have had. But there are stranger symptoms, including fears and nightmares which seem unrelated to the quakes. Personally, I had a lot of nightmares following Feb 22, and none of them were about quakes. I had my first quake dream a couple of weeks ago! Brains: complicated things. And always nice to know your response isn't actually crazy.
ETA: I spent a long time yesterday trying to convince my 80-year-old Mum that it was OK to be anxious and sad, after 3 major disasters in one year. That things are not anywhere near normal.
-
Up Front: I'll Be in My Bunk, in reply to Emma Hart,
bisexual role models
One thing I always liked about S1 and 2 is how everybody gets partners of various genders (and in some cases, species), and the only concern to the plot is whether they are evil or not.
-
Wow, you watch Torchwood and don't like Gwen, Emma?! That must be very tortuous!
And Sacha, you sound like you don't like ham and cheese?
-
Up Front: I'll Be in My Bunk, in reply to Emma Hart,
guys coming on to Jack’s coat
All that business with the coat gives me BuffyBot flashbacks. Not that that's a bad thing. ;-)
-
Up Front: I'll Be in My Bunk, in reply to Ian Dalziel,
Can I just threadjack briefly to register my dismay at the soulless Americanisation of Torchwood last night…
Oh noes!! Here I was, kicking myself for missing it (and it’s not available on demand, dammit!) Did it suck?
ETA: not that I liked where CoE went (particularly with Jack). Started really well, got so dark and nasty. Also, plot holes. Blehh.
-
Up Front: I'll Be in My Bunk, in reply to Max Rose,
I think arguments from nature, or some imagined “natural state” are a red herring ,
I agree … up to a point. I don’t want to fall into the naturalistic fallacy, but it can be important to recognise that social structures such as the nuclear family are relatively recent inventions. If as some authors suggest, for the vast majority of human history monogamy has not been the norm, then that doesn’t mean we should argue that polyamory is the “natural” or “right” option for all of humanity. But it could be very illuminating.
We can say that humans have used a variety of different social arrangements without calling any of them “natural”. And I’m deeply suspicious of anyone who thinks they know how things were in prehistory. Our knowledge is patchy even about relatively recent historical periods, and misinterpretation is so easy ( Coming of Age in Samoa, anyone?)
I haven’t read Sex at Dawn though, so can’t comment on that.
-
Up Front: I'll Be in My Bunk, in reply to Max Rose,
so many societies have to employ penalties ranging from scarlet letters to stonings in order to enforce martial bliss
I think that's actually about control of paternity: it's always the women who get punished.
There is a remote part of China which has sexual freedom: a woman raises her children in her parental home, with her brother(s) acting as co-parents. Biological fathers don't cohabit, have no rights over their children, and often no involvement with them. But: you can sleep with whoever you want, as long as it's not family. They have very stern prohibitions against incest.
This is not the only possible solution, of course.
-
Up Front: I'll Be in My Bunk, in reply to Lilith __,
oops missed the edit window but wanted to add:
Bagemihl's examples aren't all pretty and nice (and I don't just mean that photo of the masturbating walrus, who at least looks like he's having a good time). There's incest and coercion and sex with young, too. It's not all stuff we want to emulate. Hence what I was saying about natural not being the same as good.
-
I think arguments from nature, or some imagined “natural state” are a red herring, because a) sexual and reproductive arrangements in nature are *very* varied, and it all depends which examples you pick; and b) natural =/= necessarily good. If we’re going to make ethical judgements I think it needs to be along the lines of “does this hurt anyone?” And as Lucy says, context can make all the difference. Polygamy that's out in the open is quite a different thing to polygamy that not all players in a relationship are aware of.
Can I recommend Bruce Bagemihl’s Biological Exuberance: Animal Homosexuality and Natural Diversity as a fascinating read for anyone interested in the sexual practices of animals. Summary: sex really is very complicated! And it’s only partly to do with reproduction. And arguments that any given sex act is or should be reproductive have to go against overwhelming evidence that most sex acts not only don’t end in conception but that they can’t, because either the players aren’t male/female or they aren’t fertile most of the time.