Contre quelles équipes notre hymne national a-t-il été sifflé jusqu'à présent ? Algérie, Maroc et Tunisie. Tiens, les trois pays du Maghreb. Oh, oh, oh, le drôle de hasard. Ces mêmes Algériens, Marocains et Tunisiens qui sont venus en France voici plus de 40 ans (sur ordre de l'Etat et du patronat français) pour aider au développement de la France. Ces mêmes Algériens, Marocains et Tunisiens qui rêvent encore de visas pour venir en France. Ne me faites surtout pas dire ce que je n'ai pas écrit. Il est évident que ceux qui ont sifflé la Marseillaise ne sont majoritairement pas ceux qui sont venus en France il y a 40 ans ou ceux qui sont arrivés la semaine dernière sur notre sol national en provenance d'Alger, Rabat ou Tunis. Non. Non, la majorité des Algériens, des Marocains et des Tunisiens qui ont sifflé notre hymne national sont en réalité des... Français. Et c'est là que cela fait mal. Car les enfants des Algériens, des Marocains et des Tunisiens venus en France dans les années 60 sont nés ici ; ils sont Français comme vous et moi. Sauf que malgré leur carte d'identité, ils crachent sur leur pays de naissance.

Le malaise est profond. La plaie est béante. Et une fois de plus, nous avons la parfaite illustration de l'échec des différentes politiques d'immigration qui ont été menées depuis près de 50 ans. Nous avons toute une génération (voire deux) qui rejette son pays de naissance et s'identifient davantage au pays de ses ancêtres. Un peu comme si votre serviteur s'identifiait aux Italiens. La bonne blague.

Et que propose Bachelot ? D'arrêter les matches. Une réponse à la con et inutile à un problème dramatique qui risque d'avoir de violentes conséquences dans les années à venir. Il y a des soubresauts parfois, mais pour le moment tout reste contrôlable. En attendant la chute. Finale.

Cette mesure ne verra pas le jour car la Fédération n'est pas près d'organiser de nouveau un match contre un pays du Maghreb. L'Algérie, c'était en 2001 ; le Maroc en 2006 ; et donc la Tunisie en 2008. On est peinard pour au moins 20 ans là. D'ici la fracture se sera encore plus creusée entre les... Français.

Enfin, si. Il existe un bon moyen pour voir si la mesure de Bachelot sera appliquée.

Organisons un match contre le Sénégal ou le Mali.

At least, I started meditating again yesterday and it did me good. I will try to keep it up even if there is always something else to do, which is taking me to what I want to talk about today:

Resistance and control.

First of all, for about 6 months now, I have felt like my energy is being blocked. I don’t know why. I feel out of sort. It’s like I’m trying to push through something but my head gets stuck against some kind of flexible membrane that will not break and I am stopped from bursting out… I don’t know… I feel the membrane stretching but it does not rupture. Figuratively, I suppose I am trying to be born into something different, something better, freer and more creative.

There is so much I want to do but at the same time, I am afraid it will not work and I feel there is never enough time. Furthermore, life has been trying to show me that I am not in control of anything lately. I do not control what is around me, my kids (their moods, their lives: I just want them to be happy), my friends, my projects, events around me, nothing. All kinds of curves are being thrown my way. And I like control. I admit I like when things go the way I want. But who doesn’t? This has not been happening lately.

Resistance: I came across a good exercise about resistance the other day and it made me think a big part of my wasted energy is going into fighting my own resistance. When you are trying to do something you want to do but somehow, the whole day goes by and you haven’t done it. What is happening? The exercise consists in trying to hear the voices in our heads, identify them, and see how they influence our lives. That never ending tape: Parents’ voices, old friends’, people from the past, old teachers and mentors, sometimes only a comment or a smirk coming from a pure stranger but that, somehow, that day, affected us because we felt vulnerable. Voices from the past that still affect our lives today, that push us down, that slow us down, that change where we are heading, what we are becoming. Why do we stay with these voices, why do we tend to listen and believe what is negative instead of positive?

What does it have to do with control? A lot because we should not let these voices from the past control how we react to things today.

I have read somewhere that life is all an illusion anyhow, a story we tell ourselves through our perception of what is going on around us. If we are telling ourselves a story, why not tell ourselves a good one? How many of us do not believe in compliments but accept without question any negative comments?

I realized yesterday that life was trying to teach me a lesson, a very valuable one at that. I have known for a long time that you do not control anything but your reactions to any event, to what is around you, to life. But I also have tried to fight this. I like control. Even if I am sometimes myself out of control in my habits, my home, especially my painting room… which is a mess most of the time, I try to feel like I have some kind of control over events around me. I try to make people happy,  I try to influence (what a shame) my environment All this is always with good intentions really, but I realize these good intentions are according to my own values and ideas. Like I want the world to smarten up and reduce pollution and protect the earth. I want the government to stop the exploitation and expansion of tar sands which is totally motivated by greed. I cannot understand whatsoever why human beings feel they have to destroy the earth in order to survive. It makes no sense to me and I don’t see how people don’t realize that with no earth, there will be no life, or money, or comfort, so what’s the point?  Where is the voice of reason?

I naturally assume people are acting in goodwill but have found lately that it is not so. People are acting more out of fear than out of reason or goodwill. Fear of not having what they want, fear of not being loved, fear of losing control. Fear and greed... I very often feel lost in that world that is so different from what I am. I still think that peace and love will win out. I still hope for it. I just can’t figure out where the world is going right now, or how come nobody wakes up and respect one another.

Does is have to do with evolution and the survival of the fittest? Because as I see it, the fittest is also the meanest and the greediest. And it is all about control at this point.

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This is one of my main areas of difficulty in therapy so it’s something I want to take a proper look at.

Any input from others on this is greatly appreciated.

I've said before that the therapeutic relationship is imbalanced but needs to be that way in order for the therapy to work. I also recently talked about unconditional positive regard and the experience of being fully accepted by another human being who we respect.

But is this enough to create trust?

The issue of course is that you are essentially telling your deepest and darkest to a complete stranger. Ok, you get to know the therapist to some extent as the therapy progresses but not as you would in the real world and certainly not enough to walk in off the street and reveal all in the first session.

In fact, a client can be working with a therapist for months, even years before feeling comfortable or safe enough to trust them with their most difficult material.

Why is trust so difficult?
Trust takes a long time to build up in any relationship but even more so for those who have had their trust abused time and time again by people who should be relied on such as parents, teachers, and even previous therapists.

Why is trust so difficult in therapy?
I'd say that the difficulty in trusting a therapist comes from the situation of not knowing someone and what they are capable of.

In real life, with people we meet face to face and have a "normal" interaction with we can judge enough from their behaviour, body language etc to know what kind of person we are dealing with and instinctually what level of trust we are comfortable with.

These rules do not apply in therapy. In fact you can throw the rule book out the window. A therapist is already a hugely unknown quantity and will probably, for the most part, remain that way.

As I've said before, you will never be able to interact with your therapist as you would a friend or family member because of the (necessary) boundaries of the therapeutic framework. The therapist will never reveal enough of themselves (and indeed shouldn’t) for you to know that much about them.

Of course, I am not saying the relationship cannot be one of deep understanding, merely that you are there to talk about you not the therapist. You are there to gain deeper insight into yourself and how you react to people and situations in your real life. This can only be done if you are able to focus on yourself and your own needs rather than those of the therapist.

But still trust is the essence of successful therapy. Despite never knowing this person you must be able to tell your therapist everything they need to know about you to guide you forward whether this is your life history or your deepest fears.

Easier said than done.

So what builds trust and what destroys it?
There are a number of factors involved in the building of trust in therapy and of course it differs from client to client as we all have our own issues, histories and idiosyncrasies to navigate - as do our therapists.

The challenge of course is that the therapist has to handle both our and their own issues and somehow navigate us towards a trusting relationship.

Building trust
The therapist cannot create trust on their own. There has to be movement towards this common ground from both parties within the dyad. However this is not something that can be magically produced from the client.

I know from firsthand experience how important it is for the client to be open to trust as a long-term goal but not to allow themselves to be pushed into revealing information or attempting to work through material that they are simply not emotionally ready to handle. Especially when there is no trust base to support such disclosure.

The basis of all trust is communication. Yes, there are other factors such as respect, empathy, tone of voice, boundaries, remembering issues and avoiding painful areas that the therapist can provide but above all therapist and client must move towards the best possible communication available to them and be patient as they work to achieve this.

Destroying trust
Funnily enough, the easiest way to destroy trust is through miscommunication and I am talking here about the client's trust in the therapist, the relationship or the work.

This happens most commonly (in my experience) when the client expresses (or feels they have expressed) a need or an issue and feels that this need is not internalised, respected or responded to by the therapist. This is clearly caused by miscommunication which can itself, ironically, be brought about by the client's inability to openly express needs and vulnerabilities.

It is the therapist’s role to help the client identify and express these needs on a regular basis so that this kind of miscommunication can be avoided. Of course the client must work (incredibly hard) as well to communicate needs to the therapist but we don't all have the self-esteem and confidence to do this the minute we start in therapy. There is work to do on both sides but as clients we have to remember that only one of us is trained in this.

The therapist's responsibility
Is it the therapist's responsibility to earn our trust or are we responsible for that ourselves? One of the readers on this site recently suggested that you can "choose" to trust someone - I wish this were true but from personal experience I would say it is not.

Still, your therapist cannot make you trust him/her. Yes, they are responsible for creating an environment conducive to trust - an environment that is physically comfortable where you feel relaxed, to some extent in control and where you feel respected and accepted with clear boundaries and a strong therapeutic frame. But expecting the therapist to do all the work is not realistic and can be frustrating for both parties.

So what can we do as clients?
We cannot force trust and it is not wise to try to. If you try to make the leap and give your trust to someone you do not feel fully safe or comfortable with then it is inevitable that they will hurt you - even if unintentionally.

By forcing yourself to "trust" you are leaving yourself open and you simply will be too sensitised and vulnerable to further trauma. This can be avoided by working at your own pace and maintaining your own boundaries as well as those of the therapist.

Trust is not built all at once and often comes a little at a time. Often we learn to trust by taking small steps and building on that which went before. It is in this gradual process that we build a base from which to move forward as best we can.

Nor is it a constant progression. There are times in every relationship where there are set-backs and nowhere more so than in the therapeutic relationship. For every moment that builds trust there are 10 that can potentially destroy it. The constant cycle of transference issues and miscommunication must be monitored by both therapist and client and discussed openly and honestly so that when ruptures do occur, the therapy can be brought back on track and move forward once again.

For most clients building trust is a constant battle - a balance between very sturdy pre-existing defences, the (perceived?) pressure from the therapist to reveal more and go deeper and a staggering fear of revealing too much and being hurt even further.

See also:
List of all posts
Boundary issues
The weirdest relationship you’ll ever have
A brief introduction to transference
The therapeutic use of silence
Miscommunication in therapy
Building trust - the collaborative relationship
Why questioning isn’t interrogation
The intelligent client (soapbox moment)
The client’s needs in the therapeutic process – insight for clients and therapists
Taking control of your own therapy
Talking about the tricky stuff - being honest with your therapist
Resistance is (not) futile
Rights and responsibilities in therapy
Acting-out in therapy - boundaries, communication and resistance
Getting “stuck” in therapy
Emotional “resistance” - building trust with extremely defensive clients

And now see also...
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King Bhumibol entertains former president Bush and his wife Barbara at the royal palace. Observers say he is likely to be a key player if the tanks roll again. "The king is involved in every coup," points out Kitirianglarp, who like many in the capital fears that more trouble is on its way.

Irish Times | Oct 13, 2008

David McNeill in Bangkok

A year ago Chutima Penpak was just one more face in the crowd in Thailand's choking capital city. Then, on a visit to watch a Lindsay Lohan movie at a Bangkok cinema, the young political science student made a decision that may change her life: she and her boyfriend remained sitting before the opening credits.

The decision, during a song played in honour of Thailand's King Bhumibol, was greeted by catcalls, verbal abuse and showers of popcorn.

"One guy started screaming at us in English, like he couldn't imagine a Thai doing this," she recalls. "He told the staff: 'I don't want these people to watch this movie because they don't respect the king.' The crowd applauded him."

In a nation where the king and his family are treated with almost cult-like reverence, Penpak and her boyfriend, Chotisak Onsoong, are part of a very rare breed: anti-monarchists. Their protest may cost them dearly. Thailand has some of the planet's harshest lese-majesty laws, a feudal hangover that punishes disrespect toward aristocratic authority with jail sentences of up to 15 years.

Although few are punished that severely, the laws are regularly invoked, increasingly against foreigners. Australian author Harry Nicolaides was arrested at Bangkok airport last month for defaming the king in a 2003 book. Last year, Swiss national Oliver Jufer was sentenced to 10 years in jail after he drunkenly defaced portraits of the king with spray paint. The king later pardoned him.

The BBC's Southeast Asia correspondent, Jonathan Head, has also been singled out by a Thai police boss, who accused the reporter of being part of an "anti-monarchy conspiracy". Police complained that an image of the king on the broadcaster's website ran below a picture of exiled former leader Thaksin Shinawatra. Thai rules demand that images of the king must always be on top.

King Bhumibol has been on the throne since 1946, making him the world's longest-reigning monarch, and the richest. According to Forbes magazine, his family sits on a $35 billion fortune, with interests in banking, insurance, property and one of Asia's largest concrete companies. His signature yellow Rolls Royce, which is festooned with images of him and his wife, Queen Sirikit, often stops traffic in Bangkok.

The monarchs are among the first sights that greet visitors to Thailand: their giant portraits are draped across the exit of the capital's gleaming new international airport. Thais celebrate their national day on the king's birthday, December 5th, which, tellingly, is known as Father's Day. Queen Sirikit also has a national holiday named after her: Mother's Day on August 12th.

Criticism of the king, and discussion about his health or his eventual demise (he is now almost 81) are muted in the media. Talk of who will succeed him, or if the most likely choice, his unpopular only son Prince Maha Vajiralongkorn, is up to the job, is rarely aired. "Even discussing his death can be interpreted as lese-majesty," says Kengkij Kitirianglarp, a doctoral candidate at city's Chulalongkorn University.

The biggest taboo of all, however, may be the king's involvement in politics. Although officially reigning over a constitutional monarchy, he is believed to have been an adviser - at the very least - in the 2006 bloodless coup that ousted Thaksin. Without his involvement, the coup would have been impossible," Thai social critic Sulak Siwalak recently told the BBC.

Observers say he is likely to be a key player if the tanks roll again. "The king is involved in every coup," points out Kitirianglarp, who like many in the capital fears that more trouble is on its way.

There is no immediate prospect of an end to the bitter standoff between the authorities and the anti-government People's Alliance for Democracy, whose supporters have besieged the capital's government buildings since late August. Thailand's former deputy prime minister warned this week a putsch was the "only way out" of the political stalemate, although the army has waved such speculation away.

King Bhumibol's enormous popularity is difficult for

outsiders to fathom, but it is partly based on his reputation as a virtuous and modest monarch who has his country's best interests at heart. He and his wife work hard at serving their subjects; the queen, for example, gave thousands of dollars to Bangkok hospitals treating patients injured in last week's bloody demonstrations.

But the country's turbulent political history has also played a major part in his rise to pseudo-divinity. Like a rock in a stormy sea, the Thai king has been a source of continuity and strength through 60 years of chaos and on-off military rule.

His authority is invoked by competing political forces, while ordinary Thais look to him for help when the fragile status quo evaporates, as it did this year.

Critics say the increasing use of lese-majesty is evidence of political insecurity. "Some politicians want to extend the jail sentence to 20 or 30 years," says Kitirianglarp, laughing bitterly. Meanwhile, Penpak and her boyfriend wait as the authorities decide their fate. "I'm frightened of what will happen, but if I worry all the time about the future I won't be able to live my life," she says.

Et comme contre l'Algérie et le Maroc, l'hymne national français a été copieusement sifflé par les supporters Tunisiens.

Ce qui donne un petit aperçu de l'amour que portent certains Algériens, Marocains et Tunisiens à la France. Ces mêmes Algériens, Marocains et Tunisiens qui constituent bien évidemment le noyau dur des immigrés en France depuis près de 40 ans.

Ca promet pour l'avenir.

Resistance to sit and do the task. Resistance to writing, putting more words on paper. Resistance to this very thing I love to do. So why the resistance? If I love it, actually come to it with eagerness and even anticipation, why would I engage in resisting it? Why would I come here, all prepared to do it, then grasp at the flimsiest of excuses to remove myself from the clear opportunity to partake in it? Would you accept an, "I don't know?" Maybe you would, but I can't. I, after all, know the dangers of doing just that.

I know, for instance, that saying I'll get back to it tomorrow, will more than likely find me accepting the next excuse that comes along. And the next one, and the next, until I find that instead of hours missing in action, I might be AWOL for a month or two or three. Even a year, maybe more. Been there, done that, and more than once, as a matter of fact. There is only one solution that I am aware of: resist the resistance. The only way to do that is by coming back here, sitting down, and writing.

Resistance is a natural part of the human condition. We don't want to change, don't want to move outside of our comfort zone, don't want to upset the applecart, make waves that could splash us with a ton of cold water. We'd much prefer to sit back, get comfy and cozy and let it all go run the way it has always done. And mostly that means, without our input. It's so much easier to let someone else do it, take charge, make the rules, assign the assignments, make sure that it all gets done. Then our only role is to complain when it gets screwed up or doesn't work, and we even know exactly who to blame if that happens. And it certainly isn't numero uno, now is it?

I mean, I could so easily say this is all my sister's fault. She, after all, stepped into my space and enticed me, now didn't she? She dangled all that forbidden fruit in front of my eyes, what can one poor (underline the poor), frail old woman do? I'll tell you what she did. She shut down this computer, broke speed records taking a shower, getting dressed, and out the door, before she could stop and think about the very real fact that she actually hates to go shopping. That thought didn't occur until she was belted in the front passenger seat, leaving the driveway.

But she did distract herself. She saw a huge hawk sitting up high on a tree branch. Asked her sister to turn the car around and go back and take a look. He was beautiful. Do you know the symbolism of the hawk? He is considered, by many, to be a spiritual messenger, soaring up high between heaven and earth, bringing messages from that far away Sky World, back to this more mundane one. And his message? "Remember who you really are." Ummmmm, that didn't work so well.

But her sister asked if they could go out to eat before shopping. More forbidden fruit, and certainly a distraction away from that silly symbolic message. So, of course, that poor (underline it), fragile old woman said, "yes." It was obvious that that was part of the plan all along, and besides, her sister was driving so she really didn't have much choice in the matter, did she? But, she did happen to mention that she never eats breakfast unless its at a restaurant, because she hates to cook it. So much more delicious when someone else makes the mess and has to clean it up. And delicious it was.

So, her sister drops her at the Super Store she prefers, and then takes off for the grocery store because that was the kind of shopping her sister needed to do. She climbs inside the battery powered cart and goes in search of poster putty. Can't find it. Asks, but gets head scratches and vague directions to the other side of the store, of course. On the way over, she passes the Women's Clothing and takes a quick peek to see if they have the kind of pants she prefers. They do, but she needs to try them on (hates that more than shopping), and finds that she's dropped a few sizes. It's been awhile and, did I mention, she really hates shopping?

She manages to get a few grocery items, then realizes that its probably time to go looking for her sister, who said she'd be back in about an hour and a half. Rides her cart along the front end of the store making herself highly visible so said sister can find her. While doing so, it occurs to her that she does need ink cartridges for her computer. She is a writer, you know, and will be needing more of it soon. Those particular items, of course, are at the far back of the store. She manages to get them, put them in her cart, and heads up front again, where her sister is pacing back and forth, looking for her. Check out, load up, and head for home and putting all of it away.

She comes in the bedroom to hang up her new pants, and sees a note from her daughter leaning against the monitor screen. Grabs the note and looks up to see a magnificent hawk, wings spread against the sky, on her screen. It's one of the many photos she has saved to use for a screen saver slide show, and to remind her of that symbolic and spiritual message. She's exhausted and takes a nap. When she awakens, she moves to sit in front of the computer. She needs to check out a poetry site that she recently posted on. Wants to know if anyone has responded. Does that, only to find herself back here, right where she started this morning. Have you ever heard a poor (duly noted and underlined), fragile old woman laugh out loud? It's a very strong sound, and it has a tendency to shake up those demons called Resistance. They know what it means. So do I.

Resistance is a natural part of our being. And, we do resist the very things we want most and even need. We do it because the things we want and need will change our world as we know it. They might even change us.

[We] need to make a distinction between resistance and coping. Much cultural studies literature focuses, quite legitimately and fruitfully, on the ways which cultural practices can be understood as responding to and coping with people's conditions of existence. For Angela McRobbie and others, shopping grants women a space for autonomous self expression. For others, romance literature and soap operas provide the same function through fantasy. In the bad old days, we called this escapism; in those ascetic, puritan, socialist days escapism was a bad thing. Today, while it may be an understandable response to constrained social circumstances, and while it is clearly neither manipulated nor merely passive, and while these social subjects are not given any other options, escapism does little, it seems to me, to resist the structure of domination in which these subjects find themselves. In fact, escapism may (as understandable as the practice is) contribute to the maintenance of that structure of power. This is surely Foucault's main theme - the widespread complicity of victims with systems of power that oppress them. It is not a question of either patronizing the group or imposing one's own cultural standards on them, but of recognizing the systemic constraints within which they construct their forms of cultural coping and how unemancipative these can be, Surely the aim should not be to bow down in ethnographic worship of these cultural practices, but to create a social reality in which there are wider possibilities for the excercise of both symbolic and (in my view more importantly) material power. [...] We may wish to salute the courage and cultural inventiveness shown in such circumstances, but at the same time will wish to change them.

Garnham, N. 1998. Political Economy and Cultural Studies: Reconciliation or Divorce? In Cultural Theory and Popular Culture: A Reader, 2nd Edition, J Storey (Ed). London: Prentice Hall (P. 609).

And the counter-argument:

Cultural studies does not assume that opposition, resistance, struggle and survival (coping) are the same; but it does assume that the possibilities for the first two depend in complex ways on the realities of the last two. [...] For cultural studies, the fact that people do use the limited resources they are given to find better ways of living, to find ways of increasing the control they have over aspects of their lives, is significant, not only in itself, but also in terms of understanding the structures of power and inequality in the contemporary world and the possibilities for challenging them. Cultural studies does assume that people live their subordination actively; that means, in one sense, that thery often complicit in their own subordination, that they accede to it, although power often works through strategies and apparatuses of which people are totally unaware. Be that as it way, cultural studies believes that if one is to challenge the existing structures of power, then one has to understand how that complicity, that participipation in power, is constructed and lived, and that means not only looking at what people gain from such practices, but also at the possibilities for rearticulating such practices to escape, resist or even oppose particular structures of power. Cultural studies refuses to assume that people are cultural dupes, that they are entirely and passively manipulated, either by the media or by capitalism. But it does not deny that they are sometimes duped, that they are sometimes manipulated, that they are lied to (and believe the lies, sometimes knowing that they are lies).

Grossberg, L. 1998. Cultural Studies vs. Political Economy: Is Anybody Else Bored with this Debate? In Cultural Theory and Popular Culture: A Reader, 2nd Edition, J Storey (Ed). London: Prentice Hall (P. 617).

Anyway, that really has nothing to do with electricity itself, other than the fact that the use of electricity in everyday life is completely necessary and unavoidable. Within homes, electricity provides the energy necessary to power household appliances like dishwashers, refrigerators, and clotheswashers and dryers. Electricity can also come from batteries ranging from AAAs to larger car batteries. The voltage (electrical potential), or the relative desire of electrons to "get out", is measured in Volts. Although eight small batteries might have the same voltage as a car battery, the smaller batteries wouldn't be able to power a car because they wouldn't have enough charge (number of electrons, which is measured in Coulombs). Because charge is what makes certain devices generate more current, voltage by itself isn't dangerous: only when high voltage is combined with high current and therefore high charge is there severe danger of electrocution.

In the photo, both the moving blades of the fan and the lightbulbs (although they aren't lit in this picture) are powered by electricity. When a lightbulb lights, the electrons that cause the lightbulb's filament to heat and glow come from the lightbulb itself, not from the electric company: the electric company supplies current and voltage, the latter of which is typically distributed in 120 Volts to outlets in the United States.

Let's take an even closer look inside a lightbulb. When it's connected to a circuit, current flows through a conducting material on the bottom or sides and flows up one of two wires that connect to a thin filament in the center of the glass bulb. If the current heats the filament to a high enough temperature, it becomes hot and glows, emitting light. The relative brightness or dimness of a bulb depends on the resistance offered by the circuit.

Resistance in a circuit is precisely what it sounds like: the tendency of the circuit to resist the flow of current. Typically, short and fat wires offer less resistance to current than do long and thin ones: electricity can flow more quickly, efficiently, and easily through a wide, short pathway than it can through a longer, thinner one. This concept is analagous to breathing through a straw or through a thicker tube: you'll notice that breathing through a straw is a lot more difficult.

Circuits can be wired in one of two ways: series or parallel. In series, the same current passes through each resistor (something that offers resistance to flow - for example, a lightbulb). For example, most strings of Christmas lights are wired in series: this can be problematic because if one light goes out, the whole string is useless. The plus side is that it uses a relatively small amount of energy and smaller, thinner wires, which can be more convenient for transportation and storage. In parallel, current passes through multiple circuits at the same time. This is like breathing through four straws at once - easier than breathing through just one, so clearly parallel circuiting offers less resistance to the flow of current than does series. In parallel, the same voltage, rather than the same current, flows through each resistor.  Most houses and cars are wired in series - if they weren't, everything would go out of power as soon as one appliance malfunctioned. The trouble with parallel is that it uses a lot more energy than series so can wear a battery or generator down quite quickly.

The units commonly associated with electricity are Amperes (A), which measure current (I); Volts (V), which measure voltage; Watts (W), which measure power; and ohms, which measure resistance (R). The formula for finding current is I = R/V. To find power

: P = IV.

By Liz Fekete

For the second year running, French grassroots anti-racist associations joined forces to organise the Social Forum of the Banlieues (FSQP, Le Forum Social des Quartiers Populaires).

This unique and exciting gathering, attended by over 500 people from across the country, was held over three days (3-5 October) in the northern Parisian suburb (banlieue) of Nanterre.

The Forum's roots

The roots of the Forum go back to 2005 and the biggest 'riots' France has witnessed since the May 1968 student protests. The revolt of the youth, which began in the poor eastern Parisian suburb of Clichy-sous-Bois, soon spread to every major city in France. Triggered by the deaths of two youths of African origin, Zyed Benna and Bouna Traoré (attempting to evade police pursuit following an identity check they climbed into a power station and were electrocuted), it led the government of President Chirac to declare a national state of emergency.[1] Soon afterwards, grassroots organisations made the 'Call for the National Social Forum of the Banlieues'.[2] Fed up with the media demonisation of the banlieues as 'the lost territories of the Republic',[3] and 'no-go areas' populated by 'scum' and savages', these associations sought to establish through a collective mode of organisation a unity of purpose which would counter local fragmentation of the struggle for social and political rights. Thus, from the outset, the Forum was designed to 'be a place of reflection and a meeting place of different local struggles', while 'offering them political visibility at a national level'.

The history of Nanterre

When North African and other immigrant workers first came to France, principally from Algeria. Morocco and Tunisia in the 1950s and 1960s, social housing was not provided. The new immigrant workers were forced to occupy the most marginal of housing conditions in the squalid shanty towns (bidonvilles) surrounding the major cities of France. It was fitting, then, that this year's Forum was held in Nanterre for, in the 1960s, Nanterre (then an industrial area) had been the site of one of France's largest bidonville (thirteen shanty towns with a population of 8,000 - half of whom were women and children). Today, the children and grandchildren of these first immigrant workers live alongside the undocumented and marginalised in the huge sprawling estates which towered over the conference venue (a series of marquees in the Parc André Malraux). Close by was the gleaming glass of city-skyscrapers and the gentrified housing estates and gated communities which are now home to better-off Parisians.

Unity in action

Just about every French minority community was represented at the Forum - Black, White, French-Algerians, Moroccans, Tunisians and (sub-Saharan) Africans, etc as well as, of course, the sans papiers represented by the Committee from the 9th Arrondisement. An enormous range of issues was discussed in raw, and often heated (but always democratic) debate: racism, discrimination, educational exclusion, social housing, police violence and media stigmatisation; Islamophobia, feminism, colonialism and its legacy (particularly in the French Overseas Departments); the war on terror and Palestine, an issue that is part of the very heart-beat of the banlieue. What emerged from the debates was the strong unity of purpose of communities fighting as a people, and as a class.

One of the most important themes discussed at the Forum was the destruction of social housing - all part of Sarkozy's urban renovation plans (read gentrification of the banlieue and demolition of estates and dispersal of inhabitants). The session on police violence was addressed by civil rights activists campaigning around recent deaths in custody, such as that of Lamine Dieng in Paris in June 2007, Reda Semmoudi in Seine Saint Denis in January 2008 and Abdelhakim Hadijmi in Grasse in May 2008. The justice and policing session was accompanied by a moving exhibition, with photographs and campaign literature recalling the many young men (mostly North Africans) who have died over the years in police custody or suspicious circumstances involving the police. The exhibition also recalled the tragic events of 17 October 1961 when the Paris police vented its fury at Algerian immigrant workers rallying in support of Algerian independence and in opposition to the nightly curfew. As many as 200 Algerians died when police drove the demonstrators into the Seine where they drowned; others were clubbed to death.

Cultures of resistance

The Forum was not just about political discussion. There was a Cinéma des Quartiers, theatre and other cultural events. The first theatrical performance on the opening night of the Forum was by Al Houda, a Muslim feminist organisation from Rennes. Its production 'Le son du tissus', (The sound of cloth), a one-woman performance explored the personal impact of the stigmatisation and exclusion from society of Muslim women who wear the headscarf. It was based on Al Houda's experiences with French feminists who, amongst other things, banned it from taking part in their annual event on International Women's Day (on the grounds that wearing the veil is incompatible with feminism). Islamophobia and the veil was also discussed the following day in a seminar where school teacher and writer Pierre Tévanian and social activist Ismahane Chouder discussed their new book, Les Filles voilées parlent (Veiled Girls speak out). The book explores the experiences of stigmatisation and exclusion of fourty-four French Muslim girls following the introduction of the 2004 law against the wearing of conspicuous religious symbols in schools.

What next?

In the Forum's final session, participants discussed their ideas for the future. Just as in the UK, activists were anxious about increasing alienation of young people and much of the focus was on strategic interventions capable of reaching out to them. The many documentaries and cultural films broadcast at the Forum are to be shown in community venues. And there was talk of extending the forum into regional forums, addressing national themes.

[1] As many observers noted at the time, the last occasion the State of Emergency was applied by the French government was in Algeria in 1961. [2] See < www.habitants.de/en/news/movements/index.php/art_0000003>. [3] In 2002, a book entitled 'The Lost Territories of the Republic: anti-Semitism, racism and sexism in the educational sphere', edited by the Holocaust historian Georges Bensoussan (under the pseudonym Emmanuel Brenner) blamed problems of violence in schools on 'Arabic-Muslim culture'. Following that, it became fashionable for the media to talk of the banlieues as the lost territories of the Republic. Liz Fekete is head of European research at the Institute of Race Relations. She is currently conducting a two-year research project on 'Alternative Voices on Integration' funded by the Network of European Foundations (European Programme on Integration and Migration).
The Institute of Race Relations is precluded from expressing a corporate view: any opinions expressed are therefore those of the authors.

[original article]

See also: IRR: Organising in the banlieues

This article is a critical note on the proposed SKIL SEZ, in Gagret, Himachal Pradesh.

Last week 22 villages of Raigad District in Maharashtra went through an elaborate voting procedure not to elect a representative but to establish that they were indeed not in favour of giving up their lands for Mukesh Ambani’s mega SEZ to be spread over an area of 35,000 acres. The referendum was a consequence of a two-year-long agitation by farmers and fishing communities against the SEZ, a last resort for the exasperated government to ‘verify’ that the opposition was genuine and the only way for the local movement to prove its majority. It has had Reliance running to court challenging the Maharashtra government’s decision to hold the referendum in the first place. The voting, which came out with a crystal clear “No” to the SEZ obviously did not go down well with the media and the industrial lobby still reeling under the Singur happenings. In the same week the Union Ministry of Commerce’s Board of Approvals gave formal approval to 18 more SEZ proposals taking the count of approvals to 531.

In the list of in-principle approvals is the contentious mulit-product SEZ to be developed by SKIL which has faced stiff opposition from the farmers of 14 villages in the Gagret block, Una (Himachal Pradesh) where it is proposed to be located.

This has more or less been the trajectory along which the SEZ drama has unfolded over the last three years since the passing of the Act. The dissent on the ground has gone hand in hand with the chunk of SEZ approvals every month. It seems like the government, even in the election year, has no time to pause and review this policy which has drawn scathing criticism. Such is the compulsion of economic growth that the writing on the wall has become meaningless to the rulers and policy makers. The only time that the government took a brief pause was after the Nandigram movement against the land acquisition for Salim group turned violent back in January 2007. But by then 150 SEZ approvals were already granted. The Empowered Group of Ministers that was reviewing SEZs, lifted the cap from 150 approvals in April 2007 after meekly tweaking the policy, by putting an upper limit on the area of the SEZs and asking the state governments not to acquire land forcefully (using the colonial Land Acqusition Act 1894) for SEZs. Despite this, state governments continue using “acquisition” or the threat of acquisition as a method to transfer land to SEZs.

The Gagret SEZ is a case in point where even the State government has announced that there would be no land acquisition. Information provided under the RTI however reveals that the responsibility of providing the land to SKIL lies with the Himachal government. Other examples are Kakinada (Andhra Pradesh) and other states where the State Industrial Development Corporations are acquiring lands forcefully and then handing over to the private developers. SEZs are being used as mechanisms to grab, using stealth, force and deceit, livelihood resources, specifically land (and water) from poorer communities, which is the key reason for the opposition at the local level.

That the government continues to harp about the employment created with no mention about the livelihoods lost in the process of SEZ creation distorts the picture completely. Even in the employment argument it is clear that the losers of livelihoods are not the gainers of employment. Points out Aseem Srivastava, an economist, “if we look at the Commerce Ministry figures we see that it is taking 33 lakhs of investment to create a single job in an SEZ. With the same kind of investment 10 to 50 times the jobs could be created through schemes like the NREGA”.

Academics from across the country and even the proponents of free markets have argued that the SEZ policy by providing differential treatment, in terms of tax holidays and subsidies, is creating monopolies at the cost of the economy in the domestic tariff areas (areas outside SEZs). The Comptroller Auditor General’s annual report reviewing the SEZ policy found that “almost Rs 2000 crores worth of revenue losses were incurred as a result of the irregularities as well as provisions under the policy”. While the ‘development’ argument is repeated over and over again, the counter argument has been of regional imbalances and in the case of SEZs it is amply obvious that the developers are making a beeline for the areas that have enhanced infrastructure and are thus developed. Maharashtra, Gujarat and the southern states which are already advanced industrially for instance are where these SEZs are concentrated. Even within these states it’s the peripheries of urban centers, big towns and coastal areas whose resources are going to be sponged off by the SEZ developers.

However, the most perturbing aspect of these enclaves designated is that they are not merely industrial clusters as is being portrayed. Export Processing Zones (very few) and industrial parks have been around for a long while in India. But the basic differences between these and SEZs are that the latter are private enclaves for integrated development (which means apart from industrial activity about 50% of the area would be earmarked for other commercial activities – housing and entertainment complexes). They would be gated townships and communities owned, managed and governed by the private developers themselves. All powers for governance of labour, environment and land use would be centralized in the hands of a Development Commissioner. The SEZ Act provides these enclaves have to be treated as ‘industrial townships’ which would not be in the purview of Municipal Corporations or any other local self governing body.

Related to this is the issue of planning. Sivaramakrisnan of the Centre for Policy Research giving example of the National Capital Region where as many as 18 zones are planned argues that existing bodies for planning in the NCR have been kept out of the process of locating of these zones.

As farmer and leader of the movement in Gagret, Narender Parmar, rightly laments “All it takes is for a developer to put a finger on a location he wants and the government, notwithstanding the existing use, users and inhabitants of that area, will readily clear out the place and make it available (to the developer)”. This brings us back to the crux of the SEZ Act – it is conspicuously silent on the crucial questions of where the land for these zones will come from and how it would be handed over to the developers. But the judiciary in our country has provided the answers. In a recent judgment the Supreme Court ruled that Land Acquisition for infrastructure and revenue generating projects would be qualified as “public purpose’ and hence cannot be challenged!

In recent times no other economic policy or piece of legislation, has spurred the kind of controversy, especially at the local level, as have Special Economic Zones, especially post the passage of the SEZ Act in 2005. SEZs are not the only projects facing opposition but they embody and manifest all tenets of capitalist development and hence have brought to the fore the larger debate on accumulation of capital by dispossession. That the print and electronic media despite its preoccupation with Bollywood and Cricket has found the time to talk about the growing dissent along the country side over acquisition of farm lands for mega industrial projects and SEZs is one indicator. Regrettably, but not surprisingly even this critical issue has been reduced by the media into a cock-fight between industry and agriculture. No points for guessing where the readers/viewers dreaming of the swanky laktakia or an apartment in upmarket locations are putting their money. Though, if we are concerned enough to look beyond the shallow debate in the mainstream media we are sure to find the political quagmire that has been created by this new mantra for growth called SEZ.

Résumé (présentation de l'éditeur) :
Le 22 février 1943, Hans (né en 1918) et Sophie Scholl (née en 1921) étaient guillotinés avec leur camarade Christoph Probst. Quelques semaines plus tard, trois autres membres de la « Rose blanche » (le professeur Kurt Huber et deux autres étudiants : Willi Graf et Alexander Schmorrel) connaissaient le même sort. [...]

Idéalistes, graves mais aussi très sensibles aux joies du monde, Hans et Sophie Scholl, lui étudiant en médecine, elle étudiante en philosophie, avaient commencé par rejoindre les Jeunesses hitlériennes avec la ferveur des enfants de leur âge et un enthousiasme romantique. Mais cette adhésion fut de courte durée. L'emprise de Hitler sur la société se renforçant, la servilité des adultes gagnant du terrain, la chape de plomb du conformisme obligé se faisant suffocante, les atrocités se multipliant, les jeunes gens sortirent de l'adolescence avec la conviction qu'ils devaient élever la voix contre un régime meurtrier. Parsemés de commentaires sur la sinistre progression de la campagne de Hitler, ces lettres et carnets, de 1937 à 1943, mêlent les messages voilés sur le cours d'une guerre dans laquelle ils souhaitaient ardemment la défaite de leur pays et les évocations bucoliques ou les méditations sur Goethe et Dostoïevski, Claudel, Bernanos et Léon Bloy. Les demandes aux parents alternent de même avec les apostrophes à Dieu, qu'ils ne se lassent pas d'interroger sur le mystère du mal en se nourrissant de Pascal et de saint Augustin. De leurs notations sur les activités collectives, les travaux obligatoires pour les jeunes, le séjour de Hans au cachot, l'internement du père, les amis blessés sur le front est, se dégage une peinture rare de l'envers du décor nazi. De la lâcheté des adultes, des compromissions, des humiliations, ils ne laissaient rien échapper et ne voulaient rien laisser passer. Convaincus que Hitler vouait son peuple à la mort, ils pensaient simplement que mieux valait mourir pour la dignité et sauver l'honneur des Allemands. Témoignage d'un itinéraire spirituel, ce recueil de lettres et de carnets intimes, de portraits, de réflexions et d'articles, est aussi un document historique hors pair sur le refus du mensonge dans l'Allemagne nazie.

Mon avis :
Ce livre est divisé en deux partie, la première consacrée à Hans, la seconde à Sophie. Les premières lettres parlent des affaires quotidiennes pour devenir de plus en plus profondes, pleines de réflexions philosophiques et métaphysiques. Les caractères des deux adolescents se distinguent clairement : l'un plutôt idéaliste, l'autre qui pourrait se rapprocher d'un certain mysticisme-rationnaliste.

Un ouvrage très intéressant et captivant, mais qui s'adresse davantage aux personnes intéressées par cette période de l'histoire ou par les documents personnels sur cette période. Les notes de bas de pages sont nombreuses, et si elles rendent parfois la lecture un tantinet fastidieuses, elles apportent des informations utiles pour le lecteur en restituant le contexte des évenements ou en apportant des précisions complémentaires.

Habitant non-loin du Vercors, dont le passé résistant lors de l'occupation allemande est connu de tous, je lis ce livre avec attention, m'attachant notamment aux lieux, pensant dans un futur proche faire un reportage sur ceux-cis, 64 ans après...

Paul DREYFUS, Vercors citadelle de liberté,  De Borée, ISBN 9 782844 943507

Thoughts on US Middle East policy

________________________

After the terrorist attack in Damascus two weeks ago that killed 17 and wound another 14, Syrian President Bashar al-Asad has seemingly declared open warfare on jihadist terrorism. However, while Syrian civilians are indeed the victims of terrorists, the regime in Damascus is far from innocent. Syria is trying to leverage its newly found anti-terrorist vocation to settle old accounts and to restore lost dominions.

Hence the Syrian regime heralds the recent meeting between Foreign Minister Walid Moallem and US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and other U.S. officials as a harbinger of a new approach of open communications between two countries facing the common enemy of radical Islamist militancy. However, no one should be fooled by Syria’s posture, and neither the Bush White House, nor any future U.S. administration, should reward Damascus by engaging it.

Syria has long maintained a cynically “nuanced” understanding of terrorist violence, one that distinguishes between “bad” and “good” terrorism. The former targets Syrian interests – which nevertheless allows the regime to tighten its grip on Syrian society and to underline its presumed role in fighting global terrorism.

However, Damascus is also the self-described capital of Arab resistance, and in the parlance of the Asad regime, “resistance” is “good” terrorism – like Hamas and Islamic Jihad in the Palestinian Territories, and Hizbullah in Lebanon. Whether these groups target Israeli, Palestinian or Lebanese civilians, or occupy Beirut or eliminate their rivals in Gaza, this kind of terrorism wins the Syrian stamp of approval.

Similarly, Syrian authorities champion the insurgency in Iraq as “resistance to U.S. occupation” and provide it with tacit, and not so tacit, logistical support. Syria has been a main transit point for jihadist networks dispatching suicide bombers and other fighters to Iraq, while Damascus’ omnipresent intelligence services have also served to redirect the flux of jihadists elsewhere, like northern Lebanon.

It was in the course of Syria’s decades-long occupation of Lebanon that the Asad regime perfected its multi-pronged approach to Islamist militancy. Various Islamist organizations were penetrated and effectively managed by the Syrian security services. Others, such as Hizbullah, were tied to the Syrian order institutionally and logistically. The remaining groups, deemed too hostile to absorb, or more useful when used from a distance, were allowed to flourish in controlled enclaves—Palestinian refugee camps and remote mountain refuges—only to be unleashed through Syrian action or emboldened by calculated inaction.

At the same time, Damascus invoked the specter of “shadow” jihadism in Lebanon and elsewhere as an insurance policy against regime change, and as a means to absolve itself from crimes traceable to its security forces. For instance, according to the narrative put forth by Syrian authorities, the February 2005 assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq al-Hariri, occurring in an environment saturated with Syrian security services, is the work of a jihadist cell.

In the same vein, Syria sought to exculpate itself from any responsibility for the month-long battle between Fatah al-Islam and the Lebanese Armed Forces in the Palestinian refugee camp Nahr el-Bared in spring 2006. Fatah al-Islam is headed by Shaker al-‘Absi, who was detained in Syria after Jordanian authorities charged him, along with Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, with the murder of American diplomat Lawrence Foley. Shortly after the Syrians released him, ‘Absi found his way to Nahr el-Bared where with his Syrian-supplied arsenal launched a costly challenge to the democratic government of Lebanon. Fortunately, with U.S., Arab, and international support, the Lebanese Armed Forces prevailed.

Today, it is the very same radical environment that the Syrian regime has unsuccessfully endeavored to nurture in northern Lebanon that it is identifying as a threat. Damascus wants a green light from the international community to go into Lebanon and take on the jihadist threat, thereby laying the foundations for Syria’s renewed role in Lebanon.

Washington has warned the Asad regime that it will not tolerate its meddling in Lebanon, but with the U.S. Presidential elections next month it is a precarious time and Damascus is no doubt looking to set the table for the next inhabitant of the White House. It is imperative then that rather than engaging the Syrian regime with diplomatic gestures, the next administration should press forward with the UN-mandated tribunal to hand down indictments in the Hariri assassination, and pursue the sound policy of isolating a regime that has been both a generator and enabler of terrorism.

A pesar de tantas dificultades, América Latina está enrumbándose cada día, y con más fuerza, hacia el nuevo destino que sepultará su condición de “patio trasero” de los Estados Unidos, esa que ha tenido que soportar durante casi dos siglos pero sin dejar de luchar. Su marcha es percibida por todos los países a excepción del Gran Patrón que se aferra al pasado y no quiere ver los cambios, ni escuchar las voces prudentes de sus pocos sabios.

Por eso sonaban ridículas las amenazas de Condoleezza Rice a los rusos que mandaron dos aviones de guerra y una escuadra de buques a Venezuela para maniobras conjuntas. Rice dijo que “los rusos deben tener mucho cuidado en el hemisferio donde nosotros tenemos una poderosa fuerza militar”. Algunos miembros de la Cámara de Representantes fueron inclusive más lejos y presentaron una “resolución de condena a la expedición rusa que violaba la Doctrina de Monroe”. Es decir, siguen creyendo en lo que dijo el quinto presidente James Monroe en 1823: “América es exclusivamente para los norteamericanos”.

Hace un tiempo esta declaración hubiera asustado a la América Latina, pero ahora causó una sonrisa. Fue el presidente ecuatoriano Rafael Correa quien le contestó a Rice y le dijo: “si la 5ª Flota norteamericana está en América Latina ¿porqué la flota rusa no puede estar también? Ecuador está dispuesto a darles la bienvenida”. El Departamento de Estado quedó mudo. Sabían que esto iba a pasar pero no esperaban que fuera tan pronto. El documento “Global Trends 2025”, que fue entregado en 2002 al presidente George Bush por el Consejo Nacional de Inteligencia pronosticaba que “el dominio estadounidense en el hemisferio occidental se reducirá drásticamente, produciéndose la erosión de la supremacía norteamericana en las esferas de política, economía y cultura”.

En los tiempos del internet, hasta los sucesos geopolíticos sufren cambios acelerados. Y Estados Unidos, debilitado por dos guerras sin fin y sacudido por la bancarrota financiera, ya no tiene ni fuerzas, ni recursos para poner “orden en su patio trasero” que busca su propio camino hacia la prosperidad, sin la tutela del Gran Patrón.

No sólo está adquiriendo fuerza la formación de la Unión de Naciones Suramericanas (UNASUR) —la que hizo fracasar un golpe fascista en Bolivia y de paso tranquilizó a los separatistas en Ecuador y Venezuela—, sino también, el Banco del Alba y el Banco del Sur están en marcha para solventar la integración política, económica y militar de América Latina. La mayoría de los países latinoamericanos, a excepción de Colombia, México y el Perú, sacó a tiempo sus reservas financieras del Tesoro norteamericano. Entonces hay recursos para invertir. A la vez, los chinos, rusos e hindúes están ansiosos de invertir en América Latina.

Contrario al modelo neoliberal, Latinoamérica debe orientar su crecimiento económico hacia adentro, y regulada por el Estado, instituciones o sociedad. Solamente así se podrá redistribuir mejor la riqueza y salir del subdesarrollo. Se está viviendo, como dijo Rafael Correa, “no cambios en la época sino cambios de la época”.

http://lastresyuncuarto.wordpress.com/2008/10/07/vicky-pelaezel-gran-patron-pierde-su-patio-trasero/

In this case I am talking about the consistent presence of the therapist and the consistent time and day of the appointment.

This consistency is needed not only for practical reasons of fitting your schedule around your therapy or your therapy into your schedule but as part of the security and stability of the larger therapeutic framework.

This framework is established by the therapist from the very beginning and as I've said before includes boundaries of behaviour and responsibility within therapy, the payment of fees, permissible levels and means of communication between therapy sessions and so forth.

However I am not talking about boundaries right now - I'll save that for another day. Here I am talking about what the client brings to the therapeutic process in terms of consistency and the strange little therapy rituals that we all have.

I think when someone imposes rules on to an area of your life you either fit in to them or you rebel - sometimes a bit of both. As I've said before, those who feel reassured by the boundaries of therapy (such as me) often find this a comforting experience. Some who have different needs in this area may experience more resistance to these imposed structures which may manifest as acting-out. All of this should, as always, be talked through in therapy.

The role of rituals
No matter your attachment style or boundary comfort-zone I think that therapy is naturally a ritualistic process. Not just because of the repetitive nature of the weekly session (or whatever your schedule is) but also because of the bizarre experience itself. Flicking that switch for an hour a week between your normal working/daily life and the intensity of therapy is incredibly difficult.

Unlike the therapist, our brain is not in "therapy mode" throughout the day. Our experience of therapy is likely to permeate the rest of our waking hours but not in the kind of way that can always be useful to coping with the change from one frame of mind to the other.

Because of this, personal rituals can be extremely useful in aiding the transition from one world to the other and indeed back again. Nor are these rituals limited to the journey to and from the therapist's office. These can also be small things within the session itself - where you sit, what you wear, how you start the session, what you say as you leave.

All of these things ensure that no matter how traumatic the material or how difficult the session, life continues in some kind of recognisable pattern and we continue to cope as best we can.

Speaking personally, (as I do here from time to time) I have a certain route I take to get to therapy, a certain number of cigarettes I permit myself to smoke before and after, a certain bench I sit on in a nearby park if I am early and a certain route home after. I even have a certain soda I buy as a treat for myself when I make it through a difficult session.

I know that some people have a specific place in the room they like to sit, a certain pair of socks they always wear, whatever. Personally I let the sessions go as they will - I just control everything around it which says more about BTC than the process of therapy itself... but I digress....

That's enough from me - let's open this up to the forum.

What are your rituals?

Confess all... we won't tell anyone. ;)




See also:
List of all posts
Introductions
What is your attachment style?
Is emotional intimacy between therapist and client really possible?
Growing pains - the experience of emotional change
Special moments in therapy
Living with someone who’s living with therapy
The mind-body connection in therapy
Client self-disclosure
Therapist self-disclosure
Maintaining your sense of self in therapy - for clients
Expressing negative transference
Giving it time…

A lot of this from my own personal experience of a number of therapeutic environments from the sublime to the ridiculous. My personal (least) favourite as some will know was the therapist with two cheap plastic office chairs in a stiflingly hot room with no curtains above a busy high street. Needless to say, two sessions and I was out of there.

So why is it not a given that the physical therapeutic environment must be as comfortable as the emotional one?

It is of course a given that human beings like to feel safe and comfortable. This is why the majority of us spend time and money making our homes comfortable with decoration, art, books - whatever makes us happy and feel safe. So why should this be any different in the therapist's room, especially when we are deliberately putting ourselves into an intrinsically uncomfortable position?

Ok, we cannot choose the decor, nor would we expect to, but I know from personal experience that sometimes the physical environment of the therapy room is the last thing therapists think of and unfortunately can end up being a deal-breaker in the relationship.

It is a question of our basic needs - enter Mr Maslow and his very clever hierarchy.

We can clearly see that physical comfort is central to human psychological motivation so why is it overlooked so often in therapy?

Most of the emphasis in psychotherapeutic training is on the interpersonal relationship and the words exchanged. This makes sense given that, assuming the physical environment and chemistry between client and therapist is conducive, the majority of the work will be verbal. However I can't help but feel that sometimes this initial (and to me) obvious need is overlooked.

Nor is it good for the work that then takes place within the dyad.

The effect of client physical discomfort on the work
Not all clients will be self-aware or brave enough to question the therapeutic environment. It can simply be a subconscious feeling of discomfort that the client cannot quite define and if the therapist has not taken the time to address the environmental issues practically then there is little chance that he/she is going to be aware of the emotional impact on the client.

Therapists spend so much time monitoring client's body language for information and insight but if this is all skewed by the patient’s discomfort in the room then how can any accurate interpretations be made or any informed decisions guide the therapy?

This discomfort can also lead to miscommunication and frustration on both sides as the therapy fails to progress. The sense of security in the relationship (on both sides) cannot be assured if the physical environment is not conducive to the basic comfort needs of the client.

The roots of physical comfort
As a child, interaction with the physical environment is as important with our interaction with people - more so for some children who find the interaction with significant figures in their early lives inconsistent or traumatic. This means that physical objects, sensations, and places for example become invested with additional emotional meaning and memories can be triggered by certain kinds of environment.

We know how important the environment is in child therapy - why is this forgotten when it comes to dealing with adults?

Especially when so much of the material we address involves our primary experiences?

The needs of traumatised clients
What about those dealing with specific traumas such as PTSD where so many physical things and situations can "trigger" further traumatic experiences, panic attacks etc? If PTSD clients have a tendency to run from uncomfortable situations and therapists are not giving enough care to the physical environment then it is unlikely that the therapy or the relationship will "stick".

Realistic expectations
Of course there are practical concerns that effect the physical environment - the therapist's own financial resources, location of office, furnishings, building renovations, the city digging up the road outside etc but there are simple ways to make the environment not only private and safe but of more importantly comfortable for the client.

Conclusion
I would say that there needs to be a greater awareness, certainly at the early stages of therapy, of how some clients experience the physical environment. Some people, after all are more cerebral; some more tactile. An awareness of the client's physical needs through effort on both sides, well communicated and discussed can prevent unnecessary ruptures and difficulties from occurring in the relationship.

I am not suggesting that this needs to be a major area of discussion and certainly not of conflict but merely that it is an area of opportunity to discover the significance of the environment to that particular client and also make small changes, as reasonable, to add to the comfort of the client which can only deepen the trust within the relationship.

Of course there can be feelings of client discomfort in the warmest, most comfortable therapeutic environment however it is less likely to be *traumatic or create barriers and resistance between therapist and client when these issues are anticipated and discussed as early as possible in the relationship.

See also
List of all posts
Building trust - the collaborative relationship
How insecure attachment effects the therapeutic relationship
Rights and responsibilities in therapy
Emotional “resistance” - building trust with extremely defensive clients
The mind-body connection in therapy
Special moments in therapy
Introductions

Letter from Empower to the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) and the Nossal Institute of Global Health at Melbourne University.

Dear Brigitte,

Empower had a second long joint discussion about the proposed training. Empower has decided to be faithful to our original position and not take part in the training in Bangkok. We would like to explain this position to your team as well as UNFPA.

We understand the point of the training is to decrease stigma and break down sterotypes. However, we see the very process of the development and implementation of this training reflects the prejudices held by UNFPA programmers. It is simply not acceptable to hire a team of non-sex workers to create a training module about working with sex workers. The fact that the your team at Nossal contacted sex woker groups to participate in the development is perhaps to your credit, but it does not address the original insult. There are many very capable, very credible, sex worker organizations that UNFPA could have and should have hired directly to create and implement the training module. How would it be if a sex worker organization was hired to develop and implement a training module on Nossal Institute…it would be senseless, yes? Why does should it make any more sense in the reverse? We know we were certainly not the only sex worker organization to refuse to take part. We also felt our expertise was being undervalued by the small token payment you were able to offer under your funding guidelines. The project is 27 months long, obviously funded at UN rates, yet from memory you could only afford to pay Empower around $AUS800 to act as advisers. We are sure the UNFPA would not accept such small payments for their staff.

However, the money is a small part of the issue. The greater concern is that UNFPA thinks this is an appropriate process! It says to Empower that the UNFPA does not believe that sex workers are intelligent, capable, valuable partners in the fight against HIV. It says to Empower that UNFPA still sees sex workers as people who are only capable of providing colour…telling some stories and acting as sex tour guides on training field trips. It says to Empower that UNFPA still does not understand concepts like “community participation” or “best practice”. For example you said [name] was helping with your project. She came to us as a young intern to learn FROM us…we are the ones who tried to teach her how to be a part of a commuity organization and now she is better placed than us to design this training!?

When will UNFPA and others see us as educators, trainers not just targets, tools or fools?

All this leaves us wondering what kind of impact can a training that is not owned by sex workers have on the attitudes of individual UN agency staff especially while the stigma and prejudice about sex workers is so obvioulsy entrenched in much of the UN system. We note that the UNFPA and other UN agencies,as late as March 2008, are still using offensive terms like “commercial sex worker” and “high risk group” in some publications despite promises made. That such a small detail as this has proven too hard for the UN to address does not bode well for the outcome of the trainings, does it?

We acknowledge that Can Do Bar is public property so we cannot decide for you whether you include whatever the video is that you made or not. You asked us to approve the script but we cannot. We have no idea where the quotes you have came from but they are not accurate. For example we never use words like “girls” Pornpit is a sex worker too and does not use terms like “they and them” - it’s “us and we”! There are about 50,000 Thai sex workers who have been involved with Empower over 20 years. We have had a handful of westerners over the same period in minor support roles. If you quote Liz instead of us, the Thai sex workers of Can Do and Empower, it encourages people to continue to believe we are stupid and can only do something if a foreigner helps us. It also just doesn’t sound like us or Can Do Bar!

Our position is not meant to reflect in any way on those groups who chose to help you… or any other group’s involvement.

Regards
Empower

Translated by Liz Hilton : On a personal note I was horrified to see my name in the acknowledgements in the Handbook. I have not knowingly or willingly contributed to your process in any way at all. Please take my name off all and any materials associated with this project. Thanks.

In the meantime, my boys have been growing, learning, fighting, laughing. Me too. And A.

So I'm here, rambling aimlessly for a little while, just to flex my writing muscles and remind myself that it's easy and fun.

I found myself missing people here too.

BeThisWay, with her kind, down to earth, financially astute writings. Kate and her calm, honest way, KatyBoo, who feels like someone I've known for years, GoodFountain, who is encouraging and lovely. FallenAngel whose other blog weaves words into a kind of magic. And others, all of whose blogs I visit for one reason or another.

Having written that, I'm suddenly eager to go and see how you all are, what's happening with you.

:-)

After all that hard work plotting the chart, it would be useful to get some information from it. It is easy to spot support levels (the share price at which most investors think a stock price will rise) and resistance levels (the point at which most investors expect the price to fall) from them, as follows. To find a support level, look for Os at the bottom of columns that form a horizontal row – then read the support price level from the vertical axis. Similarly, resistance levels are indicated by a horizontal row of Xs at the tops of their columns.

Antibiotics are supposed to be lifesavers for patients with microbial infections. However, their inappropriate and overuse leads to microbial drug resistance which makes an infection much harder to treat. Today´s rapid rise in infections, caused by drug-resistant bacteria, poses a serious global health concern.

An antibiotic is a chemical compound which inhibits the growth and reproduction of micro-organisms such as bacteria and fungi. Antibiotics those act against bacteria are called anti-bacterials and those act against fungi are called anti-fungals. First antibiotic was penicillin, discovered accidentally from a mold culture. Today, over 100 different antibiotics are available to cure simple to life-threatening infections. Yet, several antibiotics are under research by scientists and being designed to fight more effectively against microbial resistance.

Microbes do exist in each and every living being. Not all microbes are pathogenic. There exist some useful microbes as well which save us by invading harmful bacteria and help in proper physiological function. There are more than 500 bacterial species present in the normal human gut and are generally beneficial. They synthesize vitamins such as folic acid, vitamin K and biotin, and they ferment complex indigestible carbohydrates.

Not all antibiotics work against all microbes. Antibiotic treatment varies from infection to infection, and it depends on the type of pathogen that causes the infection. Of note, antibiotics are ineffective against viruses. One has to know that antibiotics are not supposed to use for common colds and flu. In contrary to the myth, these infections are caused by virus, not bacteria. Some people, who are used to the self-medication, use antibiotics liberally for all infections without knowing the parameters.

The ability of a bacterium to synthesize a protein that neutralizes antibiotic is called antibiotic resistance.

Microbes always try to survive developing resistance against the antibiotics. Mutations generally occur in microbes. Some mutations eventually develop resistant genes in them against some drugs. Over usage of antibiotics helps bacteria to gain resistance against them. The more the bacterium is exposed to antibiotics more potent it becomes. If the patient doesn´t complete the given course of antibiotics, only few bacteria will be killed. Rest of them will become strong by multiplying and spread rapidly. They will become resistant to that particular medicine and cause recurrence of illness. When the medicine is given again for that infection, it fails to act against the microbe and can no longer kill the organism. Instead, it destroys the useful bacteria in the body, thus weakening the immune system. A weak immune system leaves the body vulnerable to various infections and dangerous diseases which finally lead to death.

High rate of antibiotic prescribing in hospitals contributes to the emergence of drug resistant bacteria. These bacteria would easily spread among patients, who are already with weakened immunity, through healthcare settings. This results in raising the mortality rate in hospitals due to unsuccessful treatment of diseases. According to CDC (Centres for Disease Control and Prevention) estimates, each year, nearly 2 million people in the United States acquire an infection while in a hospital, resulting in 90,000 deaths. More than 70 percent of the bacteria that cause these infections are resistant to at least one of the antibiotics commonly used to treat them.

Micro-organisms that develop resistance against more than one antibiotic are called as multi-drug resistant organisms. One such microbe is Staphylococcus aureus. It is a gram-positive bacterium that is resistant to large group of antibiotics called beta-lactams, which include pencillins and cephalosporins. This is also called as MRSA (Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus) or ´Superbug´. MRSA infections are more prevalent worldwide. According to a study conducted by CDC and published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, an antibiotic-resistant strain of the staph bacteria is now responsible for more deaths in the United States than AIDS.

In addition, a widespread usage of antibiotics in food-producing animals and plants also plays major role in rise of drug-resistant bacteria. Since animals also get infected with bacterial infections, vets do prescribe antibiotics for animals. And also in agriculture, antibiotics are being used to combat infectious diseases occurred to plants in fields. To improve the meat safety, ranchers and farmers feed antibiotics to beef, cattle and poultry to control deadly infections. This is a breeding ground for new fatal infections.

Antibiotics use on livestock accounts for roughly half of the 25,000 tons produced in the US each year, according to a report from the Institute of Medicine. It adds that 40 to 80 percent of the antibiotics applied on the farm are unnecessary.

Doctors are running out of effective antibiotics to treat most dangerous infections. Since bacteria gained resistance on almost all antibiotics in the current drug pipeline, CDC officials are urging doctors and patients to use antibiotics appropriately. Pharmaceutical industries are racing to develop highly effective antibiotics. These crazy bugs might gain resistance against them as well. Appropriate usage of antibiotics is the only way to control them.

Bacterial infections are mainly spread through close contact, wound and nasal passage. These infections are more in schools, public gyms, prisons and among sportsmen. Athletes and football players are at increased risk of acquiring bacterial infections. This is due to sharing equipment in their locker rooms like sharing towels, shaving kits, soaps and so on.

Practicing good personal hygiene keeps infections at bay. Regular hand washing, using hand sanitizers and disinfectants, is a best defense against these infections and reduces the need of antibiotics.

David Bell, M.D., the CDC's antimicrobial resistance coordinator, says that physicians are pressurized by patients to prescribe antibiotics. "People don't want to miss work, or they have a sick child who kept the whole family up all night, and they're willing to try anything that might work," says Bell.

Antibiotics are very powerful drugs. Yet, the more we use them, less effective they become. People must try to know pros and cons about usage of antibiotics. This will otherwise lead to a disastrous condition with overwhelming deadly infections. Awareness on appropriate usage of antibiotics is needed for public. Doctors need to prescribe antibiotics with care.

Precautions you should take when on antibiotics:

• You should complete the course of antibiotics as directed and prescribed by your doctor, to kill the bacteria completely.
• You should not take antibiotics unless you really need them.
• You should take your medicines at the same time everyday.
• You should always inform your doctor if you feel discomfort in your body, while on antibiotic treatment. In order that your doctor may change the dosage or treatment.
• You should not use antibiotics prescribed to someone else. Because, antibiotics are prescribed for a specific illness and the outcome of infection differs from person to person.
• You should not take antibiotics for common colds and flu. Because they do not respond to antibiotics.
• Self-medication is not appropriate and you should consult doctor and take his advice before taking the medicine.
• Don´t ask your doctor to give antibiotics. Not all illnesses require antibiotics.