Zombie

Present tense narratives. Don't know is this is a peeve because I just refuse to read them. I suppose the "peeve" is that at the back of my mind is the thought that it might be a really good story I'll never get to read because of my dislike. Sorry if this upsets any writers here

The US has gun crime, the UK has knife crime. Apart from the repugnance of State judicial killing, a major problem with the death penalty is where do you draw the line? Which type of killing should have the death penalty and which should not? And when you've decided on which type does / does not have the death penalty you then have the issue of evidence (where the defendant pleads not guilty) to prove the defendant killed the victim. Or (as in this case) evidence to prove the defendant had the necessary state of mind. The burden of proof is "beyond reasonable doubt". But that does not mean no doubt. This case seems clear cut in that there seems no doubt Roy killed Jack. But where the defendant denies the killing it is down to evidence. And we all know how fallible evidence can be even with modern forensics and DNA. We all know how fallible so-called "expert witness" testimony can be. There have even been cases where the police, convinced of someone's guilt, have tampered with evidence or even lied on oath to secure a conviction, so convinced were they that "cutting corners" was the right thing to do to "get that bastard put away". We also know of many cases where people wrongly convicted of murder have subsequently been acquitted - in some of these cases their innocence has been confirmed by the Crown and compensation paid. If these people had they been executed then the opportunity to right the wrong would no longer exist - because they would be dead. Emotionally I understand your reaction and wish to have the death penalty reinstated. But you must accept that if your wish was granted then more innocent people would inevitably be executed. You might think that was a reasonable price to pay. I suspect the innocent person being executed would think differently. Would I feel differently if Jack were my brother / lover? I'm sure I would. But that would be my personal emotional response. And States should not make policy decisions based on emotion.

Thanks for your link Dan. Made me all gooey inside reading it. This could be a GA story!

Walk on Water 2004 I watched this Israeli film over the weekend. It's a quality production involving a Mossad agent and a young gay German. Beautifully shot on location in Turkey, Israel and Germany and with dialogue in English, German and Hebrew, the film observes the complex attitudes between Israelis and Germans, and between Israelis and Palestinians. But the main focus of the film is the developing relationship between the agent, the young German and his sister. Worth seeing. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0352994/

To lose one (ship) may be regarded as a misfortune; to lose (two) looks like carelessness (with apologies to Oscar Wilde ) http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2107175/Costa-Allegra-Ship-run-company-Concordia-adrift-Indian-Ocean-Seychelles.html

Hmm. Is that a herd of pigs I saw fly past the window? We should want change. Maybe you have in mind male / female roles just from a US perspective where, even though opportunities are supposedly equaled, powerful male vested interests still dominate (just look at the boards of the top 500 companies - how many female CEOs are there? Jeeze, how many senior board positions are held by women? Not a lot. And is there a realistic chance yet of a female US President?). But if you're talking globally then in many countries in areas like the Middle East or Africa, women are pretty much where women in Europe were in the Middle Ages, if not much worse. So your wish for roles to be eliminated "in another few decades" seems optimistic. For that to happen in those countries is going to require some kind of "cultural revolution". Males don't give up their territory, privilege and status willingly or easily wherever they are. Maybe that's another male stereotype but a true one I think.

Good one. And "sidewalkers" who don't indicate before swerving in front of you or just stopping altogether and causing a "crash". And horrid little shopping bags on wheels. Uuuurrgh.

That's the mystery of Agatha Christie - that she sells so many books containing cardboard cutout characters. Well obviously not her personally - not with being dead an' all.

I knew someone who did just that several years ago when he and his wife, both medical doctors (GPs), were clients of the company I worked for at the time. They had been married over 25 years, lived a conventional family life and had two children on the verge of leaving home. He, Steven, one day announced to his family that he had always felt he was a woman in a man's body but had lived a conventional life trying to suppress these feelings while bringing up his family. Now aged 50+ he had an overwhelming desire to live as he felt he should be living and told them he wanted to change his identity, to live as a woman, dress as a woman and adopt a woman's name. His family were, understandably, shocked. However, after a period of adjustment, they were very supportive. He continued to live with his wife, adopted the name Sarah (or similar) and continued working as a GP. The first time I met Sarah after the change it could have been a different person, including a different voice. I suppose this helped because, for me, Sarah was a different person (wig, makeup, floral dress - the lot) who just happened to have the same file details as Steven. The only thing that struck me was that Sarah hadn't got the whole makeup thing quite right. Sarah seemed entirely comfortable as this new person and, I understand, later had counseling for reassignment surgery but I don't know if Sarah pursued this because I had left the company by then and lost contact.

Hahahah - Administrative Sex! You gotta love whoever coined that one. Hahaha!! Thanks for the detailed response Graeme. I must be honest here; when I posed the wider question I didn't really expect to get a definitive answer, although I have learned some interesting things from you and others who have posted here. It's all part of life's rich pageant

My bad Graeme. My post was muddled like my mind (I should have been asleep!) The thread title is Gender Stereotyping. But, or course, sex has reared it's head The two can and do get confused. I get confused (I'm still writing 2011 on cheques!). So I have 3 questions: 1. Graeme, when you said "Boy toddlers will quite happily urinate in public if they need to. That makes their gender quite obvious" did you mean to say "That makes their sex quite obvious" or is this a behavioral gender difference and, if so, is this the only behavioral gender difference you see exhibited by toddlers? (one of your posts said there's no effective gender difference between young boys and girls) 2. Is it the accepted position here that: - "gender" is a social construct and there is nothing "inherent" or "innate" about gender but rather it is exclusively informed or arises from our individual upbringing, experiences within and exposures to "society" i.e.family, teachers, other people, culture, social norms / behaviours etc etc? (however #25 sorgbarn's post suggested a possible biological influence) - gender is quite separate and distinct from sex or biological makeup? - we can therefore ignore sex, sexual orientation, sexual identity, M2F and F2M surgery and everything else to do with the body, bodily responses, hormones etc when considering "gender"? - if it were possible to remove all these external / societal influences then the concept of gender would be removed as well? 3. Take as an example a boy and a girl taken at birth and brought up, each in isolation, by caring but "gender neutral" identical robots in identical "gender neutral" environments. On reaching adulthood would you expect to see no distinguishing gender characteristics / behaviours between them? Or, if you would expect to see some distinguishing gender characteristics / behaviours, then what would you expect those to be?

The style is "Gothic Horror". I think I can see Norman Bates's mom in that little tower EDIT Seriously this is a frightful mish-mash of styles which, in a domestic setting, is unworthy of a serious architectural label. The developer probably got together several "pattern book" designs, mixed them up in his computer, and this nightmare popped out. But if you want a label then I guess Folk Victorian / Postmodernist neo-Gothic Revival would do. It's still a horror though ...

"there's no effective difference between the genders. Any differences will be based on personality, cultural education and family pressures." Hmm. Well if it is true that there is no effective difference between the genders, that it really isn't a big deal, then how is that consistent with "... gender allows scope for transgender to indicate what gender they want to be considered as ..." and then undergo reassignment surgery? After all, why would there be such a need? And I'm guessing it must be a very powerful sense of personal gender to drive this need. Incredibly powerful to motivate someone to put themselves through, by any measure, some quite significant surgery. This indicates a powerful sense of gender that surely goes well beyond "differences ... based on personality, cultural education and family pressures ". Doesn't it? (Edit: added "and then undergo reassignment surgery" - it's late, I need to go to sleep now )

"... until the 1940s, pink was considered appropriate for boys because being related to red it was the more masculine and decided color, while blue was considered appropriate for girls because it was the more delicate and dainty color, or related to the Virgin Mary. Since the 1940s, the societal norm was inverted; pink became considered appropriate for girls and blue appropriate for boys, a practice that has continued into the 21st century." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pink) So there we have it - colour is cultural. Nothing to do with gender. But we're still skirting around what gender is. All we can agree on is the stereotypes. There's a kind of delicious irony about that.

Hmmm. Some very considered responses here. What's coming across is agreement that male / female gender identity exists and we are comfortable referring to the "stereotypes", but when it comes down to differentiating and stating exactly what it is that defines our sense of gender as "male" or "female" - well, then it suddenly becomes difficult. Perhaps it's impossible. We are all aware of the cultural "mines" that exist in this area and none of us wants to inadvertently stamp on one of those! But I hope there'll be further insight here and if people give their honest view that we refrain from attacking them just because they've been honest enough to disclose their views and how they feel. Peace and love .....

Yeah, yeah. OK, I should have said "if this is desired, can you please create a separate thread for this". Hmmm, I reckon you knew this but wanted a pop at my lazy and circumlocutory sentence construction

Thanks for a detailed and considered post. However, the extract I've quoted isn't relevant to the question of gender stereotyping and I'd prefer it not to be a focus for this thread. It is however an interesting comment that raises the separate question of attitudes to nudity and sex in North America which are different from those in, say, Europe. There are no universal norms here. This is certainly a topic worth discussing and, if this is desired, can I request that a separate thread is created for this

I'm not sure how much more can be said about Sasha that hasn't already been said. So I posed a wider question (I notice no-one's rushed to respond to this ). Let me put it another way. Being a gay male doesn't make me feel any less male. But I find it difficult to express exactly what attributes / feelings / emotions / sense-of-self make me feel unequivocally "male". Even though I do (feel unequivocally "male"). Is it even possible to do this? Likewise, what attributes / feelings / emotions / sense-of-self make females feel unequivocally female? We're obviously not talking preferences for pink plastic snap-on iPad covers here. And transgendered members must feel this just as strongly. Maybe even more strongly? And is there a middle "neutral" ground?

You're right. We all know what the Nazis did to the Jews (excepting Holocaust deniers, of course), but less well know is the systematic persecution and murder of homosexuals. And even less well known is the appalling tragedy for those homosexuals who survived the Nazis. After the war ended, the political and remaining Jewish prisoners were released from the camps (regular criminals were not immediately released) but the homosexual prisoners were never released because Paragraph 175 (a clause in German law which prohibited homosexual relations) remained West German law until 1969 when it was moderated (but not finally abolished until 1994). So these poor innocent men, whose only crime was to be gay, watched as their fellow prisoners were set free, but they remained prisoners for up to 24 more years.

Good Will Hunting OK, it's not a "gay" gay movie but: - it's got Matt Damon (surely that's enough reason? ) - and there's obvious male love between Will and his best friend - and also (by the end) between Will and the Robin Williams character Plus - the icing on the cake - it has such a winning premise: low life janitor outsmarts the collective brains of privileged and intelligent college students. What's not to love about this film?

Here's a handy guide to Zombies It is important to remember that every zombie is unique and that zombies are as varied in death as they were in life. Assuming zombies are all the same will get you killed or worse- false familiarity is deadly. That said, there are a handful of broad categories which most zombies can be classified into. Sloucher The 'regular' zombie. Slow moving, uncoordinated, and very unaware. Will wander or lay collapsed until it detects prey, at which point it will issue a horrible moan and move to attack. Dragger A Sloucher that moves more slowly for some reason, perhaps due to injury or decomposition. A Dragger's slow but erratic movements make them more difficult to get a headshot on than the more steady Slouchers. Shambler A Sloucher that is able to move slightly faster than average. Like the Dragger, Shamblers erratic movement makes them more difficult to target precisely. Crawler A zombie which must crawl, usually because of severe damage to the legs or back. Juggernaut A very large Sloucher, either obese, muscular or mutated. Not faster or smarter but stronger and very difficult to put down. Twitcher At first glance a Twitcher will appear to be a regular Sloucher, but a careful observer will notice the Twitcher is much more alert and fidgety. Unlike Slouchers, Twitchers will run, climb, and jump to reach prey; shrieking the whole time. Wailer Usually a zombie child with enormous lung capacity. The Wailer is fond of climbing and will wait in treetops or on the roofs of houses until it spots prey. The horribly distinctive wail will attract all the zombies in the area. Banshee Usually a zombified young woman. The hellish shriek of a Banshee will not only attract more zombies, it is said to be able to transfix the living, freezing the weak willed in place. Thinker Thinkers are thankfully very rare. They look like regular people, they are able to walk and move like the living and they usually don't have obvious injuries. Thinkers are self aware and alert, able to see their surroundings in a way that other zombies cannot. Thinkers can learn simple things, use simple tools, and recognize symbols and patterns. A Thinkers most terrifying trait however is the ability to telepathically direct other zombies, allowing them to set traps and overcome obstacles. Make sure you keep those doors and windows locked now ...... More at: http://therustydagger.blogspot.com/2011/10/greater-toronto-zombies.html

Hahaha - great clip. And gender differences?

A couple more sites I've just looked at: From the Daily Mail, a UK tabloid: http://www.dailymail...stions-sex.html Worth reading some of the posted comments too. Here is a web digest of some of the media coverage: http://www.periscope...t-gone-too-far/ Interesting quote: "Stereotyping is “not only not fundamentally stupid, but it’s fundamentally necessary" (sounds like a "Discuss" question in a sociology paper ) The posts here also pose a wider question. Assuming you accept there are key gender differences between male and female (this seems to be accepted in the thread so far ...) - then what are they? And can agreement be reached on these key differences?

I've just read the "Two Dads?" thread and a couple of the posts reminded me of this news item which appeared last month in one of the British papers: http://www.telegraph...ereotyping.html "Beck Laxton, 46, and partner Kieran Cooper, 44, decided not to reveal baby Sasha's gender to the world so he would not be influenced by society's prejudices and preconceptions. They referred to their child as "The Infant" and only allowed him to play with "gender-neutral toys" in their television-free home. For the first five years of his life Sasha alternated between girls' and boys' outfits, leaving friends, playmates and relatives guessing. But the couple have finally revealed his sex after it became harder to conceal when Sasha started primary school. Yesterday Miss Laxton, a web editor, said that she thought gender stereotyping was "fundamentally stupid". "I wanted to avoid all that stereotyping," she said. "Stereotypes seem fundamentally stupid. Why would you want to slot people into boxes? "It's like horoscopes: what could be stupider than thinking there are 12 types of personality that depend on when you were born? It's so idiotic. "Gender affects what children wear and what they can play with, and that shapes the kind of person they become." "I discovered later that I'd been described as 'that loony woman who doesn't know whether her baby is a boy or a girl', she said. "And I could never persuade anyone in the group to come around for coffee. They just thought I was mental. "I don't think I'd do it if I thought it was going to make him unhappy, but at the moment he's not really bothered either way. We haven't had any difficult scenarios yet." She said she early gender stereotyping was "harmful". "My mother's very sporty and my dad was very emotional," she said. "We'd watch The Wizard of Oz and always start crying, whereas my mum would think we were really soppy. "So it's always seemed obvious to me that stereotypes didn't fit the people I knew." The family, from in Sawston, Cambs., were so desperate not to prejudice Sasha's life with gender they didn't ask midwives his sex until 30 minutes after he was born. Only a handful of immediate family members were told of the baby's gender. Finally the secret got too hard to keep and Beck and Kieran were forced to reveal Sasha's sex when he started school. Sasha wears a "ruched-sleeved" girl's shirt as part of his school uniform, and has been banned from sporting combat trousers. The youngster is also encouraged to wear flowery tops at weekends. Miss Laxton said her son would think nothing of being given flowers – a gift which would embarrass many men. "I just want him to fulfil his potential, and I wouldn't push him in any direction. As long as he has good relationships and good friends, then nothing else matters does it? Mr Cooper, a computer software designer, said his son likes to play with Lego and dolls. He said: "We wanted to challenge gender stereotypes and so if Sasha wants to dress up in girls' clothes then so be it. But we are not forcing it. Dr Daragh McDermott, a psychology lecturer at Anglia Ruskin University, said the effect of raising a gender neutral child is not yet known. He said: "It's hard to say whether being raised gender-neutral will have any immediate or long-term psychological consequences for a child, purely because to date there is little empirical research examining this topic. "That being said, the family setting is only one source of gender-specific information and as children grow, their self-identity as male, female or gender-neutral will be influenced by school, socialisation with other children and adults, as well as mass media. "As a child grows they develop their own independent sense of self that will include their own individual gender identification."" To me it seems that Sasha's Mum and Dad, whilst honest in their beliefs and concerns, did what they did because it's what they wanted to do, and their actions were not in response to the specific developmental needs of their child but were pre-determined before he was even born. In effect what they did was run an experiment on child development, with their own child as the guinea pig. I feel they did something wrong. But what do you think?