This writing is an excerpt of what easily gets lost on one of my bigger pages of pretext. I guess the pieces ancillary to the main bit will show that I want a thought spared for those interacting with those encouraged to seem so sure of themselves.
|
More to life than this ... (Modified through 1-5 Feb 2009) This is a more fully constructed response of mine to a blog entry on a BBC documentary (referenced below) concerning sex, disability and social exclusion : - in retrospect, in a sense it was much more of a discussion restricted to the main focus of others on sex work, but I was one who tried to go from there. Maybe for many, the topic is never really about sex work, but it is easier to say so. I just feel that people are squandering away the very sensitivity that they're crying out to have recognized as being within themselves. Readers may put up with this piece for longer if they realise that I acknowledge that broader views exist, towards the end of my writing. Other pages on the rest of my websites, may lend a gentler, and more credible context, to remarks that may seem to come out of nowhere on this page and are seemingly given undue emphasis here. ____ I offer up the following interpretations, and it will be seen that I am perhaps not removed enough to have my comments taken in isolation from how I have been affected as described accordingly. ____ In all my 35yrs with a lifelong disability that prevents me from walking, speaking clearly, and feeding myself, deep, deep, down, I'm sorry, but I just cannot understand the real issues here regarding sex, as one often finds attempted where disability matters are discussed, as applying carte blanche to all crips really. Um, I've read material on the so-called issue 'til it comes out my ears, but I just don't quite get it. Sure, I've been as lonely, confused and as frustrated as hell coz I've been so passed over on occasion for all sorts of things, but ... um ... ain't that just coz I'm human? I think the issue is quite tainted by a natural curiosity that, in effect, has us revisiting it over and over and over again, wondering just what is the issue. Make no mistake, though, the practicalities, and the emotions, can all be tough. Tougher for some more than others, I guess. That is, if I sound self-contradictory, I'll put it down to just my rash and lax treatment now of a lot of what I know can take up so much time before getting one's head around it. It had been an aspect of broader quagmires that I once found myself really struggling with. I've stopped all that reading years ago, and life just became so much fuller for different reasons - I come back into disability matters, and bang, what people are concerned about kinda, well, made me sad. Who wants someone who only looks at the surface? And surely, once you're with someone, working things out becomes part of a bigger rewarding journey. Twenty years for me, changing legislation in the NZ case, and so when "they" are still going on about prostitutes in particular, I need a lie down. Yawn. I'm just plain bored and wanna doze off...! I realise it's often considered different when it seems having a full-blown relationship is far from one's mind. Otherwise though, perhaps harping over matters physical and logistical and on public acceptance is a good way to sometimes avoid a concurrent maintaining of emotional growth and maturity. I do respect though, that this is kind of blaming the victim in the circumstances when such growth and maturity has never been an issue. But then, I think it can easily become one again. Still, as in the whole population, we're all different. I've done a bit of reading on how confused one gets too, when one grows up with lotsa people always insisting that they know what your feelings are, even better than you do. We can protest all we want about this, and run from it, but the ramifications when this happens early in a lot of our development, I think, takes understanding in order to subdue. This can also affect what we encounter when broaching intimacy, if we let it. The blog on the documentary was a big excuse for me to say how I've seen so many damned defences go up, and I wonder if crip advocates see this as a priority concern in their view. If anything should be, I'd say it is the most likely candidate in my mind. This defensiveness is extremely sad to witness in an individual you really do want to surround with an undeniably honest love, and who has obviously had to deal with a lot in life. Indeed, one wants to be there when another allows themselves to find that superficial impositions from the outside world just don't matter in the face of a calming that can be shared in, if I may get away with awkwardly saying so. As one corallary, it is in such mind that I, with motor co-ordination difficulties from cerebral palsy, don't mean to run roughshod over those whose other impairments present other potential challenges. Each other, is what matters. Whether it's possible, I know what it's like to just end up wanting to give anything, to pacify a loved one's fears. It was scaring me to think that I could be as defensive as I've known others to be instead. That we all have the potential to really hurt one another, is not really considered empowering information. It needs to be elaborated that there is another side of the coin to having aspects of ourselves not given due consideration. This is that ourselves and those we interact with can be hurt and damaged through a lack of knowledge we could otherwise have. I don't think the arguments I've seen are advanced in such a way. To be clear, I personally understand very well that stage of just wanting a quick bonk. It has scared me for years that I may be turning into a puritanical old sour pus ('scuse the terrible pun which I don't like either). Having said all that, nowadays I thoroughly appreciate the BBC blog comments of two posters in particular, reviewing the documentary that has raised the discussion I'm drawing from. Like them, I now would agree that it is a strange form of self-confidence that this man in the BBC documentary talks about receiving from sex workers. I try to explore what such self-confidence is, in a section lower down on this page, but it indeed proved futile to me to find much depth to what was being argued. When younger, it made some initial and cursory sense to me for others to think like the client in the documentary too with regards to self-confidence. However, the visceral reaction I had when hearing someone I loved spout the same beliefs that he was soon to advance on behalf of many, while looking right past me lying beside him, had me questioning far too much about my own feelings that for years I had pretended didn't matter. I grew tired of convincing myself that it would do, and I kept trying. Amongst very complex emotions that at that stage I couldn't make head nor tails over, I hated the thought that I was just being some judgmental and moralistic old prude. Subjected to neverending demands from someone steeped within what served them well to the eyes of the outside world, I had to question just what I was feeling. It seems I wanted the chance to offer the man I was with other ways of seeing, but, I knew it wouldn't get through to him. I wondered if anyone could. Indeed, he could have thought the same of me. If independence meant being so shutdown, unaffected and unwilling to entertain where feelings could develop, then my world had just stopped making any sense. But was I just being too weak to manage how life was? Another friend of mine used to tease me about how I could use prostitutes, as he had seen a girl on TV with CP testify to doing this. Outside I would laugh, inside, I felt like I was crumbling to bits. No, it wasn't me moralising, I was just hurt that apparently, I wouldn't ever be enough for someone. What I once was proud to think of as my rationality, really was beginning to escape me... "Don't let me drown, drown, drown Of course sex workers can be very caring individuals in their own right, but it just so happens that their services do not include imparting much knowledge on relationship skills(!). Without wanting to, I also slowly realised that I'd be very turned off if approached by someone who reckons he's acquired his confidence with women through using prostitutes. To give such a view a second thought sounds bizarre to me right now as I type it out, but that was the rationale that friends have tried to argue. Also wrapt up in compoundingly convoluted ideas about what constitutes and signifies one's independence, I believe I became too used to this mindset for too long. Today, with other considerations about sex work set aside and wherever anything is legal, however, I'd still maintain that crips have just as much right to be as dopey as the next sucker. What seems much more important for me to keep mentioning instead as I have above, is that there could often be a lack in recognizing that just like everyone else, we need access to guidance in caring about the emotional wellbeing of ourselves and others. This maybe even moreso when someone's sexuality is underacknowledged, as is claimed. If we're still talking education somewhere, somehow, I'll repetitively insist that any understanding a person undertakes of their own sexuality surely must include their potential to impact on others. Given how I've known others to think it must be said that of course no one can be ultimately responsible for every little contingency in the way others may react in any given situation. What I'm trying to mention as a message to pass on is more to do with how, within a context that at times manifests as sexual expression, the individuals involved are possibly entrusting each other with what could be some of the most vulnerable aspects of what makes them whoever they are. That is, whoever they are at a given stage in time (- I do not believe that anyone's "identity" is really fixed, but that's a different subject yet again). For those seeming to look for whatever they'd regard as greater awareness and understanding, I hope they never give up looking both ways. Other people, including a higher likelihood of some who happen to be living with a variation of the same influences too, can end up with even a greater sense of irony in understanding what has not been realised.
__________
I don't doubt that I expanded on this following footnote a little unnecessarily. I think past arguments are harder to capture as I age. A claim was that independence meant you didn't need anyone. With blistering disgust, I have had the nature of that comment levelled at me in very pained tones. Aimed at me as if I was clueless about concepts that were integral to what I was as a person too, the reaction always made me feel so shoved aside, and like I had no place to share alongside those who mean a lot to me. It shook me unspeakably to hear things being said with such indignation whenever I got close to a number of people that I've tried with a lot of effort to let into my life. I knew that angst I was at the receiving end of wasn't what anyone wanted, and until I got so run down that I could no longer get back up as I used to, I was waiting for a chance to show how I think I actually understood.
- Wonderful one, Jimmy Page & Robert Plant I did want to be able to demonstrate how I'm capable of arriving at what I do, just generally, and for whatever it's worth. To find what objectification was in my own terms, was a reward I probably don't emphasize very well here, and I might not know how to.
On and off, I could still remember what could be taken as a loophole in what I've just written on aspects concerning sexuality and ideas about self-confidence, and I'd rather acknowledge that more clearly to some extent that logic can be used with such matters. Anyone may only scan this piece of writing, and I only hope this doesn't chase them away from my site altogether, but I did want to get as much detail down for myself to have some semblance of coherency and give some feeling for where my thinking has come from. I've taken the opportunity to mention many things related, and the writing would probably be more digested if the wider terms that I mention are accepted.
I'm discussing aspects of sexuality here, but am actually tending to ramifications that I think range far wider.
A form of disclaiming the "Our People" locution With the topic of prostitution, I continue to write only for the sake of simplicity as if unmentioned matters surrounding the subject are not problematical. Furthermore, all my commentary is really only written for when disabled people are expected to be a homogenous group. It is largely only in reply to that, that I respond above and below in kind in order to make sense within the terms created. If I'm just setting up strawmen, people will find this out for themselves. [People have been through hurt times, and I eventually go off on just a conceptual joyride. I do not know why I do this. It maybe for my own sanity. Perhaps this was not the subject on which to revive a very rusty writing technique, either. One can find as many people who say that crips are the best placed to comment on such matters, and in numerous others, as there are those like me who'll realise I'm just taking a stab like anyone else may think they could. Those of the former opinion only seem to end up hearing from mob rule, so here I keep going instead for a while longer coz maybe someone has to fit the criteria, to have a greater chance of throwing the spanner in to break things up. To be brutally honest, and to mention as the only way I can see left to not patronize at times, it almost seems to me like I've started to get very tired of talking in monosyllables and in framing things for the people I usually find myself around. That sort of describes what I can get to feeling ; it is surreal and an absurd anathema to me. Nonetheless, and on the other hand, yes, of course, I can see the unnecessary padding for those who aren't too fussed with nuances. I hope it becomes fairer to say that my writing is far more a worry about my own abilities, and in knowing that I can put thoughts together, rather than a reflection on others who are used to different ways of expression that suit them. In the next breath after not wanting interference in all manner of things, it is still hard not to go to someone who also cries out for not being listened to, when maybe I've known something similar myself. I've since come to know mine as a completely human reaction, but am still conscious of becoming unduly protectionist if I'm not careful. Being human, is what I think this is all about. I used to buckle under being told by friends with disabilities that I'd only be turning my back on myself, and people who'd understand me the most, if I walked away from them and their messages. They said bitterly, that everyone else did. It's at that point, where I would swear I could almost see the masks come off and hear voices quaver. I didn't want to do what I now understand what others eventually had to. Hell, did people have to do this with me too? If so, what a horrible situation I have put people in. On one hand, I have struggled a lot at times with not casting the fears of my friends' aside, trying to address matters seriously and comprehensively, yet as I see these more for what these are to me now, grapple with finding that much substance to address. I try, and in counteraction to any patronizing tinge, have recounted with frustration as to why I continue writing once the main gist also makes it clear and evident that perhaps more detail is indeed not worth it anyway... I guess people are often angry at how disabled people can be treated, and I find it sad to realise that this anger is not balanced out for some amidst the innovative ways we do get to live viably and in appreciation of the insights into life that we do find. I guess that can sound terrible to those who really do have to live life hard. Another part of me never wants to lose sight that the upset of my friends, in itself, is genuine. My joy at seeing where I have ended up with my words is pretty futile really. Is it in lieu of not being able to reach out, no matter what I try, to impart that life is worth far more than the anger I've seen? Recognition of the sheer humanity involved comes into play for me here. ] "Time to take her home, her dizzy head is conscience-laden" - The big easy For several times yet, I will sound hung-up and preoccupied by returning to the same central topic in this writing. I want to be as thorough as I can, to really do my dash. I do roll my eyes reading through this myself. But the detail is here now for any such time there could be a need to be as discerning, having thrashed it all out - Some educative licence So maybe I am confused. It is not clear if it's the responses of their own bodies they need more assurance of, or whether they... ugh.... I dunno... Do they think someone with practiced technique really does fare that much better with another later on?! Is that what they're trying to imply? Going from what was saddening experience in conversations about disability including the topic of using prostitutes, I think I could be excused for the times I've given up on trying to have my comments taken as gentle offers of ways that may assist in changing tack. I absolutely had given up on trusting that my own loneliness shows that I don't mean to just make a meal of how others are discouraged with their life. I've had people say that I sound so up myself, that I couldn't possibly know a fraction of what they've been through. I believe I have been hurt enough in the past though, and there is ample evidence of this in my very writing. I've allowed such subtext to be. I worry about young kids being under the influences I've written about, but also of those now older, caught up in the mindsets of the most strong-willed. Growing up, crips like me are often told even by parents and teachers, to admire and listen to such go-getters with a disability, and to adopt some of their attitudes. Just like any individuals I could have met, some of those who I've thus admired as being so lively and letting nothing like their disability stand in their way, I've found could still have a detrimental effect in my life. It's just not even considered, how a lot of honest confusion and indeed a lack of developmental support, could reveal itself in ways other than what the very individuals affected can see. People can become masters of looking so in control, proficient and competent on the surface. It was more than in a few circumstances where alarm bells would ring for me when friends much older than I have assured me that they're only seeking physical satisfaction from paid transactions, but then go on to say very wistfully that it will get them ready for a fuller relationship... If an element of the latter argument is that people are only trying to relax and feel more comfortable with their own body, it seems to me that such an argument is not being elaborated properly for the discussion that some people are supposedly screaming out for. I've heard someone try to argue that paying for sex helps them relax and focus on other things when out with a prospective partner. I've no idea if any such postulated self-confidence also goes into helping with other features of life instead, somehow. Notably, I never have been given a strong impression that this confidence somehow magically transforms into greater interpersonal skills in a way like no other. Are the best interests of youth foremost in the minds of those all the while wanting to give such support and guidance? I can't emphasize enough my awareness that going on about what I do, doesn't seem to speak well for me either, I don't think. Indeed, I'm still following this through for the sake of showing that I've done so, tried to listen, and don't think I found all that much. In casual discussion easily found, guidance of younger disabled people is all pushed along as integral to the general matter of acceptance of themselves as sexual. Amongst wider matters which could well warrant consideration and should not be dispelled similarly, it cannot be said that the proponents of paid sex services specifically go to pains to be open about what at best seems to be their ambiguous contention about confidence gains. Again, this suprises me to hear it implicitly accepted that more than just physical pleasure is involved. Although in one way more realistic, I also feel this invites my criticism for when recourse to matters declared as being solely physical in nature are selectively given to suit, as is common in some form on occasion as in the wider population too. When this comes from someone older, and wrapt up in terms of being disabled, I first wondered if such was a unique situation in kind.
The dogma of going back to contribute to the young ones - I wasn't mature enough to see past what I now plainly disregard. I thought I owed it to others who feel so unheard, to listen harder. The following actually doesn't give much gain for the effort - My own tedium sets in. If taken seriously at all, what I've known to be contemplated as necessary wholesale "awareness" by such proponents convinced of confidence gains from sex work, I think demands a compelling need for as much clarity as can be to be avaliable for the sake of the impressionable. I continue this part of the discussion on whatever is meant by education and awareness, largely only to prevent emphasis from remaining with what can be distractive. The glibness with which I write is indeed a reflection of the type of dialogue I've been frequently drawn into. At times I see worth in documenting this in itself as I am doing, but I really don't like how laboured this sounds. Whilst still systematically going through the commonly mentioned ramifications to be sure, I'll say that I think there is a formidable responsibility involved in acknowledging where generalities don't apply in order for the younger ones among us to develop their own understandings. I began to write that arguments over any possible gain in self-confidence claimed to go towards future relationships through paid services as discussed here, may detract from other kinds of information that of course should be deseminated. Advocacy which ignores how a young mind can be appealed to and swayed, indeed needs to be noted as easily obfuscating the commonly associated knowledge to impart of what can constitute part of a healthy sexuality alongside. I thought that perhaps since there will always be someone convinced of sex work being instrumental to the disabled, it just has to be inherent in the nature of what seems to still end up being discussed. So I repeat that, I had kept wondering why differences in opinion were not acknowledged as such by anyone wanting to act on a concern that there is guidance to be given. I had proposed it could be more dangerous to gloss over that there are different contentions people will come across. My concern is that shirking aside that other ideas exist, is one way of not respecting that an audience has it's own mind, and this is another thing that youth can be particularily sensitive to. However, as I wrote more, I grew. I can see how it'd take someone more qualified to run through suggestions like mine of what could be passed on. It goes without saying that there is always the need to be age-appropriate if attempting to offer advice, and I write with that as understood, not that I have specifically tried to state much pertaining to strict age groups. Although I am, I don't like leading any reader through all of what I've known others to still insist on having spelt out before they'll listen to anything else. I once believed that all this spelling out would eventually win trust enough to be heard. But now it can be seen how tangled-up and convoluted a response becomes in itself. I get to the point of feeling I'm just too mixed up to know what I'm saying. I've never totally discounted such a possibility completely. I don't ever want to be too sure of myself. I know a bit more now, even just by virtue of how I'm finding words difficult to come by, how sensible it is to just keep reticent on this whole issue. This is my own personal blather, and I would want a far wider one to be handed down instead, with personal experiences only duly informing the content. If I really had to, I think I still could advocate at this point that any understandings that are to be imparted have to be given without simply grandstanding. That is, neither through wontonly value-laden snide remarks under muttered breath, nor with a gee-whizz-listen-to-what-is-amazingly-possible approach that only has me more concerned as to why anyone should seem suprised that crips can engage in the full realm of human behaviour.
The suprise really denies, I think, the higher likelihood that aspects in anyone's life will become unbalanced when it becomes a life of forever proving one's self in ways so much that an ostensive sense is all that is deemed necessary. I suggest that attention only to what others can value and appreciate, detracts from the underlying processes it takes to properly sustain the satisfying and fulfilling life that others would end up usually seeing, just as a byproduct when more substance does exist.
"I'm gone take your packaged rebellion and move on" - Packaged rebellion, Anthrax
Finally finding what objectification is as my writing deteriorates further over the same old ground as though I've never been heard
The empathy rings true as to why I found departure difficult - For those heralding that paid services have merits, and who can be loud with an expressed wish that others be helped, I'd again ask exasperatingly why they don't seem to be interested in having their contentions explored beyond rhetoric. My writing has shown that I now don't wonder why those I've known personally are just left complaining about not being trusted to spread their views more widely along with what could be more legitimate to impart. Their resolute assuredness in what they say is needed, I suggest is a strong reflection of construals that have never been teased out. Part of me can see that dismissing the viewpoints involved will keep lending a cause to the anger and defensiveness I've seen. Contentions may need to be left aside, but I do still wish an understanding could be imparted which would be felt and accepted as genuine. In saying so, I think this just touches the heart of a wider mire - people whose experiences have taught them to be extremely wary of those who say they care, for fear of pitying, smothering and a loss of control. I once saw it developing in myself, and don't think I'm exaggerating. Humans utter value-laden judgments everytime we speak, and I've always made it my job to be wary of the unnecessary damage thus possibly entailed. I'm not pretending that can be escaped, only that it can be balanced out alongside more knowledge inevitably always emerging. I think this has to be understood by those insisting that others be less emotive, implying that they themselves aren't so affected. I've seen the reverse amply demonstrated, and have only experienced virtuol when I've tried as sincerely as I can to listen despite any bomblast. As I've said, enabling people to relax and feel more comfortable with themselves once was the last argument that may have left me more sympathetic to those claiming that paid sexual services are arguably benefcial to the long term wellbeing of some, rather than merely for pleasure. With respect, I still insist that the poor formulation of many discussions that I have heard on what I write about here has led me to wonder why I continued to give these any credit at all in the past.
There is an irony where I am trying to sound as rational as possible, when I venture that much of the issue here is pretty much how a full humanity ~ with all it's inconsistencies ~ can go unnoticed. When people can't see that others can hurt in different ways, I think this painfully suggests what was glaring at me too for a long while before I understood there was a lot eating me up inside. The unique and the general just get so confused that proportion and perspective can so easily slip away. The mode of having to block off so much in order to get on with our lives, shuts us down from sharing all that it has taken for each other to get so far. Aren't we just denying ourselves of the very possibilities of closeness and comfort that all humans need an ability to acknowledge and accept, when our world just refuses to make sense anymore? Rather than any specific content, in my case, I used to find myself in shouting matches on understandings of independence and freedom, each of us crying out to have another understand. Even once calmer, the arguments don't seem to be explored beyond such a point. It is due to how impassioned I've found convictions at their height, that I find it strange that nothing more comprehensive is added further once the calm returns. My admittedly very subjective opinion, is that no one seeks more reason after matters reach the point where there are these outbursts.
Returning to how sex work and the needs of the disabled can get construed, I feel reducing the issues simplistically down to just an
overriding one of morality as often happens in even the less heated discussions, is nevertheless so distracting, outdated
and misguided. One tries not to view the naivete I've found, firstly
amongst friends I care for very much, as indicating what it perhaps indeed
does. That is, I am indeed proposing that the result of the protests I've known is a manifestation of an
irretractable hurt and confusion that has built up as the years have past.
What am I if I feel sorrow for those who I know can be thoroughly and
justifiably disgusted by such sentiment? I'm aware that in the context of
my writing, the way I'm now mentioning in this last piece about what I've
seen in friends, may seem a little ad hoc to some. For others, it
has had it's precedent when I wrote about both defensiveness, and what I
find questionable with group mentalities [see above].
Indeed though, I am extremely saddened that misunderstandings even have people feeling the need to claim that they have a sexuality. The blogsites below show this happening. I concur that this indicates what a bizarre state this sometimes comes down to. Of course this could still present itself as a situation to advocate for a whole slew of more informed approaches, with both the individual and society. It also needs to be asked how people become feeling so alienated. Meeting with such rage doesn't help, it seems to me that a far better robust understanding needs to be instilled where the sheer ignorant who believe tripe about the disabled are simply dismissed. That is, rather than say, backing demands for a feelgood public education programme (those demands always do the rounds...). I've found blips where a portrayal on television doesn't equate with what someone comes across themselves, can do more damage and just get in the way. For example, some people with my condition are affected intellectually, and I've seen people initially encouraged by some sort of promotion, then return to set ideas that become even more entrenched, once they've been confronted with a variation they didn't expect. That doesn't end up helping any of us (maybe it helps some disabled people who don't contend with such daily changes in muscle tone and communicative expression). Being told to assert yourself in a climate where everyone is told that they should understand because that's what the campaign says to do, doesn't really necessitate an underlying understanding of what is, that one can just let be. The popular view is to not let things get too "medical", but an informed bit of biology, physiology, neurology, endocrinology, psychology, anthropology, sociology and forms of critical thinking, has helped me as a person. I would draw from the same bases if I was able-bodied. Sanctioned views from disability politics does not frown on this being done, strictly speaking, but the interpretations wielded far-and-wide, often condemn a reliance on more "disciplined knowledge" that I just use when it does seem to apply. I just happen to have such-and-such a condition as part of whatever else shapes me. If I have had the luxury of education, as I've had people imply, well, I also feel clamped down upon for just offering some ways I've seen myself around some matters. Should I really risk being trampled on further and labelled absolutely uncaring and thoughtless in trying to actually endorse the importance of ensuring the very best of education, and point out how critcal thinking skills can reach out in ways simply not envisaged for a special needs child at the very outset? I feel like I've been gagged, and branded as uncaring, just because I haven't been able to conclude at times with more sanctioned views. Then, in the very next breath, friends turn on me further in disgust at my apparent lack of "independence", and in not thinking of the young ones who I could be otherwise giving to. I am sorry that my hurt from this itself distracts me from how I could contribute, firstly by articulating myself better. I find I am with my very own convolutions. But there it is. I'm human too.
Obscure to my virtual core - The nature of the way I've heard arguments usually made over how sex workers can boost a client's confidence, may mean that I am not recognizing those who would understand what I now do dismiss outright and are still somehow able to make some case that sounds contrary to the bulk of what I've arrived at. I can see how such other perspectives perhaps involving sex workers are possible; like when emotions are accepted as something to work in with rather than block off, and like when matters of self-confidence are held as too abstract to have effects as clearly controllable as we'd like to think possible. I largely hold no well thought out opinion upon these perspectives that I see worth in writing about for what really matters here. But moreover and again when a link is haphazardly assumed to exist so directly between sex work and self-confidence gains in relating, it should be stated that even my commentary is often given as if other surrounding matters to do with others who would be involved then or later, largely don't exist. Maybe a consequence of acknowledging this would now override the other perspectives involving sex workers that I have only alluded to. An instance where both of a couple are very disabled, is one of a different circumstance, again. Likewise, who knows of other contingencies that I haven't considered...? I guess I've only wanted to make available what I have considered here.I've sensed the confusion that others have in not being listened to, and I think that my own repetitiveness is reflecting a stage where I was not being heard in turn. I'd still like to suggest that the problems I've known aren't the ones others see a need to address. ____ I'll add that a bias of mine is from finding out in various other ways how easy it is to believe that one is treating others well, and be so convinced we're doing no harm, just by treating those fully in our lives as we would with only the common courtesy we have usually for those we pass by while getting from A to B. Maybe that is one of the messages that needs to be made clear. It's what we would all know when we hear it, and is usually not applied in such a way that it could be here. It's boring really ... I hate that I've treated a lot of extremely wonderful friends in my life in a similar way. ____ With thanks to Red Nicholson's walkingisoverrated.com for a chance to give a more varied opinion however mine are warped. Through him, I also met up again with Philip at diversityworks. I would really go straight to the BBC blogsite if you've time to waste. All of the posters have a lot more clues than I about being succinct!!! Much of what was said was actually in congruence with me. It seems I'm just used to being bombarded with the opposite angles. True to form, I did go to bed early on the night the programme aired in NZ, straight after dinner, and saw nothing! I'm old. "I would like to know why you cage a bird aflight feathers bright to show your might" - My song, |