Health and Safety - Conkers

Armed with a large bag of conkers and some string we decided that last Monday night would see a conkers contest just like those we used to have when I was a child back in the dark ages. Of course the first thing to do was check out any Health and Safety (H&S) issues that might be present.

After reading of the escalation of banning conkers and other places who institutes rules regarding goggles, gloves and other protective equipment we were dreading what lay before us, but we were pleasantly surprised when it appeared that the H&S wallahs were quite up for such sport. In fact it seemed that those who had embraced draconian measures (I love Bram Stoker!) had caused the H&S people quite a lot of problems and branded them as excessive killjoys, something it appears they certainly aren't.

So off we went and go the kids to play against each other in a knockout competition. The result was that some asked us where they could 'buy' conkers and how we made them (really!! What have we done to our children?). So perhaps we have, in our own small way, contributed to a little bit of childhood being reclaimed. The best bit is that the game is played in full colour and 3D without any need for special polarised glasses or two different coloured lenses.

Bargain!

And as for the injuries? It appears that I was the only one to bear any scars at the end of the day:

Political Correctness, Health & Safety, Harmful to freedom?

What do Political Correctness and Health & Safety have in common?

The answer is that both are means by which action is restricted or even curtailed and they, when combined with other measures that seek to prevent damage, offence and unwanted outcomes actually are handcuffing the worlds in which we live.

Health and Safety.

I was today told that a local team would not be parading their trophy from the top of an open-tipped bus because of heath and safety concerns. It appears that having done a risk-assessment, it was decided that there was too much potential for people being injured!

During the snow last year there was a news item about kids being stopped from sledding down the slopes for fear of injury to them should they fall off! Another story told of children who were stopped from playing conkers in case they were hit and hurt!

Heath and safety provides an opportunity for the nanny state to engage in excesses which go past taking reasonable care to protect and enter in the fantasy world whereby all things are potentially harmful or hazardous. It is easier to stop everything, because then nothing happens and so nothing harmful can result. The bottom-line is that Health and Safety, especially wrongly applied health and safety stops physical activity and endeavours.

Political Correctness.

A good principle in life is that if we stop people saying wrong things then this will lead to them stopping thinking wrong things. If we can stop people thinking wrong things then we can stop them doing wrong things. If we can stop people doing wrong things then we will have a society which is more balanced and a kinder, nicer, place to be in.

The problem is that when wrongly applied it produces a knee-jerk society that sees some people reporting others for breaches of what they consider to be correct behaviour and it drives the bigots, racists and people who live in a world of nastiness to merely function off the radar until they trapse through our towns with their banners and marches proclaiming that they are minority, acted-against, groups.

Many years a go, when our handicapped son was alive, we were visited by a social worker who kept wittering on about 'special children' and engaged in a variety of terms to avoid saying words like 'spastic' or 'mentally handicapped'. At the end of the visit I pointed out that rather than hide behind terms and euphemisms I would rather she'd have got to know our son. The political correctness stopped her engaging and thinking and this is the problem with being PC. I stops people thinking and encourages dishonesty.

One of the problems with ecumenical work is that just as people assume 'peace' is merely an absence of war, other assume that silence means unity! They don't and whilst I applaud the removal of offensive language from our vocabulary I am aware that this is not as real an outcome and stifling honest debate.

Last night I was approached by a member of the Islamic faith who thanked me for the words I spoke at a training session recently. Now we differ in faith and yet respect one another - this is what we need to encourage. Open and honest debate engaged on the playing field of honesty, respect and integrity, not encouraging people to merely hide words below the surface and growing the seeds of those words in the dark.

Pax