TonyN here and I was going to write about the ways I feel that going to SEVs has helped me become more respectful towards women and the positive aspects as well as how certain types of men struggle with the clubs. However after noticing an article on a local online paper for Southend with one guy trying to stop a club opening and being pointed at another piece where the gentleman's wife was busy I have decided to for the what feel's like the millionth time look at the arguments they used and why councils will need to check their facts.
The corner stone to a petition to not allow a new club to get a license is(was) Lilith, I mean how many times can a dead set of statistics come back to life? We know that the facts show that Lilith was a failed piece of result with no control, very limited data and not analysed based on Camden's population (a reminder of what we said is here). I find it hard to believe that people still think that Lilith is valid, after all even Object has removed the link from their pages after a few months delay. We saw the time line in my last piece.
On top of Lilith there was a reference to Newquay and the genius that was Inspector Drummond. I mean Chasmal wrote about this back in August 2012 so to see the issue dragged up again is incredible. A reminder if what we said back in 2012 is here. The arguments start reading like anti club campaign for dummies. I do wonder just what research some people do? Is it a just hop on to google, grab any article that backs up the point of view and then trot it out without even checking if the argument is still valid?
Something that is still out there and is used in arguments is the book by Jennifer Hayashi Danns and Sandrine Leveque. As I have stated before this book is highly questionable as the co-writer was employed by Object at the time of publishing. Now if we had a book that said smoking caused no harm that was co-authored by an employee of the tobacco lobby I would expect just about everyone to question it. Yet when a book is written by a dancer and a lobbyist it is seen as okay, in fact it is almost like the lobby group and their input into the book just disappeared. All of the resources that tend to be quoted from Object's page were reviewed back in December 2012 here. A few have disappeared like Lilith but no real hard hitting research from the UK has come out.
So we still see the same tired arguments trotted out by someone who could not be bothered to check the facts. In fact since 2012 we have had all of the the arguments put to bed and yet like the zombie stats they are they rise from the dead and haunt us. I was expecting new research from somewhere to come out with an outrageous claim as the rape claims have fallen by the roadside, the claims about trafficking have been seen to hold no water after Pentameter I and II but don't let facts stop people from scaremongering using zombie arguments. I had hoped that we could move on. It has been over 2 years since the arguments died why can't they be left to rest in piece?
If people spot "News Stories" in the press using the zombies please target them here and mail me. Nothing I enjoy more that going to the table with the figures and information to debate idiocy
TonyN (tonyprince@acdcfan.com)
Happy new year Tony, I was also commenting on that Southend article too. I couldn't believe it when i saw those old debunked studies back again, such as Lilith being quoted as if they were fact. Just when i was beginning to think this kind of nonsense was behind us and it comes back to haunt us yet again. It wouldn't of been so bad but then the paper goes and gives the couple an article each, which is odd to say the least? As per usual with a lot of the anti lobby on these things they lose the plot when challenged and resort to personal attacks or just crying 'troll'. In other news did you see this rather annoying piece in the New Statesmen by a feminist blogger called 'Glosswitch'? It's just wrong on so many levels. Unfortunately i couldn't find a way to comment on it but she is on twitter: http://www.newstatesman.com/lifestyle/2015/01/opposing-sexism-not-sex-how-does-feminist-mother-explain-lap-dancing-club
ReplyDeleteHappy New Year John, what amazes me is the fact that people keep referring back to the report because there is still an article on the Guardian from 2009 that quotes Lilith as fact. I have written to the guardian and the author and got the reply that it is an old closed article. BUT there in lies the problem I can't use the figures there and it will still inspire people to be stupid. Thinking a twitter campaign at the guardian may be in order next week. As to the two articles I found it interesting that when I mail the journalist she said she would check into the Lilith report as she was quoting from what she was given. She did write both pieces and so far I have seen nothing to suggest she has bothered to check the information which raises a whole raft of questions. But I will dig. I have tweeted at a councillor that Object tweeted at pointing out Lilith was dead and the campaigners had run away from the article. I think that I will be in twitter a lot for the next couple of weeks. As for glosswitch I saw the article from a link on twitter but I haven't gone after her yet. I hate twitter but it is becoming a big part of my life it seems.
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