Binge Drinking Parents

According to the Children's Commissar, Maggie Atkinson, 1 in 3 children live with a binge drinker.

Something Must Be Done!

Think of the Children!


I heard her being interviewed and she insisted this was what children were telling her- whilst parroting phrases that I've never heard anyone who is not a professional busybody utter. It turns out that these phrases were uttered by children in focus groups- given that even with adults focus groups tend to say what the person in charge wants them to say and the people in charge were professional busybodies, this isn't a surprise.

While I do not doubt that alcohol is the cause, or at least the catalyst, for a lot of social problems, it does not seem plausible that 1 in 3 children live with a binge drinker and that a ludicrously inflated figure is being used for the purpose of scaremongering. And sure enough the definition of binge drinking is men who have more than eight drinks on one session or women who have more than 6.

No definition of what a "drink" is, but I suspect that they are referring to units because the definition of binge drinking given by other bodies is 8 units for men and 6 for women. That is about three glasses of wine for a woman or three pints of beer for man. I often "binge" under this definition- having up to 12 units over the course of about 6 or 7 hours on a weekend day every so often. Yet I don't consider myself to be a binge drinker, as I drive home and beat my terrified family in an alcohol fueled rage..... or not.


The report does not say how often this one has to binge to be classified as a binge drinker either- is having three sherries over Christmas Day a danger?


Yet the Childrens' Commissioner uses figures derived from these kind of definitions to imply that scenarios like this are endemic in Britain:

‘“I need somewhere safe to go quickly when mum starts drinking and cutting herself but where can I go?”

That is a quote by a young person in the report. To which the only response is "Holy Shit! Your Mum has a problem". But it is not the kind of behaviour that is associated with three glasses of wine once in a while.


Either they should give honest statistics for the number of problem drinkers or illustrate the issue with examples that are more likely among "binge drinking" parents. But quotes like:

"Some times my Dad comes home with a takeaway before falling asleep for half an hour in the arm chair" 

 Would not generate much interest.

Think Of The Children

 Child cage fight organisers will not face police action- 

I suspect that calls for prosecution are because mixed martial arts is a relatively new discipline rather than because of the inherent dangers posed given that the same publications that condemn it are happy to give space to promote youth boxing, which also has the potential to cause real damage.

Failing Upwards

The foster carer who was struck off for "allowing" the 16 year old girl in her care to convert from Islam to Christianity has won her appeal against the decision. This is of course good news as it was a disgraceful decision by Gateshead Council in the first place- the idea that state bodies should consider it their duty to uphold religious strictures against apostasy is extraordinary- but this is one of the most depressing sentences you will see:

Gateshead’s decision was quashed by a court in Leeds last week, prompting criticism of the former head of its children’s services, Maggie Atkinson, who is now Children’s Commissioner for England.

The sort of people responsible for this kind of thing aren't simply a few bad apples, they are the people who are so respected in their field that they get promoted to national roles where they can influence policy.

The carer isn't the only victim in all this, they actually took another child whom she was caring for back into care, which given the outcomes for children in care is tantamount to child abuse, yet the person responsible for this is now the "Children's Commissioner" supposedly upholding the interests of children.

Awesome Suction Power

What 13 year old boy would create a device which has incredible suction power, then use it to climb walls?


via

It's For Children.

Whilst I agree with whoever it was that described Stephen Fry as "a stupid person’s idea of what an intelligent person is like", he's not wrong here:

: 'It's just shocking. The only dramas the BBC will boast about are Merlin and Doctor Who, which are fine but they're children's programmes. They're not for adults.

Exactly right. I saw adults complaining that the new Dalek design was obviously aimed at children, to which the only reasonable response is "well duh". The only occasionally adult aspects to the show are when the writers try to shoehorn in unsubtle political propaganda.

There are very few high quality programmes aimed at adults on British television, particular with dramas.

Wizbit

For some reason I had an urge to look up something about 1980s TV show, Wizbit, today. I think the Wikipedia entry raises some important points about the internal contradictions of the show:

Although it was stated in the show that Wizbit's year-and-a-day mission was to find out all about planet Earth, this clashed somewhat with the events witnessed on screen. Wizbit was (apparently) to learn about everyday life on earth by solving puzzles in a town inhabited by walking, talking (and often singing) sponge-balls, dice, magic wands, playing cards and 7-foot-tall (2.1 m) rabbits.

I feel so stupid for not having spotted that 20 years ago.

Caviar For Every Child

According to the "Left Foot Forward" blog, Michael Gove is the "regressive of the week" for:

scrapping Labour’s plans to lift 50,000 of the poorest children out of poverty, failing to extend free school meals to 500,000 of the poorest working families. The move will cost families up to £600 more a week – the equivalent of an extra penny in income tax per child.

Leaving aside the shamelessness of complaining about cuts when you supported the policies that made them inevitable just consider the figures.

Who the hell spends £600 a week on school meals? Given that children are only at school 5 days a week, LFF must believe that spending £120 a day on food is reasonable, I realise that the site's main man Will Straw is the son of an MP but even for MPs that's excessive.

Ok it does say the cost is per family, and many families have more than one child. Even then though if you assume that an acceptable lunch costs about a fiver (probably less actually) one would need to have around 24 school age children to be spending £120 a day.

Latest Human Right Discovered

He asked: "If it's thought that it's the right of adults to see drama that reflects their lives, then why isn't that a right for children too?

It's not a right of adults to see drama that reflects their lives, so the premise of the question is wrong. Although if it is a human right then charging for the licence fee must be a violation of that right.

Anyway the fuss over American culture being represented by children's television programmes to the point of crowding out British culture seems misplaced. First of all there is precious little incentive to make programmes for children when advertising to them is heavily restricted. Secondly this sort of cultural exchange works both ways, the success of Harry Potter has probably influenced American culture at least as much as British culture has been influenced by American imports. I don't see any complaints about that though.

via Atlantic Crossings

The Curse Of Brown Strikes Again.

He really is bad luck.

Think Of The Children. (Unless You Are On The Register)

Compulsory CRB checks for anyone who has any official contact with children ever seems like a waste of time to me. Aside from discouraging adults from having any interaction with children, it doesn't seem like a particularly effective method of protecting children in any case.

There are around 16 million children in Britain, let's suppose that there are around 15 million parents of children ( a very rough estimate of course but that doesn't matter for now). Assuming that maybe 1 in 15 of them wishes to get involved with helping children other than their own that would require 1 million CRB checks each year. This is a guesstimate but it seems like a reasonable ball park figure. Each test costs around £30, so let's say the total cost of all this is £30 million (not including the cost of lost volunteers).

Meanwhile there are around 30000 people on the sex offenders register. Why not take the £30 million and add £1000 per known offender in additional funding, for monitoring the people on the register? With that money they could easily carry out a number of random spot checks on each known offender throughout the year, in addition to the sex offender monitoring that already occurs.

Since it is effectively impossible to check every single person who has access to children in any case the whole thing amounts to trying to catch water with a sieve in any case and risks creating false complacency about child safety by pretending that comprehensive monitoring is possible when it is not and probably never will be.

The Return Of Chucky

The Sun are trying to revive one of the silliest stories of the 1990s- the claim that the killers of James Bulger were inspired by the horror film Child's Play. Apparantly the two brothers age 10 and 11, who tortured two other children, were also inspired by the film:

SICK horror movie Child's Play, which the "Hell boys" watched, has been linked to a catalogue of crimes.

A female relative of the evil lads revealed their mum had let them watch the 18-cert slasher film when they were aged just "six or seven".

I can see the pattern here, they watched Child's Play and just half a decade later they tortured some kids, therefore Child's Play causes children to attack other children because nothing else might have happened in a brief five year period.

I haven't seen Child's Play and I haven't attacked any children- how much more proof do you need of the perils of the evil film?

Bad Fads.

'Nurtureshock' looks like an interesting book on fads in education, judging by the review:

the psychologist Nathaniel Brandon published a path-breaking paper in 1969 called "The Psychology of Self-Esteem" in which he argued that feelings of self-worth were a key to success in life. The theory became a big hit in the nation's schools; in the mid-1980s, the California Legislature even ­established a self-esteem task force. By now, there are 15,000 scholarly articles on the subject.

And what do they show? That high self-esteem doesn't improve grades, reduce ­anti-social behavior, deter alcohol drinking or do much of anything good for kids. In fact, telling kids how smart they are can be ­counterproductive. Many children who are convinced that they are little geniuses tend not to put much effort into their work. Others are troubled by the latent anxiety of adults who feel it necessary to praise them constantly.

The benefits of teaching tolerance and promoting ­diversity look equally unimpressive in the current ­research. According to "NurtureShock," a lot of well-meaning adult nostrums—"we're all friends," "we're all equal"—pass right over the heads of young children. Attempts to increase racial sensitivity in older students can even lead to unintended consequences. One ­researcher found that "more diversity translates into more divisions between students." Another warns that too much discussion of past discrimination can make minority children over-reactive to perceived future slights. As for trying to increase emotional intelligence, the education fad of the 1990s, it doesn't seem to ­promote "pro-social values" either. It turns out that bullies use their considerable EQ, as it is called, to ­control their peers.

So telling how wonderful children are makes them complacent and banging on about diversity heightens racial divisions (the second point probably applies equally to adults). The amazing thing is that there are people who will be shocked by this.

I suspect that it isn't so much self esteem that is damaging but unmerited self esteem where someone is praised for no good reason and seldom criticised for any reason at all..

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Never Too Young For Extreme Sports.

Indian baby dropping.

The School Vetting Affair.

It's the story everyone is talking about-or were talking about yesterday- the decision by Phillip Pullman and other children's authors to refuse to submit to the governments vetting procedure for people who visit schools. I asked some of the leading figures in the debate to explain their positions:

Phillip Pullman, Children’s Author:

I’m sorry whilst I do appreciate that this scheme must apply to the little people, but do you know who I am? As Britain’s leading children’s author I shouldn’t be made to feel that I am being treated like a sex offender, or even worse an ordinary member of the public. It is preposterous and degrading.

We children’s authors should be exempt from the Vetting and Barring scheme, and we should also get a free pass for avoiding airport security and using the bus lane during the rush hour.

Ed Balls, Schools Secretary:

I understand the frustration felt by writers like Mr Pullman, but child safety is the number one priority for this Labour government. In my role as a cabinet minister I visit many schools and have been frankly dismayed at some of the people who hang out near them. At one recent visit to { name of school deleted in order to deter sex offenders} I often see sinister looking men lurking in the corridors with bulging eyes staring who terrify the children. I have since asked for all mirrors to be removed in future.

Beatrix Campbell OBE, Child Protection Expert:

If it is worth letting someone check your body and examine the contents of your bag at an airport, then it is worth letting the computer check whether you've committed crimes against children before you are allowed to attract their attention in their schools.

However as I have previously demonstrated most police officers in Britain are part of a giant conspiracy to abuse children and are likely to allow their fellow satanists off scot free. Therefore we need a more reliable method to ascertain whether unconvicted sex offenders like Mr Pullman are guilty. As we need an objective method that can't be compromised. If Pullman really wants to skulk around in schools then he should register with social services then we can set up a system where he will be tied to a chair and dunked in a lake- it is well known that Satanists float in these circumstances.


Maud Flanders, Cartoon Character:

The Children!!!! Won't someone please think of the children?

Gary Glitter, Musician:

Whilst Philip Pullman rightly raises the inconvenience cause to innocent people like him, the impact of the Vetting Scheme is felt even more strongly by us actual sex offenders. Instead of being able to wonder into schools to talk to/ molest the children we now have do so outside of school premises.

Julie Bindel, Lunatic:

The voices protecting someone like Pullman who I am not accusing of any crime are louder than those that speak up for his victims. Philip Pullman may not have been caught and convicted molesting any children yet but lets not be complacent. Unfortunately the legal system is set up to protect and perpetuate male violence so we can't simply ban all men from going within 100 metres of children.

Surprisingly I live at home with my cat, who has to wear a bell on her collar so that she can't sneak up on any birds or rodents, is it really too much to demand that men be required to wear these bells too. Are children less important than sparrows?

Atheist Camp

I'm not convinced by the argument that atheism is "so intellectually unappealing that only very clever people can believe in it " ( not that the veracity of atheism is affected in any way by who believes in it), but nonetheless professional atheists* appear to agree with that proposition and so are going to make it more appealing to 'tards:

GIVE Richard Dawkins a child for a week’s summer camp and he will try to give you an atheist for life.

The author of The God Delusion is helping to launch Britain’s first summer retreat for non-believers, where children will have lessons in evolution and sing along to John Lennon’s Imagine.

As a militant agnostic I have no dog in this fight, but isn't one of the key complaints by Dawkins and other evangelical atheists against organised religion the indoctrination of children before they are old enough to make up their own minds?

* Among the recent wave of atheist authors- Dawkins, Hitchens, Harris, Grayling & Dennett -Daniel Dennett is by far the most thoughtful and the only one who takes a balanced view of the subject.

Maths: Chicks Versus Children.

Two stories:

Baby chicks do basic arithmetic

And:

Pupils 'not performing' in maths

I'm not criticising our hard working teachers, but surely if our avian friends, with brains the size of walnuts are outperforming British schoolchildren, then maybe there are flaws in our teaching system.

RIP.

I've not got much to say about the death of Ivan Cameron other than the obvious statement that it is desperately sad.

It's strange coincidence that both the leaders of the main parties have lost a child and I suppose it is a reminder if one is needed that even front line politicians are human beings with real lives beyond climbing the greasy pole.

Family Values.

Social Workers fear media frenzy will damage Alfie's family.

Yeah because the family was doing so well up until the media took notice.

Update: See what I mean, Alfie goes for a walk and demonstrates his class:

An Important Announcement

I haven't got much to say at the moment, except having just read:

The French guessing game over the identity of the father of justice minister Rachida Dati's daughter was reignited on Thursday after a new book suggested that he was a Middle Eastern prosecutor.
....

The prosecutor joins a long list of names, including leading French television host Jacques Essebag (popularly known as Arthur), Henri Proglio, a prominent Paris businessman, Dominique Desseigne, a hotel and casino tycoon, and Jose Maria Aznar, the former Spanish prime minister.

All have denied being the father but Miss Dati has said nothing. Former French rugby coach and sports minister Bernard Laporte also made an official denial, as did François Sarkozy, President Nicolas Sarkozy's younger brother.

I just want to make an official denial too.

Bea-ing Ridiculous. (Updated)

If there is one characteristic that I particularly envy among professional columnists is their uncanny judge of character, honest. After the conviction of Karen Matthews for the abduction of her daughter Shannon it seems like a good time to revisit Bea Campbell's class war column on the subject from earlier this year:

Karen Matthews has acted appropriately throughout: she was waiting for Shannon at home; she contacted the police as soon as she had exhausted all the obvious locations.

Apart from with the bloke she gave her to.

And yet, our eye is drawn to her poverty, numbers of partners, cans of lager going into her household. Everything about Ms Matthews' life has been up for scrutiny.

This appears to have been quite astute.

Karen Matthews has been subjected to a Today programme interrogation that appeared to position the mother as the perpetrator: Sarah Montague asked her seven times about her lifestyle. Her patronising preoccupation was how many men there have been in her life, not her judgment about them. Has any other, apparently blameless mother been so sweetly assailed?

Sarah Montague 1, Bea Campbell 0.

{the McCann's} resources - money, looks, religion, organisation, focus (all a function of class) - were all mobilised to protect them and to obscure the question of culpability. It was the McCann's photo-opportunity with the Pope that eventually exposed the campaign to criticism as inappropriate, not to say unseemly.

Unseemly!?

No one thought Karen Matthews had abducted or killed her daughter - and yet she has been judged. Some commentators think they can say anything they like about this woman and even to her. She has spoken with reticent dignity, yet her class makes her available for blame.

Nope her obvious unsuitability as a parent appalled most people, who kept their silence because of the awful situation they believed that she was in.


Update: Most spectacular volte face ever? (Via Marcus at Harry's Place and Julia)