tomorrow's punditry, today

Following Alan Johnson's speech on the government's "bias free" policy on family and parenting, here's a little reminder of what happened last time.

a few leading questions from the daily express

The Daily Express invites you to Have Your Say on the top stories of the day, invoking some of the very best loaded and rhetorical questions. My personal favourites are "Should illegal immigrants be free to roam Britain?', 'Should we let Europe scrap our traditions?' and 'Should Muslims tell us how to run schools?' Isn't it nice how we're being given a little help with our opinions?

Strangely absent is the question 'Should illegal immigrant Muslims roam freely through our school traditions?'

career women and "defying nature"

While there's no denying that pregnancy later in life carries more potential health risks, this kind of language is misleading:

Doctors have warned that modern career women who delay starting a family until into their 30s are defying nature and risking heartbreak because older women have an increased chance of suffering health problems, ranging from high blood pressure to diabetes and birth defects.

Why is that career women who wait to have children are defying nature? If they don't work, is this in compliance with nature's plan?

Should obedience to "nature" then require women to avoid work and put breeding first, at all costs? And why is this defying nature at all when the majority of such women are perfectly fertile and seemingly able to bear children without serious health risks?

The side-step from cultural values to biology is completed when the language changes later in the article to argue that "the 'biologically optimal' time for childbearing is 20 to 30," a claim of a rather different order to the defiance of nature.

Adding to the stupidity of the casual claim to speak for "nature" is the inability to differentiate between different kinds of risk (are birth defects equally as likely, or as dangerous as high blood pressure?) and the absence of proportion: just how high are the risks, compared to my 20 year old self? Does the risk increase overnight on my 30th birthday?

So, let's try and put some numbers to the scaremongering: check back later in the week to see what we can find.

methinks the archbishop doth protest too much

Snort:

The Anglican Church appears to the outside world and to many of its own members, to be "obsessed with sex", the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, admitted to the General Synod yesterday.

But the Archbishop argued that its bitter and prolonged dispute over homosexuality touched deeper issues, such as the way the worldwide Communion dealt with profound differences, which could not be easily avoided.

Deeper issues, such as whether it's enough to shun the deadly deadly homos, or if they need to be pursued with fiery brands.

Seriously, if you're part of a church which is perpetually on the edge of a split over the question of what consenting adults do in bed together, then pretending you're not obsessed with sex is a losing game. You might not like how your religion is dominated by this issue, but it's pretty much a bed of your own making. Sure, it would be great if sex wasn't being used as a moral cosh, but there are a couple of hundred years of "Christian" tradition which suggest otherwise.

sex education and the faith-based clitoris

A Daily Mail story on sex education: are we finally going to talk about the issue like adults, without all the hysteria?

Outcry over explicit sex education video shown to five-year-olds

*sigh* Alright, we'll do this instead, then. What's being shown that's so explicit?

In the video youngsters are told that "rubbing the clitoris will give them a warm feeling".

I admit I'm part of the internet generation but that's explicit? I'm not even sure it passes muster as "detailed."

Rather wonderfully, the headmaster of the primary school in question seems to have been unrattled by the Mail - and conscious of their tendency to quote-mine:

Headmaster Mr Hughes said: "We are revising our sex education policy because girls are maturing earlier.

"Out of context saying we are teaching four or five year olds about touching their clitoris sounds shocking. But in the context of the video it is taught well and is not offensive. It will go over the heads of most, but some children will understand it."

And the size of the outcry?

Of 180 parents shown the video, eight were worried the children were being taught too early, and two were specifically concerned over the description of female genitalia.

Leaving female genitalia undescribed doesn't actually make it go away, though. I also see that Concerned Parents Who Sound Exactly Like Mail Journalists are able to raise their own straw-man arguments:

"Teaching my daughter about her clitoris is not going to stop teenage pregnancies. It's liberal clap-trap."

Not that anyone is making that claim, of course - though I like the idea that the discovery of one clitoris would somehow reduce teen pregnancies within a ten mile radius.

Still, it's bluster that skids past the idea that children who are comfortable with their bodies might become young adults who are better placed to make decisions about that body because they're not racked with fear and guilt - choices that include the decision to not have sex, and the decision to have safe sex.

I'm also slightly confused by the objection from one family on the grounds that they are Christian - though it does leave a gap for a joke about a faith-based clitoris right about here. Seriously, when did parts of the body get so threatening?

(Oh, and I think I've discovered that blogger's post by email function has a discrete filter than holds posts with certain words in the title.. need to experiment a little to prove it, though.)

those "impermissible donations"

Here's a little interesting context for the story that UKIP may be forced to forfeit £367,697 of "impermissible" donations because the donor was not on the electoral role. From the independent Electoral Commission's quarterly report:

Parties are responsible for checking the permissibility of donations and returning any which are not from a permissible source within 30 days. This quarter, the Conservative Party reported that it had returned three impermissible donations worth £1,250, and the Liberal Democrats reported that they had returned two impermissible donations amounting to £300.

In all cases, the donations were returned because the donors were not on the electoral register at the time the donations were made. Since 2001, 58 impermissible donations totalling £66,700 received by six parties, have been reported to the Commission as being returned within the 30 days required by law.

While this demonstrates that the law relating to impermissible donations is being observed by the major political parties*, it also shows how UKIP's £370,000 problem dwarfs the sum total returned since 2001 when records began. So, proof of a level playing field, or proof of a disproportionate vendetta? Let the spin begin!

(EDIT - *this instance being the doily of modesty on the brothel tea-tray of electoral finance.)

the politics of marriage

The question of whether government should "champion marriage" or not seems to be one of those issues where the shrieking accusation of "social engineering" is strangely absent. I'll make a small bet here that the same restraint will not be directed towards the government's impending publication of a "parenting strategy."

That said, this debate seems to be often reduced to polarised positions: do you love or hate marriage? Are you in favour of the family, or not? The advance excerpts from education secretary Alan Johnson's speech seems to attempt to side-step that debate by being in favour of nothing at all:

'Family policy must be bias-free - to express it in a more Clintonesque manner, "It's the parenting, stupid". Not all children from married couples fare well, and other family structures are not irretrievably doomed to fail.'

The words "bias-free" are going to trigger a thousand opinion pieces; at the very least, Johnson is going to be read as dangerously close to arguing that the structure of a family has a minimal effect on the children raised within it. The seeming assumption that marriage is "value free" is going to raise some major hackles: while the quality of parenting is not confirmed by marriage, that's a a different claim from the idea that there's no connection at all.

Though we'll know more when the speech is given, he seems to making the argument that as marriage does not have an exclusive or wholly reliable claim on the best environment for children, we should not favour it exclusively. To do so, the argument follows, would be to unfairly discriminate against unmarried families who also do well, and add to existing social prejudices that surround single parent families.

I supposed we're dealing with two issues - the first is what effect different social structures have on the upbringing of children, and the second is the question of what kind of steps government should take to encourage (or enforce) those structures.

One of the problems here, I think, is that this issue cuts across a series of policy areas - including, for example, the question of welfare support for single parents, which in some circumstances is higher than for two parent families and therefore - so this argument goes - creates a disincentive to marriage or even co-habitation.

Also still floating around in the void is the question of whether the proposed Tory tax breaks for married couples will include same-sex couples or - if this is an argument about supporting families, not just marriage - whether childless couples will also benefit.

the hpv vaccine and male health

After months of stories repeating the "concern" that vaccinating girls for cervical cancer would encourage sexual promiscuity (and a smaller number of stories indicating that almost no-one actually believes this), the HPV vaccine - Gardasil - was licensed in the UK.

Though the vaccination of young men against HPV has been something of a side-issue - and one presented without dire warnings that this would turn them into sluts - research has long suggested the link between HPV and cancer of the penis, as well as anal cancer and penile warts.

Yet, though there's seemingly been a lack of interest when it comes to straight male health on this count, there's news of clinics selling the HPV vaccine to gay men:

Dr Sean Cummings at the Freedom Health clinic in Harley Street, where dozens of men have had the jab, said he was happy to recommend Gardasil to his adult men, at £450 for a three-dose course.

"We've had a strong demand for it. I had a man come in for the vaccine this morning. He was 24. Then I have one this afternoon who is 67 years old. The motivation is to protect themselves and to prevent spreading HPV to their partners."

Opponents say there is no point in immunising people who are already sexually active. But Dr Paul Fox, a genito-urinary medicine expert at the Chelsea and Westminster and Ealing hospitals, believes it can be worthwhile.

He argues that it is unlikely a person will have encountered all of the four strains of HPV found in Gardasil, including the two linked to cancers, even if they are leading a very promiscuous sex life.

However, general stupidity about sex and sexuality might be about to bite back:

Roger Peabody of the Terrence Higgins Trust said if the trials were successful, there would be a good case for vaccinating young boys, not only to stop the spread of HPV to women, but to protect men against HPV-related disease.

Dr Szarewski agreed, saying: "It is bad enough suggesting to people that their 12-year-old daughter might need a vaccine against a sexually transmitted infection.

"I would be interested to see the response of suggesting to parents that they should vaccinate their boys at 12 in case they become gay."

She said heterosexual men and women also risked anal cancer.

Given that cancer doesn't care whether you are straight or gay, it's an argument that detracts from the real case for HPV vaccination - not merely to protect individuals from developing cancer, but to prevent the virus from being passed on.

While there are always going to be a fringe of crazy people who prefer cancer to anything to do with sex, can we please agree that those attitudes can and should be safely ignored when it comes to public health policy?

daily mail to blame for drop in marriage rates?

Two features currently running the Daily Mail's femail section. First, "Who'd be a modern man?":

"Men today might be responsible for a lot more than making sure that the mortgage is paid and there's food on the table," said one. "And why shouldn't they be? My father never lifted a finger except to occasionally do the washing- up. Why shouldn't men pull their weight at home?"

Fair enough. Most men I know wouldn't want it any other way. They view their marriages as a partnership in which financial, domestic and child-rearing duties are shared. Men cook and do the laundry, they work, and they look after the kids.

And then there's "Why marriage can be a chore for women":

When a woman is single, ironing, cleaning, cooking and other duties take up about ten hours a week. But after they are married, or have simply moved in with a boyfriend, they typically do 15 hours of housework every week, according to a report in the latest edition of Economic Journal.

For men, the effect is opposite.

Now that's what I call a sales pitch.

now that's what I call snark

You have to respect the effort it takes to do this:

To become a fully fledged Brownite you first enter a darkened room, led by the keeper of the Holy Whelan and are blindfolded with a tablecloth from Granita. Before an image of the all-seeing eye of Gordon you swear to abjure the evil lord Lynton and all his works.

If you repeat the oath of eternal loyalty without a flaw, the secret words of power are whispered into your ears. As the cult repeat "Neo-endogenous macro-Economic Growth" again and again in an ever rising pitch, the high priest intones that you are a now a Brownite, and shall take thy orders from the king over the water, and none other.

You are then given a code name. Mine is fiscal framework. Then, eyes blinking, you are expelled into the bright light of day, sworn never to repeat the secrets you have learnt that day. You are told nothing else but to await the day when you will be needed.

The blogwar is dead; long live the blogwar!

my non-spider sense

My hack journalism radar is going off: can anyone find the report that this education story is based on? I can't find anything on either the MORI or the DfES websites, though I might be jumping the gun a little..

marriage not religious for majority

A detail missing from coverage of the downward trend in marriage rates is that more and more people who are getting married choose non-religious ceremonies. From the ONS:

Since 1992, there have been more civil marriage ceremonies in England and Wales than religious ceremonies. In 2005, 65 per cent of marriages were solemnised by civil ceremonies.

So, can we please stop going to religious leaders for the final comment on marriage?

As discussed in previous "ordinary people to blame for social change" posts (see here and here), a major part of this trend is that people are waiting until they are older to get married: on average, 36 for men and 33 for women.

"natural family planning" and real-world contraception

The reports of research that "a natural family planning method is as effective as the contraceptive pill" have almost consistently ignored the particular advantages offered by the pill and barrier methods, while seemingly downplaying the specific conditions for success demanded by natural methods.
Also largely absent is the explicit recognition that "natural methods" are only useful if you are willing or able to plan ahead and abstain from sex when you think you are fertile - whereas condoms and the pill work throughout the month.

Let's start with the proviso offered by the BBC:

UK experts said natural family planning was effective - provided it was taught properly and carried out correctly.

Okay - so what does that involve? Here's The Scotsman's version of the "sympto-thermal" method:

The system predicts the woman's fertile phase through measuring temperature and examining cervical secretions, which vary according to the stage of the menstrual cycle.

The BBC's version goes into more detail of how a woman is supposed to monitor her fertility:

Start of fertile period:

The first fertile day is when the woman first identifies either: 1) first appearance or change of appearance of cervical secretion, or 2) the sixth day of the cycle.

After 12 cycles, this second guideline is replaced by a calculation that subtracts seven days from the earliest day to show a temperature rise in the preceding 12 cycles.

End of fertile period:

The fertile phase ends after the woman has identified: 1) the evening of the third day after the cervical secretion peak day, and 2) the evening when the woman measures the third higher temperature reading, with all three being higher than the previous six readings and the last one being 0.2 degrees Celsius higher than the previous six.

With further detail about detecting changes in cervical secretions:

The amount of the hormones oestrogen and progesterone varies in the menstrual cycle, which alters the quantity and the consistency of cervical mucus.

Just before ovulation the secretions become clearer, wetter, stretchy and slippery, like raw egg white.

Anyone spotting the problem here?

While any form of reliable contraception is good news (though this is another form which is exclusively about the management of female fertility), this doesn't sounds like a method which is as convenient or easy to learn as the alternatives. That's not to say that the techniques can't be learnt, but that it's far from a simple alternative - and that the relative complexity of this method may prove its weakness in real sex lives.

The true test of this method's reliability will come when - as we've already seen with the pill and barrier methods - we see the consequences of real people using the technique in every day life i.e. without necessarily respecting the very strict rules which determine this method's success.

The incredibly uncritical report that "natural methods are as effective as the contraceptive pill" is unhelpful because it presumes that the conditions of a controlled test will be replicated in the real world - and if there's one thing we know about contraceptive use, that's rarely (if ever) the case.

Oh, the idea already being floated that critics of the Catholic Church's stance on contraception should now "eat their words" because the Pope "was right" is ridiculous. It ignores the fact that the main problem with that Catholic stance is the demand that only "natural" methods be used, even when other more convenient alternatives (ones that don't involve a calendar and monitoring changes in basal body temperature and cervical mucus) are available.

The idea that the Catholic Church's preference for "natural" methods is somehow proof of their enlightened knowledge of contraception is quite extraordinary, given their general attitude towards sex is that it should be for procreation and not recreation.

edinburgh PFC to close

Following on from the Sunday Mail's hit-piece on the Edinburgh Protein Fractionation Centre (discussed yesterday), there's this news:

BLOOD PLANT SET TO CLOSE
SCOTLAND'S only blood products plant is to close, it was announced yesterday. The Protein Fractionation Centre, in Edinburgh, was up for sale but no buyer has been found.

All 145 staff were told the plant will close within a year.

Strangely, the Daily Record didn't find time to comment on the closure of a Scottish source of vital "life-saving" products, aided in some measure by the hackery of their sister newspaper The Sunday Mail.

those blogwars

In case anyone's having trouble with their brain, pointing out hypocrisy on "the right" is absolutely not the same thing as denying or excusing hypocrisy on "the left." As it happens, the ability to be a highly selective, self-serving hypocrite is not reserved for any single political group.

Consequently, you can find the snug relationship between groups with "charitable" status and political parties unedifying regardless of their affiliation. If it makes you feel good, please engage in the kabuki of claiming people who make this argument are the undercover operatives of the Other Party but don't expect me to take you seriously.

widgetry

My RSS comment feed seems to have fudged itself, so I'm removing the widget. Anyone having problems with their feed? It used to show recent comments but now seems to be stuck on July of last year:

http://rhetoricallyspeaking.blogspot.com/feeds/comments/full

patricia hewitt's budget dumb-show

Following on from Blair's patronising suggestion that surgeries should merely operate for longer hours (with no mention of that might be paid for), we have the nonsense of the NHS' balanced budget :

NHS bosses said overall the health service will break even - as promised by Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt.

Health chiefs have built a contingency fund by making savings from training and public health budgets, and holding back money due to the NHS this year. Three-quarter year forecasts show that the health service will finish £13m in surplus.

But this masks the increasing deficits hospitals and PCTs are predicting - up from £1.2bn three months ago to £1.3bn. Financial balance can only be achieved by taking money from elsewhere and using the small surpluses some trusts are running up.

So deficits are increasing, and training and public health budgets (one of the very things that might help reduce the load on the NHS) are being cut in order to meet an arbitrary, short term target. Why? So that we can all witness the mindless dumb-show of the health secretary announcing that the health service has broken even.

Bra-fucking-vo.

white hot catholic lovin'

Libby Purves' despair at the Catholic Church's obsession with her, your and my genitals is worth a read, though desiring that this wasn't the case does rather demand that the Catholic Church pretty much stop being the Catholic Church.

A desire to control of the sex lives of consenting adults seems to have become more than just a strong feature of the faith - recent months have seen bishops actively arguing that sexual morality (especially when it comes to the deadly, deadly homo) is the rock on which the whole Church is built.

Oh, and insert joke about Peter here.

bad blood: the sunday mail smears the edinburgh PFC (updated)

Last week's Glasgow Sunday Mail carried a masterpiece in bad science writing - claiming that millions of pounds worth of blood has been poured down the drain by staff at the Edinburgh Protein Fractionation Centre (PFC). It's a solid hack job that's probably going to have consequences for the current attempts to sell the PFC to a private company. This post is a little dry in places, but please stick with it.

The confusion starts with the definition of blood, referred to variously as "blood," "blood plasma," "blood products" and "blood and products" even though the terms are far from interchangeable. At the very least, there's a major difference between blood - the red stuff taken from your arm during donation - and the yellowy liquid plasma which is one of the major components of blood.

It also helps to remember that the plasma in this story was imported from the US and Europe (as has been the practice since the 90s) and has nothing to do with blood donated by the Scottish general public.

The central narrative seems to be that ill-defined blood products are being brought into the centre only to be flushed down the drain - with a confusing side-claim that some of the blood is going to British soldiers even though it's "not good enough for the NHS." It's a combination of inaccuracy and outright fabrication. Let's start with an example of that toxic mix:

The Protein Fractionation Centre in Edinburgh said the blood treatments had run out of date while under a quarantine order after the centre failed a heath check. But incredibly, although the blood stock is classed as not fit for NHS patients, they are still contracted to supply our frontline troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The fact that the PFC might have a contract to supply the armed forces is a red herring, introduced here to smear the PFC by suggesting they have lax standards when it comes to the military.

This assertion ignores - or is ignorant of - the fact that any disputed products supplied to the Ministry of Defence would have been done so under the terms of concessionary release. The Blood Transfusion Service's guidelines describe how "components which do not comply with the specification for mandatory tests" can be issued for therapeutic use with the consent of a doctor who has understood any risks that are involved.

In other words, a doctor is allowed to make the decision as to whether something is safe to use or not; it's not difficult to understand how medics working in a war zone might be prepared to make that kind of judgement calls when the alternative might be denying treatment to the seriously wounded. In non-urgent, civilian circumstances, a different standard prevails.

Also of importance is the detail that products were quarantined as matter of precautionary best practice when an inspection by the Medicines and Healthcare Regulatory Agency (MHRA) in January 2006 identified a need to upgrade systems and procedures at the PFC. Subsequent risk assessments of products produced by the PFC did not identify any significant risks to product safety (see Andy Kerr's answers in the Scottish Parliament to that effect here).

The Mail overrides this detail to compound the confusion by claiming that the destruction of quarantined materials is proof of senseless waste, even though the rationale for that disposal is plain for anyone who'll look for it. While there might be a clinical or regulatory argument about undue caution in this instance, the fact that the PFC have been buying in new stock which can be used now without any questions has nothing to do with the destruction of old stock.

The spokesperson from the Scottish National Blood Transfusion Service quoted in the story says as much:

"All products manufactured by PFC and which predated the MHRA inspection were placed in quarantine. Products including those still in date and part processed were quarantined with the agreement of the MHRA and cannot be released for distribution."

The claim that freshly imported products were being destroyed is also dismissed:

But a spokesman for [Health Minister] Kerr said: "SNBTS have assured us that only blood plasma products which have been quarantined by the regulator and since passed their use-by date have been disposed of."

To cap the story, my favourite moment of outrage is the breathless description of "sodium chloride" (also known as salt):

used to dilute life-saving blood products so they can be injected into the bloodstream. It is also vital as a saline drip for dehydrated patients.

Methinks the intrepid reporters may have confused the contents of the bottle with the main ingredient listed on the label - given that what they're describing is saline solution: a solution of sodium chloride in sterile water which is neither rare nor expensive, nor a product of the blood donation service.

Long story short? The Mail's "Bloody Disgrace" presents an alarmist and misleading version of events that presents a whistleblower's allegations without challenge or clarification, all topped with a barely literate understanding of the science involved.

(I've tried to do as much background research as possible and relied on a few informed people I trust: please let me know if you think I've missed anything important - or, indeed, if I have entirely the wrong end of the stick. That's what the comment section is for.)

UPDATED: The Daily Record - sister paper to the Sunday Mail - reports that the PFC will close within a year.

gayest ultimatum ever

I'm really enjoying how the lingering double meaning of "gay" can still produce headlines that sound like tag-lines for 1940's muscials - particularly the BBC's upbeat " Gay ultimatum for Anglicans in US."

However, the less-than-upbeat ultimatum demands that the US House of Bishops (apparently not an Aaron Sorkin mini-series) "make an unequivocal common covenant that the bishops will not authorise any Rite of Blessing for same-sex unions."

Rowan William's comment that the document presents "a challenge to both sides"  is a splendid bit of obfuscation (behold my word power) and seems to conveniently downplay the extent to which the conservative mainstream is getting exactly what they want. Apparently, it's:

"A challenge to the Episcopal Church to clarify its position, a challenge also to those who have intervened from elsewhere to see if they can negotiate their way towards an acceptable, equitable, settlement."

Except that the Episcopal Church isn't so much clarifying their position as being told to toe the line.

dear freelance "journalists"..

..I'm quite busy at work, so I'd appreciate it if you didn't fire off accusatory emails which can be refuted by using google. I'd particularly enjoy it if a search for the key fact in your allegation didn't produce exactly two google hits, both of which prove you wrong. If you have email, you have google.

Yours,

BD.

the emperor's new surgical gown

Will someone please shake him and point out the bleeding obvious?

Tony Blair will today call on hospitals to keep operating theatres open into the evenings for non-emergency procedures to ensure that NHS patients on average wait no more than seven to eight weeks.

And - given that some trusts are already delaying operations until the next financial year because they can't afford them now - hospitals will pay for this how, exactly?

what no reformation?

The Times' front-page headline claim that "Churches back plan to unite under Pope" is pretty much contradicted by the article beneath it - not least by the third paragraph which reveals how Anglicans and Roman Catholics are being "urged to consider the idea." So, "urged to consider" not quite the same thing as the foregone conclusion of "back plan to unite." It also helps to note that the backing doesn't come from either church as a whole but from the International Anglican-Roman Catholic Commission for Unity and Mission, whose purpose is rather to encourage this kind of thing.

Rather than unifying the Anglican and Catholic faiths, the document proposes closer interaction:

In another paragraph the report goes even further: "We urge Anglicans and Roman Catholics to explore together how the ministry of the Bishop of Rome might be offered and received in order to assist our Communions to grow towards full, ecclesial communion."

I also particularly liked this one line summary version of the reformation:

Anglicans rejected the Bishop of Rome as universal primate in the 16th century.

No mention of Protestantism, or any other historical or theological details which kinda sorta triggered the split in the first place.

i'm so outraged (I completely agree with the thing making me angry)

I'm not quite sure that some people have the hang of giving outraged quotes to journalists. It's clearly not as easy as it sounds:

Christians have accused the artist Damien Hirst of exploiting religious imagery for the sake of controversy in a new exhibition, to be displayed in a working Anglican church. [...]

According to Mr Hirst, the works explore the tensions between religion and science. "People tend to think of them as two very separate things, one cold and clinical, the other emotional and warm and loving. I wanted to leap over those boundaries."

But Justin Thacker of the Evangelical Alliance warned that some Christians will be affronted by Mr Hirst's "crass theology". He said: "You could be offended at seeing a great symbolic event in Christianity reduced to a headache pill ... although both pharmaceuticals and Christianity provide relief from physical or emotional pain."

So you're offended.. insofar as you kind of agree with the point of "crass theology" that he's making. O-kay.

bad metaphor special: sex is not like pizza (or smashing windows or chewing gum)

Following on from the revelation that sex is not like having a pizza, I feel I should point out that sex is also not like chewing on a piece of gum, or throwing rocks at the windows of your house. I should also probably try to explain myself.

For some reason, there's a tradition of spectacularly bad metaphors when it comes to socially conservative teaching on sex. Maybe it's a product of not having had much sex (and therefore having few points of actual reference), but whatever the reason it's a trend on the rise.

For example, Laura Stepp's new book - Unhooked: How Young Women Pursue Sex, Delay Love, and Lose at Both (reviewed in the Washington Post) joins that fine tradition to caution:

In a smorgasbord of booty, all the hot dishes start looking like they've been on the warming table too long.

and

Your body is your property. . . . Think about the first home you hope to own. You wouldn't want someone to throw a rock through the front window, would you?

As with many bad metaphors, you can take an entirely alternative message with the greatest of ease. If your sexuality is like a smorgasbord of booty (and please let me know if it is) then you need to make sure you enjoy it before it overheats and is inedible. Gather ye hot dishes while ye may, as Robert Herrick very nearly wrote.

Similarly, if you're thinking about your body as your first house, you might want to invite some friends over for a raucous party before you settle down, decorate and buy expensive furniture.

Actually, the image of sex as having your windows smashed in is spectacularly violent: what's the idea, here? Only your future husband gets to smash your windows? Or are we supposed to think that only he has the key to the front door of your vagina? Insert back door entry joke right about here, btw. Still, why should anyone treat the idea of pre-marital sex as a kind of violent assault? That's pretty fucked up, no?

Meanwhile, there's news that abstinence "educators" made students share chewing gum to teach them about the dangers of sexual promiscuity, because everyone knows you only want one person to be chewing your.. chewing on your.. well, probably not chew. Well, depends if you like it rough - or spearmint-style, as the lesson plans undoubtedly caution.

Presumably, we're supposed to think that all and any sexual contact is so dangerous as to be attempted only once for fear of cooties. And, because the marriage ceremony involves a unique full spectrum bio-sterilisation of foreign germs, your future husband or wife is the only safe person to allow to touch your window sills.

But rather brilliantly, the reverse message is more fitting: any morality tale involving the direct transfer of bodily fluids is an argument for safe sex practices, where you can protect yourself against the transmission of STIs and even unwanted pregnancies. Hey! Sex needn't be a matter of life and death - and not even a matter of gum and windows.

The thing that both the house and gum metaphors have in common is a belief in the fragility of your sexuality: that unless you save it for your one true (but not before married) love, you've ruined yourself irretrievably. The fact that these morality tales seem to mainly be for the "benefit" of women tells you nearly everything you need to know about the kind of atittudes at work here.

and elections are only suggestions, really

I see we're now at the stage where we don't even pretend that the ritual kabuki theatre of public consultation has an effect on governance:

A High Court judge has ordered a rethink of the government's nuclear power plans, after a legal challenge by environmental campaigners Greenpeace.

A judge ruled that the consultation process before the decision last year had been "misleading", "seriously flawed" and "procedurally unfair". [...]

But Tony Blair said while the ruling would change the consultation process, "this won't affect the policy at all".

So even though the process which gave political cover to the policy was fundamentally deceitful, we're going to stick with it.

Also see A Big Stick and A Small Carrot and Temperama.

when you said marriage, did you mean straight people?

I'm waiting for the details of the new "family-first" Tory policy which - according to an interview with David Cameron - will involve "a tax break for marriage." Does this definition of marriage include same-sex couples in civil partnerships, or is it intended only for straight people?

And if it's about supporting breeding pairs, can you only claim that tax relief if you have children or is just the reward for having an opposing set of genitals?

tom utley: our moral objection to burglary is proof of our immorality

My very favourite nonsensical commentator, Tom Utley, in praise of Catholicism:

There's a lesson in all this for the Government. Do you know that in modern Britain a burglar stands only one chance in 32 of getting caught - and then, as we learned the other day, a smaller than 50-50 chance of being sent to jail, even when he has a string of more than ten previous convictions?

So what's stopping us all from becoming burglars? I'll tell you what: it's the belief, mercifully still held by most of us, that burglary is morally wrong.

Instead of dumping on the Catholic Church from a great height, as they did over their insistence that church adoption agencies should farm children out to gay couples, wouldn't it be a good idea if Ministers heeded the concerns of what is fast becoming the most powerful force for morality in this morally rudderless land?

Uh, a land so morally rudderless that most of us think that burglary is morally wrong?

Aside from these three paragraphs appearing in sequence, I'm struggling to follow the argument - which seems to be that the low conviction rate for burglary would be higher if we didn't commonly believe that burglary was immoral, therefore the government should listen to the Catholic Church.

What?

Let me take another pass: the government are queer-enabling baby farmers, therefore we should listen to the Catholic Church.

Nope, still no luck. It still doesn't make any sense. Still, anyone who can dismiss "the kiddy-fiddling clergy, the banal new liturgy [and] the 'liberation theology' that smacks more of Marxism than Christianity" as minor problems with a faith is clearly working to a different standard for coherence.

admin

I'm upgrading the template but should be finished by the weekend: please excuse any unscheduled weirdness.

EDIT: Should be all done, actually. I've stripped down the tags to a more reasonable number, added a recent comments box and a deli.cio.us feed.

Let me know if anything is broken.

note to education editors: more men going into higher education than ever before

The Times' super-scarey headline that the "growing gender gap risks turning universities into ‘male-free zones’" is entirely undercut by their own illustration:



While more women than men might be applying for university places, any system where around 175,000 men (represented by the big blue bar next to the pink one) are still applying is unlikely to become single sex anytime soon.

As with other statistical accounts of educational performance by gender, levels of achievement for both men and women are improving: the specific trend described here is that women's participation is increasing faster than men's.

While female participation in higher education is indeed outstripping male participation, we should still realise that more men are going into higher education than ever before, not fewer. This trend is taking place within an overall susbtantial growth in the number of people entering higher education. For an exciting dull spreadsheet of the figures, go here for a summary of the information found here.

That said, the comparative rates of increase in participation rate may be a genuine cause for concern (though we've yet to talk about what either men or women are actually doing higher education). However, it's a different problem from the one that the Times describes and not a sign of a coming gender apartheid.

tagging help?

During the week I frequently post to blogger by email: any idea how to add tags that way?

you wants ya monkeys? I gots ya monkeys

And yes, I do seem to have an extensive collection of pictures of tiny monkeys clinging to people's fingers, and no, I can't really explain it.

dialing the femputron 2000

The question "did India Knight let feminists down when she wrote a diet book?" really does miss the point.

While I've yet to check in with the global femputron database of how everyone feels about the issue, I'm pretty sure this a) ignores the substance of the criticisms of a focus on weight and appearance and b) sounds like an attempt to rally some entertaining infighting amongst those crazee feminists and allow the Comment is Free trolls out for some air.

more misleading coverage of working women

There's a fairly obvious bait and switch in this morning's coverage of new figures of working women. The Mail leads with "More mothers caring for their career than children," arguing:

Just two million women are now at home looking after their family, mainly young children or elderly relatives.

This means just one in 10 women of working age are staying at home, a radical change from the lives of most of their mothers and grandmothers.

The figures, published yesterday by the Office for National Statistics, show the sharpest drop in 'stay-at-home mums' for two years.

The most obvious thing that should occur to you is that not all women have young children or elderly relatives that require care (nevermind the fact that that care might not have to be the sole responsibility of women). So the drop in women of working age who are staying at home is simply not the same thing as a drop in "stay-at-home mums."

While the statistics (pdf, table 13) show some 2 million women who give care of home and family as the reason for being "economically inactive," it's not cross-referenced by age or by the kind of care involved. Furthermore, the ONS labour market figures to which the Mail refers don't give any figures of the number of working women who have "caring dependents" so we have no sense of proportion involved there, either.

Similarly, while there might be more women at work outside of the home, there's little factual evidence to support the claim that are more women "caring" for their careers ahead of their children. Even allowing for the misleading assumption that all working women are also primary care-givers, to be a working mother is not synonymous with being a neglectful mother.

The same piece of misdirection is repeated further down the article:

Around 13.4 million women of all ages - the highest number ever recorded - have jobs, with more than 55 per cent of them working full-time.

Over the last two years alone, it shows the number who have full-time jobs, rather than part-time jobs which fit around family life, has jumped.

Once again, not all women have a "family life" around which they should - or would want - to shape their working life.

The Mail's assumptions are also based on the figures for all women of working age (aged 16 and over) not merely those who might be at an age where they would have a family at home that they might be expected to care for.

The claim of a "jump" in full-time workers is also a little suspect. I'm looking at the ONS's report (pdf), and these are the figures for women in full-time work (in thousands):

Oct-Dec 2004: 7,462
Oct-Dec 2006: 7,605

So that's an increase of 143,000 - an increase not disimilar from the increase of men in full-time work by 132,000 over the same period.

There are - most definitely - changes in the working lives of women and men apparent in the ONS statistics, but the Mail's attempt to render those changes as the female abandonment of their supposed role in life is both crude and misleading. Who'd have guessed?

kilroy-silk: credibility is for other people

Robert Kilroy-Silk clings to the crazy with both hands - despite no evidence whatsoever beyond the opinion of his wife and daughter that Marks & Spencer have installed slimming mirrors:

The former chat show host said he had written to M&S's chief executive, Stuart Rose, asking that the mirrors be withdrawn before they are outlawed later this year under new EU consumer protection rules.

Mr Kilroy-Silk said: "The whole practice tarnishes the image of M&S and its reputation for integrity. I have asked him to take out the offending mirrors and apologise to women customers for deceiving them." Mr Kilroy-Slik said the issue was relevant because of the current controversy over the refusal of the British fashion industry to ban the use of skinny, "size zero" models on the London catwalks.

Well, it might be relevant if it were true - in the same way that CIA broadcasts routed through his fillings would also be an issue of concern if they existed.

think unsexy thoughts

I'm going to jump the gun a little and point out - in the aftermath of the Unicef report showing "Britain's children are the unhappiest in the West" and ahead of the presumed moral outrage that they're also having "more sex than their peers" - that the countries at the top of the list (Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark) have the same or lower age age of consent as the UK and far more explicit and comprehensive sex education. The Netherlands also has the lowest teen birth and abortion rates in Europe. The fact that young people might be having sex is not intrinsically problematic if no law is being broken and no-one's getting hurt. Just saying, okay?

barbara taylor bradford's black death

The Mail's free dvd - "the perfect gift for valentine's day" - is a tale of emotional infidelity and kidnap in a war zone. It's all so heart-warming I can barely speak.

democracy inaction

A special Robert Kilroy-Silk treat:

Marks and Spencer has said it is mystified by a claim by MEP Robert Kilroy-Silk that it uses "distorting" mirrors in its changing rooms. [...]

In his [written] question, Mr Kilroy-Silk asked if it was "conceivable that within the millions of EU regulations covering virtually every aspect of life in the EU" there was not one that made it illegal for M&S to have mirrors that "deliberately distort women's shapes".

Kilroy-Silk's letter went on to discuss how EU regulations had hidden his slippers and made the nurses steal his outdoors clothes.

india knight: feminism, diet and self-policing

India Knight's defence of dieting - and slap at the feminists she feels unfairly criticise an obsession with weight - misses a fairly important trick. The desire to help "unhappily fat women" - to use Knight's phrase - tends to ignore why weight should be the automatic source of unhappiness. It's not a simple question of whether women are entitled to feel good about themselves or not (and I think feminism is pretty clear on that one) but rather a concern with how having your sense of self-worth ultimately bound up in weight and appearance might be problematic.

That said, it's not an argument that Knight seems to recognise or address. Instead, there's a new straw-feminist:

There exists a very bizarre, inverted kind of feminism (invoked by critics of dieting) that isn't about what you can achieve, but what you mustn't achieve. It's about not being things - not making any effort to improve yourself, not celebrating, or even noticing, what you look like and what your body can do.

I'm not really sure which feminists Knight is talking about; at the very least, it's totally uncritical of the terms in which "improvement" are couched.

At best, I think she's misrepresenting feminist objections to an obsession with weight and appearance - which include a call for a celebration of the body that doesn't involve weight loss and a sense of self-improvement that can't be measured in pounds and inches. While mastering your own demands of yourself might be tremendously empowering, the problem with that strategy is that it might ignore how a cultural emphasis on dieting and weight loss adds to the sense of blame and self-punishment for women who do not want to lose weight.

Knight's declaration that:

We are thinking about our own gaze, about what we want, and about what it does to our sense of ourselves to want things - weight loss, in this instance - and not to blame or punish ourselves for wanting them.

also seems to minimise the cultural emphasis bound to the "instance" of weight loss. The issue of dieting is contentious precisely because it is not an "instance" - it is part of a historical account of women's bodies, a point at which multiple pressures about femininity, desire and self-determination come to bear.

Despite Knight's attempt to re-polarise the debate, I don't think it's not a case of "dieting good" or "dieting bad." Instead there's a more careful analysis put forward by some feminists that an emphasis on weight is not universally or simplistically empowering - primarily because it has been (and continues to be) a major way in which women's bodies are policed. The fact that dieting might be liberating for one woman doesn't prevent that same cultural tradition from adding unrealistic pressure to another - hence the call from some to view the mastery of appearance and weight as an interest with the symptom of an unfair system rather than the system itself.

If the only demands being made of your body are your own, that's great. The problem becomes when those demands are the product of someone else's expectations, someone else's definition of desirability and someone else's narrow definition of the "healthy" body. Similarly, while choice is the enactment of liberty, becoming self-policing isn't the same thing as becoming self-liberating.

lauren booth: my marital difficulties could be yours (a limited time offer)

There are few human relationships between newspaper columnists which - no matter how specific the situation - aren't also cautionary tales for the rest of the human race. In a pre-emptive Valentine's Day special, let's turn to Lauren Booth's feature in the Daily Mail: Can a marriage where the woman earns more than the man ever work?

Like most wives, I'm approaching Valentine's Day tomorrow with growing expectation tinged with a certain niggling fear that I might end up with an entirely unsuitable gift. And when I finally polish off the warmed croissants, it'll be time for my husband to give me my present. Of course, I'm hopeful it'll be thoughtful and expensive enough to take my breath away.

Yet, as I gaze in silence at the antique book, bracelet or ring, I won't be feeling as grateful as perhaps I might.

You see, I am a Breadwinner Mum, the sole earner in a household of four. So when my beloved hubby spends weeks picking out the perfect gift, regardless of the exorbitant cost, it is - perversely - me who picks up the bill anyway. Does it rankle? Sadly for us, it does.

At this point you want to try to ignore how Booth both expects a gift expensive enough to take her breath away and resents that her husband is going to get that gift. So it's an article about the difficulty of the marital promise to share and share alike? Or an article about a spendthrift partner? Close, but no cigar:

According to psychologists (and divorce lawyers) many relationships where the financial burden lies entirely with the wife follow the same pattern. First, the wife loses respect for her husband, then he begins to feel emasculated, and then sex dwindles to a full stop.

Which psychologists? Sounds an awful like an appeal to authority without any evidence.. And if you don't have respect for your partner, regardless of his salary, isn't your marriage already a little rocky?

Well, I'm happy to say we're not there yet. I respect what Craig does for his family and he loves me enough to do the washing up when I'm really stressed out.

Truly, there is no greater love a man has for a woman than when he occasionally does the washing up when a woman is on the point of collapse.

But many times I have felt simmering resentment when my income has funded bloke things like trips to London to visit his pals, or his 'must-have' tickets to this year's Rugby World Cup.

But there's no resentment that she's the primary wage-earner and is still expected to do the washing-up? That just comes with being a woman? Wait for it..

Indeed, one of the most intriguing emotional battles in a relationship like mine is over the housework and other domestic chores.

The truth is that when you are a woman and you have been away doing something exciting and fulfilling, you simply don't have the heart, when you return, to nag a man for failing to empty the dishwasher.

Okay, I'm going to pause here and register how bizarre Booth's argument seems to be. She's seemingly unhappy with the amount of household work her husband does, but she thinks that the real problem is that she earns more. She resents that he spends money on things she thinks aren't essential, but the real problem is that she earns more. She's concerned that she doesn't respect her partner, but the real problem is that she earns more. Get the feeling Booth has different problems from the ones she thinks she has?

Still, rather than becoming a member of the Gillian McKeith postal school of psychoanalysis (collect tokens from ten crisp packets to graduate) let's stick to the text. Booth spends a couple of hundred words outlining how the division of household labour is cultural, rather than biological and that women - regardless of whether they work, or earn more - do more household labour. Booth even quotes "relationship expert Dr Gail Saltz" to argue that - like most young girls - she

was brainwashed into believing that one day a prince would whisk me away to a beautiful palace. [...]  Now that I was cast in the role of provider, I began to feel an almost unconscious dissatisfaction that this fairytale was not working out at all according to the script.

So having established that cultural expectations regarding gendered work are  damaging her marriage, Booth decides that.. it's actually to do with the pre-determinism of biology after all.

There is an almost unlimited potential for the man who does not earn to feel emasculated when he is no longer in control of his own finances. This comes partly from a masculine pride that is hardwired into all men - a competitive urge to win that manifests itself in a desire to be the familial provider.

and

Perhaps a working woman carries an innate guilt that her bloke is at home clearing out the bin while she has left her children with him to go out and enjoy a stimulating career.

Ah, the guilt. It's been too long. How have we made it so far without guilt? Lovely, warm, suffocating guilt.

It's a familiar argument: that the people who seek change from unfair or restrictive cultural traditions only have themselves to blame for making themselves unhappy, and what could be a call for change becomes a cautionary tale for people who would be stupid enough to try to think differently or resist their biological "destiny."

Embrace your unhappiness! Happy Valentines!

dr bookdrunk's amazing emporium

Ben Goldacre's epic gutting of Gillian McKeith - now with matching podcast - is a delight to behold. The news that Gillian McKeith has "agreed" to stop using the title of "doctor"   is an added bonus, though I should perhaps say that McKeith has stopped using that title to avoid prosecution for misleading the public. That said, McKeith still thinks she's entitled to use the title:

[McKeith] told the Guardian she understood the offending ad was a leaflet without the usual disclaimer she was not a medical doctor. She said she understood the honorific had to go from leaflets, but not from all adverts. "As far as I'm concerned, because of the hard work I have done, I'll continue to put PhD after my name; I'm entitled to use the word Dr as and when I choose."

No, you're not. You're really not. No-one who thinks that chlorophyll "aids in the transmission of nerve impulses that control contraction" in the muscles of the heart gets to call themselves doctor with a straight face.

And as for the hardwork and entitlement? I'm a lower-echelon web pundit who has a phd - mine took four years from a recognised university while working two jobs - and I don't get to talk like that. By McKeith's standards I'm also a chartered architect, a barrister and an internet minister: answering junkmail has been very kind to me.

Actually, maybe I'm missing a trick. Anyone want to buy a slimming novel from Dr Bookdrunk?

it's sex education, stupid

Given that there's a problem with sex education in the UK, and that we recognise that there's a problem and that it's not a problem with there being too much sex education but seemingly too little, wouldn't it be nice if we could do something about it?

The statutory requirement to discuss reproductive biology alone is the definition of the absolute minimum commitment to sexual health. Want to bring down the transmission of STIs? Want to reduce the teen pregnancy rate? Then make the discussion of sexual health and contraception a requirement of law, and not an optional extra decided on an ad hoc basis by people too embarrassed to deal with the issue.

a professional scandal: cameron, drugs and the daily mail

The Daily Mail has turned some rather spectacular twists in the last 48 hours to frame their own front-page exclusive as a Labour dirty tricks campaign.

First, the Sunday headline: " Exclusive: Cameron DID smoke cannabis," with Cameron's superlative non-denial ("I'm not issuing a denial. Like many people I did things when I was young that I should not have done, and that I regret.")

Then there's the obedient "Drugs? My past stays private says Cameron," which reframes a red-letter day for right wing Tories as the cunning work of Labour strategists (despite the fact the highly desirable revelation stems from a book to be "exclusively serialised" in that bastion of the left.. uhhh. the Daily Mail.)

The comment section then obligingly jumps on board, attacking Labour and forgetting that this apparently awful and outrageous slur against Cameron.. actually originated from the front page of the Mail on Sunday. The fishing expedition for obliging Labour criticism then allows the holier-than-thou reaction from Cameron's camp ("This is a pathetic attempt by Labour to make cheap political capital.")

Finally, there's the rather brilliant bit of background reporting that argues that cannabis is now ten - or even twenty - times stronger "than when David Cameron was a teenager in the 1980s." So even if he did smoke cannabis, it was no more intoxicating than a double expresso or perhaps a brisk walk. And Labour should shut up, alright?

The result is that the Mail gets to attack both Labour and the boy Cameron (who isn't nearly anything enough for their tastes) while playing them both off each other to produce a sales-friendly scandal. Rather brilliant, no?

adequate contraception reduces demand for abortion, shock?

Both The Guardian and The Daily Mail cover an industry-sponsored survey of contraceptive use, focusing on abortion rates amongst women in long-term relationships. Both papers highlight widespread confusion and ignorance about contraception, and carry quotes arguing that better access to and stronger education about long-term contraceptive solutions is required. Neither paper goes beyond the survey to comment that long-term contraception is still - almost universally - a female responsibility.

But then there's this comment in the Mail from the Catholic Charity LIFE:

LIFE spokeswoman Michaela Aston said: "It is sad that Schering suggests such an inadequate solution to high levels of abortion in long-term relationships. We are not surprised that a contraceptive company is calling for increased sales of contraception but this knee-jerk reaction does not get to the heart of the matter.

"A more humane response would be to find out why couples in long term, presumably committed, relationships feel unable to welcome their child into the world especially at a time when so many couples are struggling with infertility."

Making better contraception available to couples who don't want or aren't ready for children is a knee-jerk reaction? What?

Somehow, LIFE has decided that fertile people who don't want to have children but do want to have sex must have something wrong with them, rather missing the point that better contraception would obviate the demand for abortion and that for most people sex isn't just about procreation - despite the best efforts of religious conservatives everywhere. Boh. So why shouldn't couples in long-term relationships (including, one presumes, the married) enjoy sex without having children?

community hospitals: when a promise turns into an "early estimate"

Coverage of new government initiatives is always greater in size than coverage of cancellation of the very same initiatives, which is why it's generally safe to play this game:

In January 2006, Miss Hewitt unveiled her plans for community hospitals in a White Paper, with journalists being briefed that the money would fund 50 new hospitals. [...]

A month later, Liam Byrne, the then health minister, said the £750 million investment would allow trusts to "build, rebuild or refurbish at least 50 community hospitals". In April, the health department confirmed the plans.

But in a written Parliamentary answer, Andy Burnham, the health minister, has revealed that the promise has been dropped. He said there was "no target for the number of community hospitals we intend to fund".

If you're wondering why the name Andy Burnham rings a bell, it's because he used to work in the Home Office where he was responsible for lying about.. uh.. distributing talking points on the usefulness of ID cards.

Anyway, what's the response from the Department of Health?

Last night the Department of Health denied that ministers had ever pledged that 50 new community hospitals would be built.

"The figure of 50 was an early estimate but we have not used it for some time because we do not want to dictate to trusts what they should do," said a spokesman.

But it was the figure that was happily fed to journalists at the time, and one which went conveniently unchallenged. There certainly seemed to be a number of journalists covering the story in January 2006 who thought that the health minister had made a commitment, free of any provisos. In fact, the decision was depicted as evidence of insightful management. For example:

Ms Hewitt has been struck by the NHS's heavy reliance on hospitals in dealing with the 45m or so outpatient appointments each year. She wants to switch a substantial slice of this work to 50 new community hospitals, modelled on the "polyclinics" successfully pioneered in Germany.

Or more directly

Ms Hewitt announced the building of a new generation of 50 polyclinics to provide extra capacity, including minor surgery and diagnostic tests.

and

A new generation of 50 cottage hospitals with modern diagnostic and treatment facilities are to be built across Britain as part of a drive to bring care closer to patients' homes.

Didn't quite sound like an estimate at the time, did it? Rather sounded like some kind of commitment or guarantee - and not a mention of the automony of health care trusts.

Funny that.

Could it be that Hewitt wanted to take credit for decisions which she could then later blame primary trusts for failing fulfill? If the money is indeed "still there" and this is only a slow start to a five year programme, why the lack of commitment?

Will see if I can find a public speech where Hewitt announced the plans.

EDIT: Here's Hewitt speaking in the House of Commons in May of last year:

We have already promised a new generation of at least 50 community hospitals, because some existing cottage hospitals are not providing the right services, are not in the right buildings, and will need to change.

Does that sound like an "estimate" to you? Or does that sound like someone claiming that something is definitely going to happen, and is in fact proof of how well managed the NHS is?

deadly deadly niqab?

Shorter scaremongering: if you can't tell the difference between a twelve year-old girl wearing a veil and a grown man wearing a veil then you might as well stay under the bed with a paper bag on your head.

p is for paperwork

I'm teaching and filling out job application forms today: I might just turn into a real full-time academic. It's pretty weird to actually be at the stage of applying for things which I am now qualified for - after huge effort and almost as huge expense - but still have only the vaguest idea of how, when and where the next step happens. I passed, didn't I? :)

yes, housework is still actually work

Here's one of those seemingly regular surveys that seems amazed to discover that housework involves physical labour. Also resurfacing is the argument that housework is great because it helps women stay slim:

Before women start to demand that men share custody of the vacuum cleaner, they should be aware that cleaning can be better exercise than the gym and a lot cheaper. Stretching and reaching, lifting the machine and staying on the feet all provide enough exercise to help to keep weight down.

So there you have it: don't demand that your male partner do a fairer share of the housework or you'll turn into a fatty.

re: little children, suffering of the

To file next to the claim that the Catholic Church "doesn't want to discriminate against gay people" and thinks they should be "treated with respect," there's this:

The Church rejected calls from ministers for every school - including England's 2100 Catholic state schools - to have a policy on tackling homophobic playground bullying.

Because if you recognise it exists, you might also have to recognise it's a thing about which something could or should be done.

dance like it's 1984

Woo! We're back to the magical jukebox of excuses.. uh.. compelling rationales for ID cards. You may have previously enjoyed such hits as An End To Benefit Fraud, Stop Identity Theft Now and Help Reduce Credit Card Crime (featuring the Oh No It Won't Chorus), but there's nothing like ten verses of Terrorists Will Cross The Border And Kill You Unless You Give Us Your Money.

Why now? The Tories have announced that they will scrap ID cards if elected, and have given formal notice to the Cabinet Secretary:

In the letter, [David Davis] asked what measures were in place to ensure that early cancellation does not hit taxpayers. The Tories say cards will damage civil liberties, but the government insists they will improve security.

The letter from Mr Davis, sent on Monday, said the Cabinet secretary was "formally on notice" of the party's intentions. It added: "You will be aware that there is a long-standing convention that one parliament may not bind a subsequent parliament.

"As you will also be aware, the Conservative Party has stated publicly that it is our intention to cancel the ID cards project immediately on our being elected to government."

The response:

John Reid, the Home Secretary, said ID cards would help secure Britain's borders, boost the fight against illegal immigration, combat people-trafficking and protect the country against terrorism.

He said: "The Tories' ill-considered opposition highlights their lack of leadership on security issues - they can't be trusted with Britain's safety. David Davis has shown that he and David Cameron talk tough while acting soft."

Whereas the party planning to hand over billions of pounds for an illiberal system that no-one has really been able to rationalise properly yet is the one to vote for. It's the combination of tough talk and soft brains that wins every time.

If you'll excuse me, I need to go and dance to track seven: If Only You Knew (The Terrible Secrets of the Plots To Kill You, You'd Let Me Do Anything In The Name of Security).

fish in a barrel

It's no fun catching the Daily Mail lying when they can't even get past the first sentence:

Schools are to ditch basic facts and figures from lessons in favour of discussions on global warming and slavery in the biggest curriculum shake-up for 20 years.

First of all, I think we can all agree that slavery was - at the very least - a factual event and the study of it might be a discipline we call "history."

Secondly, despite having found a prep-school head to criticise the change to the school curriculum, no-one offers any proof whatsoever that "basic facts and figures" are being "ditched."

Even the claim that core subjects are being "cut back" is an assertion presented without evidence to support it - and, even if it were true, it's still a much, much weaker claim than the idea that facts and figues will be "ditched."

If anything, the proposals allow for flexibility in teaching some parts of the core subjects in conjunction with other subjects, instead of as rigidly separate disciplines i.e. not scrapped at all. While this might be a genuine issue of contention, no-one's giving up on "fact" as the basis of our education system.

So the original claim is still a load of bollocks and has nothing to do with any actual problems or merits of the new proposals.

Thank you, please play again.

(Incidentally, we're now midswing between people arguing there's too much regulation of the classroom by central government and people arguing that central government isn't doing enough to make sure the right things are being taught in the classroom. See you on the other side.)

teething times

I'm not very impressed by the Times website relaunch: everything seems to be surrounded by plentiful empty space and promos for things other than what you're actually looking for, which becomes comedically bad on some pages when you turn on an ad-blocker to choke out the flash-ridden adverts for Apple.

All of that I'd suffer if the site could actually load. Bringing up the homepage currently takes at least thirty seconds, and each clicked link involves another long, churning wait for another page filled with shiny stuff and things to click and adverts for columnists - and if you're lucky - some news in a small box on the left.

The slightly-too honest explanation from the designers ("It was a unanimous decision! But then, we probably hadn't slept for some time...") for the lime-green accents (web poll currently has 67% "hating it") seems to involve a little confusion between "classic with a twist" and "classic with a twist of lime in the gin we were drinking all night."

The integration of delicious and newsvine buttons to each story is a nice idea (though most delicious users already have a short-cut javascript thing) and "faith" now seems to have its own sub-section under comment - though it's currently displaying a "site unavailable, please come back later" message. Oh, no, it's back. A second coming, if you will. I'm intrigued to know if you're allowed to invoke reason in the faith zone, or if it's wholly for faith-based arguments.

Either way, someone needs to go in and check the CSS because linked text in Times blogs is CONVERTED INTO BLOCK CAPITALS, giving an entertaining Tourette's-like quality to many stories (e.g. "The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, has led Church of England bishops in attacking THE PLANS FOR A SUPERCASINO IN MANCHESTER pictured here..") I like to imagine a booming voicing shouting out the most important bits of every story, though I'm not sure it's exactly an improvement. Still, WHAT DO YOU THINK?

Oops. Now "The Web Server may be down, too busy, or experiencing other problems preventing it from responding to requests. You may wish to try again at a later time." Or not, as it turns out.

shakespeare for kids: murder, revenge, suicide and racism, oh my

The recent poll of teachers to discover which Shakespeare plays are suitable for younger students is an exercise in selective reading. Let's take a look at the chart printed in the BBC's coverage - the higher the number, the more suitable the play was thought to be for 13-14 year olds:

Romeo and Juliet - 91%
Midsummer Night's Dream - 90%
Julius Caesar - 62%
Taming of the Shrew - 61%
As You Like It - 61%
Othello - 43%
Henry IV Part I - 32%

Apparently, Othello is thought unsuitable because it deals with "sexual jealousy," whereas Romeo and Juliet's themes of " young love and family" make it more accessible. It's unclear whether the scenes of murder, self-obsession, failed romance and a botched suicide pact also make Romeo and Juliet so fitting for teenagers.

In fact, let's go down that list again:

Romeo and Juliet - murder as revenge, disobedience towards parents, secret marriage, glamorisation of suicide / suicide pact.
Midsummer Night's Dream - cross-dressing, sexual confusion, sexual deceit, suggestion of man/donkey hybrid and/or drugs culture, marriages of convenience. Julius Caesar - murder, revenge/betrayal, murder, civil disorder and more murder.
Taming of the Shrew - discussion, deception, inappropriate marriages, misogyny.
As You Like It - cross-dressing, homo-eroticism, sexual deceit, marriages of convenience.
Othello - murder as revenge, sexual jealousy, racism.
Henry IV Part I - war, kings, Falstaff.

You really can't move in Shakespeare for filth and moral depravity if you know where to look - and after a couple of degrees in literature, I'm happy to say I do. See? Not a waste of money, oh no.

There's also a bit of a problem with the idea that Othello's handling of sexual jealousy is "beyond the experience of year nine students," as if Julius Caesar didn't also involve events and experiences beyond the average 13 year old (children of despots schooled overseas notwithstanding).

Almost sadly, The Daily Mail has managed to remain calm and also manages to report one small detail that's missing from the BBC's coverage - that the teachers who rejected Othello for 13-14 year olds tended to do so because they wanted to teach it at A-level.

The Mail also carries a great quote which the BBC missed. On Othello:

A significant proportion [of teachers] also commented on the large number of sexual puns, which was felt to be a barrier to productive language analysis.

I really love it when people get stuck between the urge to get young people to study the classics and the fear that those same young people might actually find out what those stories are about.

(edited for formatting)

would greater transparency help close pay gap?

So here's a Tory policy that sounds like it could be a good idea. No, really.

Research by the Chartered Institute for Personnel and Development shows that about one third of employers stipulate that staff do not discuss pay and conditions with their colleagues. The Tories want to consult on outlawing confidentiality clauses, arguing that they contribute to the pay gap and "inhibit effective and informed pay bargaining". While the Equal Pay Act requires that men and women receive equal pay for doing the same or similar work, the party says that identifying a pay gap can be made more difficult by such clauses.

No one would be forced to reveal their salary, but the move could help get round problems of obtaining information on pay rates from employers through the existing Equal Pay Questionnaire.

Given that discussions of the pay gap are frequently mired in either wholesale denial of a gap, or disagreement over the size or cause of the disparity, wouldn't greater transparency benefit everyone?

EDIT: Apparently even asking this question puts me in league with the Accursed Toynbee. It's a genuine question, okay?

Oh, and amongst the details to note is that "no one would be forced to reveal their salary, but the move could help get round problems of obtaining information on pay rates from employers through the existing Equal Pay Questionnaire."

theatres act 1968, how do I love thee?

See Mediawatchwatch for further details of Christian Voice's failed blasphemy case against the BBC.

Rather wonderfully, the bit of legislation on which the district judge has based her decision is the Theatres Act 1968 - which abolished censorship on the stage and ended the arbitrary rule of the Lord Chamberlain's office over performance that had persisted since 1843.

(Theatre academics and comedy geek side-bar: in requiring the submission of a script for the purposes of licensing, the Theatres Act 1843 also has the consequence of criminalising improvisation. So possibly not all bad, depending on your experience of live improv.)

Lifted from the CV website, here's that lovely clause:

"No person shall be proceeded against in respect of a performance of a play, or anything said or done in the course of such a performance - (a) for an offence at common law where it is of the essence of the offence that the performance or, as the case may be, what was said or done was obscene, indecent, offensive, disgusting or injurious to morality."

I really need to find some time to expand the Wikipedia stub.

there's no part of a blogwar that doesn't drive up everyone's traffic

First, here's a tidy summary of this week's claims and counter-claims when it comes to think-tanks and transparency, courtesy of ABSaaSC:

So when Iain Dale, Conservative A-lister and trustee of the "independent" Policy Exchange, Cameron's favourite conservative think tank, makes lots of noise on the interwebs about Brown's overly close connections to an "independent" charity while failing to mention his own connections to a very similar organisation with very similar connections to the boy wonder, I'm inclined to believe that it wasn't a great day for standards of openness and transparency in political life on the interwebs. I am, rather, inclined to think about pots and kettles, glass houses and dirty tricks.

Meanwhile, in today's Times we find an article talking up the potential of right-wing think-tanks which covers the think-tank and registered charity Policy Exchange ("very close to the Conservative leadership", for which Iain Dale is a trustee), 18 Doughty Street ("the biggest right-wing group [...] employing 21 people helps to push out the centre-right message") and Tim Montgomerie ("a co-founder [and co-host with Iain Dale] of 18doughtystreet.com, and the former chief of staff to the one-time Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith").

Presumably this is the good kind of close relationship between think-tanks, charities and political parties - and not the kind that requires formal enquiries.

More importantly, does this mean I've surrended my chance to be the token faux-liberal on Doughty Street? :)

the sunday double bill

stupid girls and clever boys

Jill Parkin's piece in the Daily Mail on the "feminisation" of education wraps some common complaints around the idea that - when you get right down to it - there's something suspicious about the achievement of girls.

First up is the claim that actual ability and achievement is not being rewarded; instead effort and attitude are prized. This is, apparently, the same thing as "feminising" education.

The swimming bag hit the car floor with a thump and my son hit the car seat with an even bigger thump, grumbling: "What's the point?"

His primary school had just lost a swimming competition, largely because their head teacher had picked a team on the basis of enthusiasm rather than ability. [...]

For the story of my son's swimming competition is also the story behind recent figures showing that boys going to university are now outnumbered by girls in every subject, with 23,000 more places awarded to women than to men.

Places for (smart) boys are being given to (stupid) girls? Is Parkin really arguing that "enthusiastic" (i.e less able) girls are replacing able boys in higher education? Does she want to look at the gender-split in courses for law and medicine? No?

The second part of the argument follows a similar pattern: a stereotype about male behaviour, followed by the implicit claim that boys are doing less well because the standard for achievement has been changed to favour girls. However, here that claim arrives with the suggestion that girls are achieving good grades because the bar for attainment has been lowered.

What boys are made of is this: tremendous data banks that can recall years of FA Cup ties in minute detail; lashings of testosterone that needs constant burning off on a sports field; and a hideous competitive streak almost as vital to them as lifeblood itself.

Harnessed in the right way, these raw ingredients can help boys make the most of their education. But far too many of today's schools try to stifle these instincts in favour of a feminised curriculum that benefits girls in almost every single regard.

The problems start in the classroom. Instead of the make-or-break sprint to the exam deadline, boys have to endure stultifying coursework.

So, testosterone = sporting prowess = ability to pass exams. Whereas girls aren't capable of hight level thought:

This system of continuous assessment means that anyone who can call up Google on a computer can cut and paste answers from the internet at home. Girls, with their more patient approach to learning, thrive under such a system.

"Anyone who can call up Google on a computer can cut and paste answers from the internet at home"? Anyone but boys, apparently.

There are traces here of the idea that it's unfair to make boys sit and work, instead of letting them play competitive sports - despite many generations of boys who have managed to thrive under much stricter expectations of discipline. The argument that achievement isn't being recognised is also entirely different to the idea that achievement is being recognised in a way that's unfair to boys.

Sadly, that argument - for which I've yet to see anything like decent research - disappears under a small avalanche of sexism to follow the standard Mail format in asserting that common (and even recent) cultural expectations are the immutable product of biology and, as such, that we're helpless to resist the god of testosterone. Unsuprisingly, the goddess of oestrogen doesn't get a look in.

maybe my sex life wouldn't be so interesting if you weren't celibate

Brokenhut neatly summarises the arguments presented so far:

I’m following this whole story with confusion and disbelief. I believe all of the following statements about adoption are accurate, from what I have read in the press and elsewhere. If they are wrong then obviously later assumptions will be wrong.

1. It’s not about single-person adoption, because single adults can adopt children.
2. It’s not about gay adoption, because single gay adults can adopt children.
3. It’s not about gay marriage, because that was a different and previous argument which caused barely a whisper of protest in comparison.
4. It’s not about gay couples adopting, because gay couples could adopt before civil unions.
5. From 3 and 4, we can infer that it’s not about gay couples adopting a child and later getting married.

Which leaves only one possibility, and one which makes no sense whatsoever. It’s about gay couples getting married before adopting.

It might not make much sense, but it is indeed the argument of choice for the Catholic Church whose obsession with your sex life grows each day (and despite a growing body of evidence that the children of gay couples do as well as straight couples in every way).

As Winter has been arguing alongside me in the comments to various posts, It has rapidly become more transparent that the church's problem isn't primarily about children's welfare, it's about marriage.

In the full knowledge that I'm repeating myself, it helps to remember that most marriages in the country are not religious and that changes in family life have almost nothing to do with the deadly deadly homos we've been hearing so much about.