Monday, September 20, 2010

Unbelievable

Many moons ago, when I was welcome in Education Departments, I signed up for a class in Personal and Health Education just to round off my timetable.

Walking into the classroom, standard long prison tables and god awful chairs, I saw the doll resting on the teacher’s desk. Very lifelike, I thought, and wandered over to look closer. Extremely lifelike. I gently poked it... It was a dead baby.

12 comments:

  1. This is your dark side I presume.

    We have all got a dark side.

    It must be quite extra ordinarily difficult living among many people whose dark side became prominent and out of control, as well as having to deal with your own.

    Probably is an example of one of the ways the prison system fails to help individual inmates and the society at large.

    Hold it down Ben, keep strong. We are still rooting for you. For many reasons, one being your fantastic ability and honesty in communication. You write with your soul.

    I am praying for you and wishing you endless luck for the future. Really hope you get out of Shepton Mallet and have that damned parole hearing soon.

    Very best wishes Ben, thinking of you xx

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  2. "Poking a dead baby"

    Sounds like one of the refrains in the 'Aristocrats' joke.

    Now imagine it leaping to its feet, pointing in an accusing manner, and yelping in its best Richard Dawkins accent: "Mummy number 1; mummy number 2; a Catholic Priest just poked me!"

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  3. If this a 'dark side' moment I humbly suggest that people on the 'outside' would find this sort of comment rather strange and you should keep your 'humour' to yourself and talk to your psychologist about it when you next meet.

    I'm not one to censor speech, far from it. Making 'humourous' observations of any sort however necessitates an understanding of your audience. A forum such as this, open to all, is not the place where observations about dead babies whether in fact or fiction can be acceptable.

    I would go further and suggest you would be hard pressed to find any audience where referring to a dead baby is acceptable in jest in any situation - prison or otherwise.

    Perhaps you should think before you 'speak' in future or at least have your editor apply a modicum of common sense and check with you whether you actually meant to write what you did.

    I appreciate that context is everything. I find it hard to think of any context in which this post would engender you to your readers however.

    Rather tasteless in my opinion.

    Take care.

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  6. I wonder if this is an allegory or literally true?

    I am edging towards the latter, given the amount of effort it takes to write something, send it by royal mail or pass it to somebody and have it typed up for here, it's unlikely to be something sent "off the cuff" or without thought,

    I am most intrigued in a disturbed sort of way and hope we get more background at some point!

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  7. Editor.

    Why was my comment removed?

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  8. Ed here. Just got home, logged on and seen people telling me comments have been removed. I wonder if there is a blip on the site, because I have not deleted any comments. Actually, it is something I rarely do. Only spam or gobbledegook usually!

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  9. "This is your dark side I presume.

    We have all got a dark side. "

    Im starting to think that Sophie J would have your back Ben if you decided to blow up a hospice. It seems her continuous contempt for any semblance of ill will towards you/your views is detremental to the point of this blog.

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  10. "This is your dark side I presume.
    We have all got a dark side. "

    What is so controversial about that Anonymous?

    Surely Ben can decide the point of his blog and whether or not my comments are detrimental.

    However, I do appreciate your concern!

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