Posts by BenWilson
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PS I thought it might be the child discipline law which transformed me into an ex-lurker :)
I'm tempted to see this as evidence to the contrary to your view that things will blow over. But welcome in from the lurking cold anyway, Julie. Looking forward to more :-)
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I think that will happen. Nothing's going to change if (a) John Key or (b) Labour lead government. Which probably takes us to 2014 and the legislation having been in place for seven years.
I think it's way too early to be sure. Public feeling on smacking isn't going to go away. It's a very far-reaching law change, if followed through to the letter, and the way it's managed by the current government is going to continue to be of interest to a huge chunk of NZers. If they're still lightly smacking their kids for correction, feeling safe because John Key is relaxed about that, they haven't really changed at all, and the 'bring back the smack' crowd will continue to have a sympathetic following.
Strikes me that it's actually quite a cunning position of Key's, from a tactical point of view. If he runs a line that the government isn't actually going to actively prosecute the law as it is writ, then for smackers it's another reason to vote National - because there is no guarantee Labour will do the same if they get back in. But at the same time, there's no point of attack for the anti-smackers, because the law is technically in their favor, and National aren't changing it.
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Latta did strike me as being someone likely to be far more subtle than his show was able (or intended) to show.
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It does pass.
Good to hear. It passed quickly for us, perhaps because the cause of his disability is known, a stroke. Makes it a pretty easy sell that he's not 'normal' in every way.
Dyan
The boy is so upset that he disappears and is finally found crying inconsolably
Cued into the tone perfectly, despite missing the actual meaning?
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There's no nice words, though. I remember "special" being used in a pretty derogatory way many a time. The problem is that the derogation of the term comes from what it is describing. So every term that could ever be come up with will be used in a derogatory way eventually. It's mostly in how it's done, rather than the words used. Tone, non-verbals etc.
I don't really have an acceptable lexicon for discussing my son's issues. Respectful people will cue off the words I use. I'm yet to meet anyone disrespectful. The trickiest is the people who want to say he's 'normal', and seek to find every behavior normal. Which is true to some extent, all kids do all of the same things at some point. They just don't do them as much. It seems to me to devalue the effort and attention which does actually need to be given. Especially when you're pretty sure they're the smacking type.
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Why else would someone cough up ten grand toward a party for a bunch of internet geeks.
I can't remember the advertising...it must have worked. They were advertising Panadol? I felt strangely compelled towards it on Saturday.
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We are not the right demographic and the advertisers know that.
Yes, anyone who threatens that they will not buy something from an advertisement because of offense taken to some buffoonery in a show is probably in the 'too hard' basket. Advertising is meant to slip in under your consciousness, not be something you consciously choose to buy because you liked the show it interrupted.
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I'd have said he was more sharp and angular. Looks and manner.
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I don't think it took any elaboration to figure out it was a polite euphemism for "their brains and mouths are not always on the best of terms", if not "they'd get beaten up in bars a lot if they weren't on radio".
I was wondering if he had some slightly less catastrophic way of discovering 'marginal personalities', short of unleashing them in a bar or on national TV.
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Yeah, I doubt there's a conscious choice of the safety factors, just a feeling of nervousness caused by the perception that things are going too fast, that leads to excessive slowing. People who are stoned a lot (that I know) tend to recalibrate, although that could just be because they don't get so stoned due to tolerance. Hence the troubles with establishing a safe dosage. In truth, there's nothing safe about it, but in the past it was easy to get away with. It might actually continue to be, except in cases of clear impairment - I'm not sold that the cops can tell who's high just by looking at them, except in a profiley kind of way, which is pretty creepy, really. "He's young and brown, he's probably stoned", isn't really how our Force should be thinking.
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