The Political Asylum

muppetmurderer · Posted: Sat Jun 21, 2008 11:26 pm Post subject: Getting Paid to Quit Smoking

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/tayside_and_central/7465908.stm

Smokers in the poorest areas of Dundee are being offered £150 worth of groceries by the health service if they are able to give up cigarettes.
Participants in a 12-week scheme will be given £12.50 a week by NHS Tayside if a carbon monoxide breath test proves they have not been smoking.
The money will be credited onto an electronic card which cannot be used for cigarettes or alcohol.

Well, putting aside the idea of paying people to do something that will save their lives - which I'm sure will be remarked upon...

Exactly how does this stop the money (which would have been spent buying bread or milk etc in any case) being taken from the card, and then the equivalent amount of cash being spent on beer! Probably the Civil Servant who thought of this assumed that this will never occur to the people of Dundee, of course!

Very Happy

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Do you know what it means when you come home to a little affection, a little tenderness, and a little sympathy? It means you're in the wrong house

cherrybabe · Inmate of the Asylum Joined: 26 Jan 2007 Posts: 345

Jesus wept, WTF next..... i despair of these Isles we live in.
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I hear the ancient footsteps like the motion of the sea
Sometimes I turn, there's someone there, other times it's only me.

BlueEmperor · Posted: Sun Jun 22, 2008 12:28 am Post subject:

I am really beginning to object to the massive amounts of money being spent trying to browbeat people into giving up a perfectly legal passtime. I have no intention of giving up smoking and no amount of bribery is going to make me do so. In fact, this anti-smoking fascism is making me want to smoke MORE, simply to thumb my nose at Nanny State.

B.E.
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The doctor is in!

cherrybabe · Inmate of the Asylum Joined: 26 Jan 2007 Posts: 345

If people want to smoke and die let them, it's a personal choice. Smoke free in public places is nicer for me, i will admit (as a now 17yrs non smoker) but it is very anti-social IMO. Chucking my husband outside when socialising takes him away from me & my company, at home he nicks out in the back and has a quick wiff

This new local effort on smoking is just another PC nightmare designed to waste taxpayers money. When will they learn that familiarity on this subject breeds contempt in the old fashioned way.
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I hear the ancient footsteps like the motion of the sea
Sometimes I turn, there's someone there, other times it's only me.

wakeyboy · Posted: Sun Jun 22, 2008 2:27 am Post subject:

I believe that smoking is not a good idea, and I choose not to do it.

I think the NHS should always provide support, advice and information on quitting smoking but they should NOT be paying people to quit!

These people will be saving loads of money anyway if they stop buying cigarettes/tobacco.
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http://www.realradioyorkshire.co.uk/

cherrybabe · Inmate of the Asylum Joined: 26 Jan 2007 Posts: 345

There is more out there than ever to encourage people to quit smoking, there was bugger all when i gave up the mighty nicotine.
The government should have rested there, and stuck to dealing with more important social issues like knife crime which is becoming more addictive lately.
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I hear the ancient footsteps like the motion of the sea
Sometimes I turn, there's someone there, other times it's only me.

Merak · Inmate of the Asylum Joined: 05 Apr 2008 Posts: 214

muppetmurderer · Posted: Mon Jun 23, 2008 12:31 pm Post subject:

I suppose that with the rise of STD's in the younger population these days, it won't be long before the NHS offers money if you avoid having sex! (wish they had done that when I was 16 - I'd have been rich!)

Razz

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Do you know what it means when you come home to a little affection, a little tenderness, and a little sympathy? It means you're in the wrong house

BlueEmperor · Posted: Tue Jun 24, 2008 7:21 pm Post subject:

On the contrary, this Government won't be happy until they've turned our schools into walk-in sex clinics. Far from discouraging sex amongst youngsters, this Government are at pains to facilitate it and continue to chant the tired old mantra that we need 'better sex education', despite the fact that massive increases in sex education programmes in schools and an abundance of money thrown at providing youngsters with free contraceptives has had the net effect of making our teenage pregnancy and abortion rates the worst in Europe.

B.E.
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The doctor is in!

muppetmurderer · Posted: Wed Jun 25, 2008 4:17 pm Post subject:

Yesssss - the UK is the best at something!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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Do you know what it means when you come home to a little affection, a little tenderness, and a little sympathy? It means you're in the wrong house

wakeyboy · Posted: Wed Jun 25, 2008 5:26 pm Post subject:

I saw a documentary last night about Britain's youngest grandmas (they were in their 30's!).

One woman had her daughter when she was 15, she went to university in her late 20's then became a family planning adviser to teenagers. She educated her own daughter on sex and STDs at a young age... her daughter got pregnant at 16! - fat lot of good that 'education' did.
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BlueEmperor · Posted: Thu Jun 26, 2008 12:28 pm Post subject:

That's because sex education is more of a 'how to' guide than a serious attempt at prevention. Because in these morally bankrupt times it is seen as 'quasi-mediaeval' to try to teach children that they shouldn't have sex. Too 'judgemental'. So we invest huge amounts of time and energy explaining to young people how sex works but without stressing the point that they shouldn't have sex until they are mature enough to deal with the possible consequences. All sex education does is spark an interest amongst pre-adolescents and create a climate in which the race is on to be the first one to do it.

B.E.
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The doctor is in!

wakeyboy · Posted: Thu Jun 26, 2008 3:28 pm Post subject:

I'm not opposed to sex education but I think that too much of it has the opposite effect to its intended purpose.

My Mum educated me on the more biological aspect of it (sperm and eggs - chickens etc!) when I was about 9 or 10 but didnt tell me anything else.

At high school we were taught about sperm, eggs, fertilisation, puberty etc but absolutely nothing about contraception (as it was a Catholic school). It was taught for several weeks during biology classes. There was no talk about it in any other forum and there was no formal advice service for anything of that nature.

Funnily enough only ONE person in my year got pregnant at 16. A further two people at age 17 (after leaving school), and then about 5 have got pregnant in their early 20's but are in long-term relationships and marriages.

So it may be anecdotal evidence, but I think that there really is such a thing as TOO MUCH education, particularly on this subject.
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adrien · Posted: Thu Jun 26, 2008 5:06 pm Post subject:

Merak · Inmate of the Asylum Joined: 05 Apr 2008 Posts: 214

Not sure how it's taught these days, but when I was at school it was only the biological side of things - basically just how the egg gets fertilised. It was almost clinical as if that was the be all and end all of it. There was nothing about the consequences of unplanned pregnancies or prevention of them, relationships, or even having sex. Was just purely about how the egg gets fertilised. Mind you, that was about 25 years ago when the explosion in teen pregnacies was still a burning fuse.

SilverMiniCooperS · Inmate of the Asylum Joined: 09 Jan 2007 Posts: 195

Merak we had much the same sex education - back in the late fifties and early sixties. They explained about the egg and sperm and all, but NOT how the two get together!!

JuanaLaLoca · Posted: Sun Jun 29, 2008 12:07 am Post subject:

wakeyboy · Posted: Sun Jun 29, 2008 1:58 am Post subject:

cherrybabe · Inmate of the Asylum Joined: 26 Jan 2007 Posts: 345

I do not believe it makes much difference. Sex sells, and our youth our only interested in making quick money.
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I hear the ancient footsteps like the motion of the sea
Sometimes I turn, there's someone there, other times it's only me.

Merak · Inmate of the Asylum Joined: 05 Apr 2008 Posts: 214

Goodbrit · Inmate of the Asylum Joined: 05 Nov 2006 Posts: 859

wakeyboy · Posted: Sun Jun 29, 2008 4:11 pm Post subject:

Goodbrit · Inmate of the Asylum Joined: 05 Nov 2006 Posts: 859

Not quite that much-but we werent just told about the basic `machinery`-we were told about everything from orgasms, masturbation, ejacualtion-how to actually have sex-the basic motions, how to put a condom on-all very detailed
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Manchester, when death isnt enougth

wakeyboy · Posted: Sun Jun 29, 2008 4:29 pm Post subject:

SilverMiniCooperS · Inmate of the Asylum Joined: 09 Jan 2007 Posts: 195

wakeyboy · Posted: Sun Jun 29, 2008 11:14 pm Post subject:

Goodbrit · Inmate of the Asylum Joined: 05 Nov 2006 Posts: 859

well it was a normal state school, and very recently-give that im 22, within the last 10 years at the most
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Manchester, when death isnt enougth

Mpls Druid · Posted: Mon Jun 30, 2008 6:24 am Post subject:

Way back when I was in school, we started getting the sex education when I was about 8, and when I was 13 we had the formal class detailing everything about sex including the videos of STDs and what the consequences could be from having sex too early. In retrospect, I think the practice of starting early to talk about the changes in our bodies and the basic differences between boys and girls was good. A little too on the obvious side, but good nonetheless.

JuanaLaLoca · Posted: Mon Jun 30, 2008 3:29 pm Post subject:

muppetmurderer · Posted: Mon Jun 30, 2008 3:39 pm Post subject:

what does happen?
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Do you know what it means when you come home to a little affection, a little tenderness, and a little sympathy? It means you're in the wrong house

JuanaLaLoca · Posted: Mon Jun 30, 2008 3:43 pm Post subject:

I don't know, I've never been married yet. Razz

muppetmurderer · Posted: Tue Jul 01, 2008 11:11 am Post subject:

I'm sure its not from a lack of opportunities JuanaLaLoca - you're obviously just soooo fussy!

Laughing

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Do you know what it means when you come home to a little affection, a little tenderness, and a little sympathy? It means you're in the wrong house

kitchenwitch · Posted: Tue Jul 01, 2008 1:21 pm Post subject:

muppetmurderer · Posted: Tue Jul 01, 2008 2:19 pm Post subject:

Yes to both, KW Razz

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Do you know what it means when you come home to a little affection, a little tenderness, and a little sympathy? It means you're in the wrong house

kitchenwitch · Posted: Tue Jul 01, 2008 3:15 pm Post subject:

And here was me thinking you were a contemporary of Statler & Waldorf when you are merely a child. Wink

Are you even allowed to legally drink?
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In all matters of opinion, our adversaries are insane.
-Oscar Wilde

muppetmurderer · Posted: Tue Jul 01, 2008 3:45 pm Post subject:

Well maybe I was fibbing about the 'too young' bit (my fresh-faced youthful appearance can indeed be misleading) so I am actually just about old enough to drink - are you buying then?

Razz

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Do you know what it means when you come home to a little affection, a little tenderness, and a little sympathy? It means you're in the wrong house

JuanaLaLoca · Posted: Tue Jul 01, 2008 4:39 pm Post subject:

JuanaLaLoca · Posted: Tue Jul 01, 2008 4:47 pm Post subject:

kitchenwitch · Posted: Tue Jul 01, 2008 5:43 pm Post subject:

muppetmurderer · Posted: Tue Jul 01, 2008 6:33 pm Post subject:

Looks like I could be in trouble here..... Smile

Fortunately, VG knows who's the boss, so I should be safe!
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Do you know what it means when you come home to a little affection, a little tenderness, and a little sympathy? It means you're in the wrong house

Vintage Girl · Posted: Tue Jul 01, 2008 6:38 pm Post subject:

Yes I do know who's boss.............it's matron!

You're in deep shit!!
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Girls are like phones. We love to be held and talked to, but if you press the wrong button you'll be disconnected!

wakeyboy · Posted: Tue Jul 01, 2008 6:55 pm Post subject:

JuanaLaLoca · Posted: Tue Jul 01, 2008 8:10 pm Post subject: