An Open Letter to Richard Dawkins

Dear Prof. Dawkins.

I know you're used to people writing to you mostly because of religious matters and indeed I have studied your works on religion and atheism in detail, but never felt inclined to discuss them with you directly. Contrary to what you're used to, this letter is not about religion at all, and is all about your recent TV series Sex, Death and the Meaning of Life (Incidentally it's not a good idea to give your programme a title that makes it sound like a Woody Allen comedy). In one episode you bring up the ancient Greek myth of Sisyphus, the king who was punished by the gods by having to continuously role a boulder uphill for eternity. You then go and find what you believe is a real life Sisyphus, one Hori Lal, a man whose job it is to sweep the streets of Varanasi, India. Do you really think that this is an appropriate comparison? Appropriate or not it is certainly deeply disrespectful. There is an enormous difference between Mr Lal's duty and the punishment of Sisyphus. Nobody would suffer if Sisyphus found some way of dropping his rock and escaping the Olympians' divine wrath. However, if Mr Lal downed his broom Varanasi would very quickly become buried under a mountain of its own refuse. Mr Lal carries out an essential public service and, you are correct to say, it's a shame India has a caste system that looks down on his duty. It is very insulting to compare such a man to a mythological figure who is burdened with an eternal useless chore as retribution for perceived wrongs.

Like myself, you live in Oxford and therefore you or a member of your family will almost certainly have at some point needed the medical assistance of the John Radcliffe Hospital. I was a porter there for over twenty-three years. This was a position in the hospital's own unofficial caste system similar to Hori Lal's in Varanasi. Hospital porters are the dalits of the NHS. However I performed my service with great pride. I considered myself an essential member of a life saving team doing one of the most important jobs in the entire world. In fact I once calculated that if you took away the porters, the JRH would grind to a halt within quarter of an hour. It's perfectly possible that one day I helped to make you better; so that you were in good enough health to travel the world to exotic locations making TV programmes that patronize people like me and Mr Lal. Think about that.

Yours sincerely.

Ben Emlyn-Jones

(former porter at the John Radcliffe Hospital)

This letter is based on an article I wrote a while ago, see: http://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.co.uk/2015/09/richard-dawkins-patronizing-git.html.

Richard Dawkins- Patronizing Git!

Sex, Death and the Meaning of Life sounds like the title of a Woody Allen comedy, but it's actually a new documentary with Richard Dawkins; see the background links below where I've written about Dawkins before. Its style leads me to believe it is from the same production team that brought us his previous clangers, The Root of All Evil and Enemies of Reason. In the third part of Sex, Death and the Meaning of Life, Dawkins discusses the Greek myth of Sisyphus. Sisyphus was a king who displeased the gods. With typical Olympian sadism, the gods punished him by making him role a huge boulder up a hill; and once he'd accomplished that, the boulder would roll to the bottom, forcing him to repeat the tribulation, and this cycle would recur over and over again for eternity. This story made the French philosopher Albert Camus think about how it related to the meaning of life. In 1942 he wrote a book all about Sisyphus. The universe, Camus said, was "absurd"; there was no rhyme or reason at all. Some people committed suicide because they found no meaning in their lives. Camus found hope in the myth of Sisyphus, in fact for him Sisyphus was a hero and prophet who represented the rebellion against the futility of existence because his arduous task had its own meaning from the very effort he put into it. Camus said: "The struggle itself is enough to fill a man's heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy." Dawkins states that he does not agree with Camus, and neither do I. For Dawkins and me, Sisyphus' torment is pointless, as his divine persecutors intended it to be. The problem is that Dawkins then goes on to find what he thinks is a real life Sisyphus. His name is Hori Lal and his job is to sweep the streets and clean the public toilets in Varanasi, India. He has done this job for over twenty years and will probably do it for the next twenty, see here from about 27:00: https://vimeo.com/121751019. India has a "caste" system, a very rigid order of social segregation. Hori Lal is a Dalit, the very lowest caste. In the programme Dawkins riles against this system and cheers on Mahendra Kumar, another Dalit who escaped his conventional bonds to become an IT expert. I agree, it's admirable that Mr Kumar had a personal dream and achieved it, but this does not make him objectively any more valuable a person than Hori Lal in my view. I understand completely the issues involved here because as a former hospital porter, I played a role in my society very similar to the one Mr Lal plays in his. It never occurs to Dawkins that there is an enormous difference between Mr Lal's duty and the punishment of Sisyphus. Nobody would suffer if Sisyphus found some way of dropping his rock and escaping. However, if Mr Lal downed his broom Varanasi would very quickly become buried under a mountain of its own refuse. It is extremely ignorant and patronizing of Richard Dawkins to equate a job to the ordeal of Sisyphus just because it lacks conventional status. Like myself, Richard Dawkins lives in Oxford and might have had to use the services of the John Radcliffe Hospital. In that case, I helped to make him better, better so he could go off gallivanting around the place making condescending TV documentaries that pour scorn on the essential servants of the human world. Dawkins is not the only one who fails to grasp what I see as a very obvious concept. There were people I served alongside in the hospital who had the same attitude, see here for more details: http://hpanwo.blogspot.co.uk/2007/12/dont-tell-em-were-porters.html. I wonder if Richard Dawkins is aware that Albert Camus was good friends with another great philosopher called Ludwig Wittgenstein, and that's a name all regular readers will recognize. He was a professor of philosophy at Cambridge... but was also a hospital porter, see: http://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/wittgenstein-on-that-dress.html. Did Camus get his ideas about the meaning of life from his conversations with Wittgenstein?

See here for background: http://hpanwo-tv.blogspot.co.uk/2011/05/richard-dawkins-mba-criminal.html.

And: http://hpanwo.blogspot.co.uk/2007/08/richard-dawkins-enemies-of-reason.html.

And: http://hpanwo.blogspot.co.uk/2008/04/god-delusion-by-richard-dawkins.html.

Assisted Dying Bill Rejected

MP's in Parliament have vetoed the latest attempt by campaigners to make it legal for doctors to end somebody's life with their permission if they are terminally ill or grossly infirm without any hope of recovery. The vote was decisively against the bill. I know many people at the British Constitution Group and UK Column who have been warning that legalizing euthanasia could be abused by those who want to depopulate the world and rid it of its "useless eaters". Elderly and disabled people might have subtle moral pressure put on them not to be a "burden" which might influence their decision. These sceptics have a valid point, but I don't think it's as black and white as that. The news article below contains video interviews showing both sides of the argument. One is with a man who is dying of a rare form of motor neurone disease; he vehemently opposes the bill for the reasons I state above. Another is of the wife and children of a man who chose to go to the Dignitas clinic in Switzerland and commit legal suicide there because he had come down with spinal cancer. He was a keep-fit enthusiast and couldn't bear the thought of spending the last few months of his life in a wheelchair, see: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-34208624. As I explain in the background articles below, Euthanasia, a Greek word that literally means "a good death", is killing somebody for the purposes of relieving their pain and/or misery. It's an everyday practice in veterinary medicine for dealing with badly ill animals; but it is an extremely controversial topic when it comes to humans. The medical profession is divided on it, as are politicians and ethical philosophers of medicine. This is why it's legal in some countries and not in others. There has been a long campaign by various pressure groups and individuals to bring in the right to die in the United Kingdom, including the British Humanist Association, the actor Dirk Bogarde and the author Terry Pratchett. They've been opposed by the church and other religious groups, but also some geriatric and palliative care organizations. Despite the church being against euthanasia, the former Archbishop of Canterbury... and son of a hospital porter, Sir George Carey, has publicly backed the bill, see background links below. I'm in favour of the right to die under certain circumstances. The tide is definitely turning I feel. I know that mercy killings go on anyway; I have served alongside doctors who have dispatched hospital patients secretly, with the individual's and/or relatives' permission of course, when they know they will be able to get away with it. If these doctors were caught, they might face a charge of murder. It could actually take a test case like that to make any further progress in the law. Another concern for people opposed to the right to die is that prognoses can change; in certain circumstances this could be a medical breakthrough, as in the Darek Fidyka case, see background links below. I share those concerns, but still think it doesn't justify forcing somebody against their will to carry on living in what they experience as humiliation and agony because somebody might find a cure for their illness at some point in the future. This was the first time Parliament has voted on the right to die for almost twenty years. The wheels of legislation turn slowly and the pro-euthanasia protesters will have to go home disappointed, and stay that way for some time; but another opportunity will arrive, one day soon.

See here for background: http://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.co.uk/2014/07/carey-backs-right-to-die.html.

And: http://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.co.uk/2014/10/darek-fidyka-and-right-to-die.html.

JR Porters' Strike Update 2

See here for essential background: http://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.co.uk/2015/08/jr-porters-strike-update.html.

And: http://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.co.uk/2015/07/100-of-porters-vote-to-strike.html.

The porters' strike at the John Radcliffe Hospital is winding down into what is being euphemistically called a "negotiated and lasting settlement ". No industrial action at all was ever taken in the seven weeks since we voted unanimously to go ahead with it. Instead there has been an endless series of negotiations, as I explain in the more recent background article. This has resulted in management proposing a new agreement, see illustration below. In this model, rotary shifts will be maintained, but at a greatly reduced level of twenty-two porters from the pre-dispute deployment of forty. ROE stands for "retention of employment", so these are NHS staff seconded to the contractor Carillion, not direct Carillion company personnel; and a "Dispatcher" is a porter who does the job of a full senior, but for a basic grade wage. The "improved career path from Porter to Operations Manager" is code for: "If you're good enough at kissing our arse we'll promote you a bit quicker". I'm not sure about the "greater choice of shift patterns" bit. They may be planning to introduce a corps of 11-to-7 or 12-to-8 porters. These are hours nobody would choose, but they make effective dumping grounds for idiots, or as punishment duty. "Addressing" pay protection means what? They can easily respond after a two-minute consultation of twiddling their thumbs: "OK, we've addressed it, now get back to work!" No staff-member should even think of accepting this resolution without a written guarantee that their pre-dispute pay level will be permanently maintained. The paragraph beneath the bullet points sounds very sinister. It might result in a musical chairs-style scramble for all the tastiest drafts; and resentment and infighting when some of the crew don't get the hours that they want. "Work-life balance" is one of those Orwellian phrases we hear all the time nowadays in the hospital.

I must pay tribute to my contact on the inside. He has risked his career even more than all the others to bring me this information. The document above is a confidential internal communication that if you're a reader outside UNISON or the JR Portering department you should not have access to. He is the hospital portering equivalent of Edward Snowden. Naturally I have blanked out the identities of the signatories, but they are most of the people in command on both sides of this dispute. According to my contact, that portering fighting spirit has been extinguished; this proposal was passed 58% to 42%. He himself voted against it, as I hope I would have done. I don't wish to judge my serving peers in the hospital portering community, but I predicted in the previous article that this would happen. I said at the time that after the ballot the crew needed the catharsis of immediate action. I knew that this anticlimax of dithering and waffling would lead to frustration and demoralization. These are healthcare professionals and they are risking everything for this strike! They're going to feel very insecure and frightened. They might be tempted to accept a damaging compromise from Carillion that they would otherwise never consider. This is not a defeat for Carillion. In fact it's possible they put out the initial proposal knowing full well that they'd never be able to achieve everything within it. They just gave it a try to see how much they could get away with. They've settled at a satisfactory fall-back position and have made adequate progress. Give them six months to a year and they'll suggest more "streamlining and labour intensive" changes. There has been a split among the personnel, as I also thought might happen. Some of the porters have washed their hands of UNISON and are trying to bring in another union, the GMB, an organization that appears to have a good track record for taking a hard line against Carillion in the construction field, see: http://www.gmb.org.uk/. I don't blame those porters. UNISON are very good at hosting women's groups, black members facilitator meetings, organizing LGBT conferences and generally persuading white straight males of how EEEEEEEvil we all are, but the moment a good old fashioned punch-up breaks out, they suddenly shrink like violets. Unfortunately Carillion has refused to recognize the GMB in this state of affairs, even though many of their other employees are GMB-members, albeit in a different sector to healthcare. There is now going to be at least another month of sordid and grubby intercession in order to administer this new deal, but that is just a formality. The JR porters' strike is over. I just hope that the porters hang together and don't take out their resentment on each other. If there's to be any hope of salvaging something good from this situation then you, my brother and sister porters, must keep positive, keep your heads and stick together.

JR Porters' Strike Update

It is now a month since the porters of the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford elected to go on strike due to unacceptable changes in pay and shift patterns, see here for essential background: http://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.co.uk/2015/07/100-of-porters-vote-to-strike.html. So far no action has taken place. There have been strike dates announced but the actions have been called off. This has happened three times now; the latest being one that was due to start at 10 PM last night for forty-eight hours. My "insider" (qv) says there have been some worrying developments. According to him the strike action has been blocked by the regional office of UNISON. They say that this is not a "trade dispute", whatever the hell that means. I dropped out of trade unionism for ideological reasons, but still take an interest in it, at least as it relates to the National Health Service, and believe it can do some good. I don't see how UNISON can command strikers to stand down when their own members voted for strike action in a ballot UNISON organized itself; not only voted for it, but did so completely unanimously within a membership pool of almost a hundred. The JRH porters are risking everything over this action and their decision should be respected and taken very seriously. Bear in mind that this is information that I've only heard from a single source, but this kind of thing could be interpreted as a betrayal. People leave trade unions over matters like this, in fact shortly after I started in portering there was a split within the department itself. The main trade union of the NHS ancillary staff in those days was NUPE, the National Union of Public Employees, but the theatre porters defected to COHSE, the Confederation Of Health Service Employees. In 1993 both of those unions merged, along with the admin union NALGO, the National Association of Local Government Officers, to form UNISON. What porters have joined together porters can put asunder. If UNISON really do pull the rug out from under this strike will some of the porters move over to another union? Or will they form their own organization dedicated to this specific dispute? At the moment there is another in an ongoing series of "consultations" with management. There's also talk of referring the case to arbitration. I can guess exactly how the porters are feeling. This delay and indecision can be frightening and demoralizing. It might tempt them to accept a damaging compromise from Carillion that they would otherwise never consider. I hope not. We'll see; I'll post further updates as and when they occur. 

Paper Mask- full movie Online

Somebody has done the world an enormous disservice of uploading the entire film of Paper Mask to YouTube, exactly as I feared somebody would. It's obviously in the public domain now. I was hoping it had vanished forever, but it's popped up again like a bad smell,

See here for the film: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4BgBoaCQr20.

The film tells the story of a hospital porter who steals the identity of a dead doctor and impersonates him. I'm only posting a link because some people are curious to watch it. If you choose to click it, don't blame me afterwards!

See here for background: http://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/paper-mask-online.html.

Alyson Dunlop on Hospital Ghosts

Supernatural Magazine has recently published a very interesting article which confirms some of my own observations. Alyson Dunlop, a Scottish paranormal researcher and radio show host relates her experiences of being in the Western Infirmary in Glasgow for major surgery last year. She saw an apparition of a teenage boy and a cloud of "smoky mist". She also encountered a departed family friend. During a second admission she was kept next door to a room with an old woman in it who was being treated as terminal. She witnessed a frightening dark entity in the vicinity of the room, as if this was a Grim Reaper type character who knew the old woman's time was almost up and was waiting to take her away. Alyson prayed to the angels and she reports that they chased the dark entity away. The old lady made a miraculous recovery. I myself have seen miracles in my hospital quite a few times. One that sticks in my mind is a case from the delivery suite in which a mother was expecting twins but was told one of them had died; this was confirmed by Doppler ultrasound scan. However both babies were born alive and well. Alyson asked the nurses and they told her that there had been a similar incident that they'd witnessed in the course of their duties. She wonders if a dark entity is haunting that ward, and that maybe the operating theatres are haunted too, see: http://supernaturalmagazine.com/articles/hospital-ghosts. I've found that supernatural occurrences in hospitals are extremely common, perhaps because of the amount of pain, fear and death you find within their walls, see background links below for more details. Hospital staff are sometimes quite willing to discuss it privately if they know they're in the presence of somebody who will take them seriously. Other than that it is something of an "open secret". Near-death experiences and contact with deceased patients by staff is another frequent occurrence, see Dr Mitchell Gibson; however for reasons I go into in the background links, such phenomena are very hard to scientifically prove. However, as the saying goes, absence of evidence does not equal evidence of absence.

See here for background: http://hpanwo.blogspot.co.uk/2011/03/hospital-ghosts.html.

And: http://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.co.uk/2015/06/hospital-worker-sees-ghost.html.

And: http://hpanwo-voice.blogspot.co.uk/2014/10/proof-of-life-after-death.html.