Ethical Public Health advertising? Aaaaargh! Disgusting.

I got momentarily excited today when I read the summary of this article.

The ethics of distress: Toward a framework for determining the ethical acceptability of distressing health promotion advertising

And then plunged into my usual despair at the insanity of humans on this strange planet. I am not paying for the article, but the summary starts by saying "Distressing health promotion advertising involves the elicitation of negative emotion to increase the likelihood that health messages will stimulate audience members to adopt healthier behaviors. Irrespective of its effectiveness, distressing advertising risks harming audience members who do not consent to the intervention and are unable to withdraw from it. Further, the use of these approaches may increase the potential for unfairness or stigmatization toward those targeted, or be considered unacceptable by some sections of the public.

Well at this point I thought I might read something intelligent on how criminal it is to brainwash humans using medical porn subliminals on "plain" packs of cigarettes - or any cigarettes for that matter - and - going into the future -  the affront on obesity and alcohol, planned in the same way.

But no! It goes on.

"We acknowledge and discuss these concerns, but, using the public health ethics literature as a guide, argue that distressing advertising can be ethically defensible if conditions of effectiveness, proportionality necessity, least infringement, and public accountability are satisfied."

Oh yeah?

None of that has hapenned to smokers, has it? Ethics don't exist in Public Health. The only thing I see is lies, persecution and huge infringement in the rape of people's minds through the use of medical porn, brainwashing and fear. And now they plan to attack other groups of misbehavers.

Shame on you.

"We do not take a broad view as to whether distressing advertising is ethical or unethical, because we see the evidence for both the effectiveness of distressing approaches and their potential to generate iatrogenic effects to be inconclusive. However, we believe it possible to use the current evidence base to make informed estimates of the likely consequences of specific message presentations. Messages can be pre-tested and monitored to identify and deal with potential problems. We discuss how advertisers can approach the problems of deciding on the appropriate intensity of ethical review, and evaluating prospective distressing advertising campaigns against the conditions outlined."

Everyone knows smoking may harm them. Society has moved away from it naturally right from the day the first information percolated through to our consiousness. I think people will change their lifestyles on obesity, alcohol and other destructive aspects of modern life like detergent pollution, chemical overload, work stress etc, all by themselves without having to be bombarded with Public Health "advertising". 

Ethical? No. Aaaaargh! Disgusting.

Time for hot frogs.

Making hoarding a crime caught my eye on Twitter this morning. The new law would protect us oldies from ourselves and our clutter.   I thought Hoarding was a compulsive obsessive disorder. I couldn't think of anything more cruel and barbaric than making those with clutter be legally forced to not hoard. It ranks with making older people to not smoke when they have done it for years. Or ban smoking in hospitals where the mentally ill have to re-home to sometimes.

This mornings tweet made me remember how utterly insane our legislators are. They actually have NO IDEA really do they? They overstep the mark of basic compassion.

We are living in a world where everything is cosmetic - it's got to look right. We have forgotten our messy past. We think we are building a better future by making things look right. Hoarding is messy. Hoarders don't follow the rules of being tidy. They haven't got neat minds. They must be made illegal. They are a danger to themselves and others. Their houses might burn down. Rats might infect the houses around them. It is unhygienic. Hoarders need disinfecting from society.  They need LEGISLATING against.

Smokers are disgusting and dirty too. They stink. They are a danger to others with their second hand smoke which kills. They might burn the house down too. They must be legislated against to smoke outside, oh no, I forgot, not outside either. They mustn't be seen, even though they count as one quarter of the population.Children must grow up not seeing anyone smoking so they can be protected against it when they grow up and actually see people smoking.

And such a disgusting habit may not be practised by the mentally ill. Their second hand smoke will injure others around them. So they must be offered NRT patches immediately on admission. I think this is a crime.

Once we had laws against sexual orientation, race, pregnancy, abortion, prostitution, women, religion, witches, slaves that were all crimes against groups in society. In most Western countries, we expect to be free from government sponsored social discrimination.
 
I don't see this. I see discrimination alive and well. It disgusts me.

But the uplifting thought for my day is that our legislative madness will pass. One day, some of the frogs heating up slowly in the petri dish of life, will leap out - maybe.

 

Reincarnation and karma - good system

I believe that the idea of reincarnation and karma is a most satisfying one. Well it is for me. I never have to feel vengeance. Whoever it is that did me wrong will have to rectify it in some way at some other time. I don't have to do anything. It's a natural law.

All the nasty things I have said in this blog will need redressing by me too.

I am trying to fix my karmic bank balance for the future by not moaning all the time and feeeeling da luuv.

However!

In my new incarnation, I'd be hoping all the anti smokers be smokers.

That would be a good start.

Legislative Vengeance

Legislative vengeance is not my phrase, but I am stealing it! Thanks Jan. This idea covers what I feel is seeping into society drip by drip by drop.

I think it might be something to do with my generation. It was the sex, drugs and rock n roll generation. First it was Rock 'n Roll, Elvis Presley and Rebel without a Cause James Dean era. We were the first official teenagers. Before that there were just mini-adults. We became "problems" for kissing in the backs of cars, for drinking, for smoking, for having fun. We became consumers.  We grew up rebellious.

We needed to be heard  and we yelled loudly. We yelled for peace. We yelled for black rights, gay rights, women's rights. We yelled to stop censorship. We watched Deep Throat and Caligula anyway. We fell pregnant. We had our babies cruelly removed from us by moral vengeance. We Twisted the Night Away. Psychiatrists told us to "let it all hang out". Psychologists wrote books on how to bring up the babies we managed to keep or have in wedlock. We had hopes and dreams of a world of peace and a better way of life. We made waves, we disobeyed, and the Press followed our antics so our message spread. We changed things because we wanted a world with a better future. We bought into the system Bill Hicks warned us against.

We grew older and our children became the teenagers becoming an even more permissive, self-indulgent generation. By that time legislative vengeance coming along behind us, had made using drugs a "crime".  Instead of the Vietnam war  there was a new war - on drugs. A big lucrative industry of criminals and law enforcers and prisons to keep the new criminals in, grew up.

And simultaneously, a new kind of drug baron found it's power, the Big Drug Corporations put themselves together in the style of Big Tobacco, using the marketing blueprint/template familiarly used now by all Corporations. Toggle the press to your side and propagandise about our wants, fears and  weaknesses with "cures" and "solutions" and keep the fear alive at all costs. There is only room for allowed permissiveness and self-indulgences that promote the economy, and the "Bigs". Our children are now grown to middle age. They have been groomed by regulation and education to pass on legislative vengeance lifestyles that were started to control their parents. It is mainly my generation that perceives the abnormality of  the "normal" that "normal" is.

The new epidemiology makes sure that the groomed, manicured and manufactured politicians have science to back up the policies they are lobbied to promote. And also guarantees work for scientists funded by Big Pharma, Big Seed, Big Oil, Big War and Big Corporations

So our grandchildren are growing up in a world as equally repressed as the one we lived in. Their repression is less about morals or religion, and more about what has been proved by science to be good or bad for them. So they don't have to fight for gay rights,woman's rights or equality as it has already been changed by us. Their parents are the age group of our current boy politicians endorsing legislative vengeance against the rest of us, all backed up by science of course. Did that generation do anything outstandingly rebellious? Or did they just "follow orders".

It's up to the new generation to kick against their own repression. And I think they might. Already their parents (the obedient ones) are beginning to lose confidence in the epidemiological scare stories, twististic and hype pouring out in confusing piles of information from Corporation-funded scientists, the Media and Governments. The age group that I know who are 40 something are beginning to question, to notice, to perceive that some things presented to them, are not quite what they seem - are ludicrously opposite to previous information and they are awakening.

I am hoping their kids are listening to them awakening as they are being "scientised" at school and that their own sense of curiosity eventually will break through the brainwashing of the education system, and they will ask questions about good science and bad science and demand it be purified from all the corruption that has built up in it since grandparent's time. In this computer age,I am hoping that my grandchildren will question everything they are told, and question every law that has been passed the appears vengeful to some lifestyle. And mostly question the science that brought it into being.

I hope they will see through the complex a tangle of wrongfulness we live in, and get rid of it. That Corporate greed favouring shareholders instead of social responsibility becomes unfashionable. That using science with malicious intent to promote a cause becomes a punishable offence. That epidemiology becomes a real science that cannot be used to promote legislation, but is used for observation and education.

I expect my grandchildren to rebel and I'm working on it already!

The planet of duplicity and hypocrisy - thank God for the Internet

My husband sent me this link - The Best of Obama  - I think they are brilliant! Enjoy.

They show that us ordinary mortals have a sense that duplicity, hypocrisy and rediculosity rules our world - and the best of it is that the Internet is far more powerful at quickly sharing ideas than jongleurs and troubadours could in the middle ages - or music halls in the Victorian era.

Very uplifting rediculosity exposure.

The BBC - where do they get their statistics? 80% indeed!

Couldn't believe my ears! Just heard that 80%  of citizens in the UK want more wind farms according to a BBC poll.

Bwaaaahaaaaha. ROLF                                                  Aaaaaarrrrgggh   Surely not!

Why can't every roof be fitted with photovoltaic cells - or water driven generators be installed in our thousands of rivers - or tidal energy be used? And what about methane? Or geothermal energy?

It's always wind farms.

What about plain old coal!?

Instant response - furious request

Today, I took the dog for a walk because I was so uptight about a really weird and not-so-pleasant day. I went to the park, to relax.

But, we were terrorised by an idiot dog owner whose three adolescent Labradors raced round and round us loose of their leads. She might have thought they were cute - but I really was terrified. My own cute little dog has to be carefully protected because he might look like a Yorkshire Terrier, but he THINKS he's an Alsatian. As a rescue dog, something must have happened to him in the long distant past. The trigger to his rage is any dog that sniffs his neck. They can sniff any part they like and he's a friendly little  chap - but a neck-sniff does it. These three horrid Labradors leaping about and pawing looked like neck sniffers to me.

I yelled and screamed "b***** off" and "go away" in several languages I know. I heard the owner calling them to her.

I shouted "Put your dogs on their bloody leads!" And she did instantly.

That made me feel better.

A bloody good idea.

I am not super inelligent, not do I understand a lot of things. I sometimes get a good "gut feeling" and other times a bad one.

This lobbying bill must not pass - a blog today by big brother watch, made me think it would be one way to curb the influence of lobby groups - sock puppets - that have meddled with our Government for many years. In the UK, unlike other countries, there is no curb on them. I refuse to give money to charities that I know will use my money to make my life miserable like The Heart Foundation and The Cancer Charities that have overstepped their remit by spending it to lobby against smokers - and probably now against vapers. They are shamefully politically involved. Drinkers and fat people are begnning to feel the influence of the Righteous too.

" Some have reported on the concern that the bill could ‘gag’ charities." Well, as there are several very interfereing charities, sock puppets for the righteous and those who have without shame and without exposure, peddled smudged medical statistics as "science", made even challenging them not politically correct, advised the Government to put criminal nocebos on cigarette packs and caused the persecution of a raft of our citizens, I think that would be a bloody good idea!

If the fish smells bad, you need to look at the head

We have just been watching Plamegate. Very interesting movie.

"This event in American history is sometimes also referred to as the Plame Affair, Plame Scandal, or CIA leak scandal. Plamegate started in early 2003, when officials in the Bush administration leaked Plame's identity to members of the press, and the media promptly published information about Plame. The officials in the administration argued that the leak was accidental, while others suspected that it may have been deliberate.

Public attention as the scandal unfolded focused both on Valerie Plame and on her husband, Joseph Wilson, a former American ambassador. Wilson claimed that Plamegate began out of a desire for revenge, after he wrote a series of scathing opinion editorials in the New York Times about the lack of weapons of mass destruction in the Middle East. Wilson argued that the administration was angered by his attempt to undermine its justification for going to war in Iraq, and that it struck back by outing his wife's secret identity."

It is a fascinating glimpse at the corruption of power and Dubya's (and Tony Blair's) determination to attack Iraq. And how viciously people who tried to argue for truth were treated - Dr Kelly in the UK comes to mind for instance.

I have sat here wondering what is happening in the USA to prove the gas used in Syria was actually used by Assad when I have seen one or two reports that the rebels have admitted releasing it by accident. But there is nothing about that in the mainstream media.

Sarin was used by a rebel group in the Tokyo underground nearly twenty years ago - how did they get it in such "olden days"?

Something stinks. And my husband always says "if the fish stinks, you need to look at the head".