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Posted: Tue Mar 07, 2006 2:29 pm
by Frodo
Mike, pupils shower after games always have, in all schools. Teachers are required to be in attendance, probably some health and safety rule. These are the facts. A lot of additional accusations are being flung around post-enquiry that were not, apparently, raised earlier. This is just mud-throwing so far as I can see and about as realistic as the accusation that pupils were forced to exercise naked in Hyde Park. Cold shower anyone?

Posted: Tue Mar 07, 2006 3:58 pm
by mgormez
Frodo, that an accusation wasn't raised earlier can not be the defining moment to declare what is true and what not. The inquiry and subsequent media attention did alert people to look what it is about and some came on here. A lot of new members have been added since then.

This was posted a little over a year ago. And about as worse as what is posted after-inquiry
http://www.whyaretheydead.net/phpBB2/vi ... =shower%2A

Posted: Tue Mar 07, 2006 8:16 pm
by Alban
Frodo,

Sometimes it is extremely hard to put into words on what is wrong with a situation - you just instinctively know it's wrong. Unless you were there, you're never going to know exactly what happened. On top of that, people have different reactions to the same circumstances.

Given that, I would question the authenticity of casting doubt on someone's experiences based on conjecture about the way in which the experience was shared.

Alban

Posted: Thu Mar 09, 2006 4:01 am
by BoeingDriver
I found the following in the St. James Spectrum 2005 magazine. I feel that a thread started by a 'non-subserviant ex-St. James girl' is probably as good a place as any to post it.

" It is good that our young women should be encouraged to view their potential as limitless, but we must take care to ensure that the spirit of love which is so natural to a woman's heart is inspired to meet the needs of those with whom she lives and works. If we make the mistake of rearing a generation of self-seeking young women we are heading for calamity. Women have the power to create the emotional environment in which a community lives and the need is for a loving and benevolent force, which is directed to the attentive care of all. If we could all concern ourselves more with the quality of our service and less with our personal accomplishments and status, real liberation of the human spirit - with all its amazing creative powers - would emerge. "

This is a paragraph from the 'Welcome' written by the Headmistress of St. James Girls School.

Is there a point to posting this? To be quite honest, I really don't know.

Do I have an opinion on what is being said? I suppose I do, but I would rather keep it to myself at the moment.

I am, however, very interested in what the ex-students, current students and any other interested observers make of it.

Posted: Thu Mar 09, 2006 4:59 am
by Free Thinker
"If we could all concern ourselves more with the quality of our service and less with our personal accomplishments and status, real liberation of the human spirit - with all its amazing creative powers - would emerge. "

This I would wholeheartedly agree with if it wasn't directed at teenage girls. but combined with the stuff that goes before it. ICK!!!!

Posted: Thu Mar 09, 2006 5:12 am
by a different guest
I guess the SES have never heard of the term "SNAG"?

and that bit about "concerning ourselves less with status" - you've got to laugh. "Status" underpins the SES's entire belief system!

Posted: Thu Mar 09, 2006 6:39 am
by Free Thinker
a different guest wrote: "Status" underpins the SES's entire belief system!


Truer words were never spoken!

Ok - they probably were but there are as true as any of them.

Posted: Thu Mar 09, 2006 6:45 am
by Free Thinker
And I figured this is as good a time as ever to add an avatar. I'll have to give someone a chance to tell me "Stop being such a goose!"

Posted: Thu Mar 09, 2006 7:22 am
by a different guest
I'll have to give someone a chance to tell me "Stop being such a goose!"


lol FT!

And I LOVE your avie :)

Posted: Thu Mar 09, 2006 9:56 am
by Stanton
Mary Edmunds - who started this thread - will be training to be a doctor and may turn out to be an exemplar of a loving benevolent force.

Posted: Thu Mar 09, 2006 10:15 am
by BoeingDriver
I certainly hope she does, Stanton.

Posted: Thu Mar 09, 2006 10:55 am
by Jo-Anne Morgan
Thank you for posting that paragraph.

I bet there's no such sentiment expressed about the boys.

Clearly it is saying that women (actually, don't they mean 'ladies', or do even they realise that would sound too freaky) should put themselves second. They should spend their lives 'serving' others thus creating a benevolent environment for all. The implication being that if they don't, then the troubles of the world are their fault? That old chestnut. Depressing.

Surely the world would benefit if both women and men put themselves second, served others. We are all capable of love. I think it's a fallacy to say it comes more naturally to women. I don't see that any good has come from this idea that women 'serve' and men 'lead', that women obey men. The world is in the most hideous state, cruelty and poverty wherever you look. Maybe it's time for a new idea. Men and women working together as partners, serving each other, having equal say. The one balancing out the other.

If I had a teenage daughter I would not want her fed these ideas about women. I'm sure it would lead to repressions later in life and an inability to assert herself, believing it somehow 'wrong', 'unwomanly'.

Posted: Thu Mar 09, 2006 7:50 pm
by Alban
Absolutely spot-on Jo-Anne...I was thinking along the same lines as I was reading it, but you've expressed it better than I could.

I think the other thing that winds me up about it, is not so much what it is saying, rather how it is saying it. It's that old 'SES-Speak' again. The words say "we" but it somehow comes across as "you". This may be something that is only recognised by people who've had years of SES tutors trotting out the same old garbage in an identical tone.

The trouble is, they cannot stop themselves doing it - here is the headmistress lecturing parents what they should or should not be doing...in the school brochure!..they haven't even signed up yet and already the author is taking a superior tone.

Maybe that is the trick of the SES - they take this tone, which immediately put's off everyone apart from the people who are looking for authority. These are the people who would be most receptive to the SES ideas and most likely to embrace it enough start emulating the same tone - so the cycle is complete.

Alban

Posted: Sat Mar 11, 2006 4:19 pm
by Jo-Anne Morgan
In an earlier post, much was made of the emphasis on qualifications and careers at the girls' school, as if this proves something about the attitude to women. To my mind these much-vaunted high academic standards have no relevance when it comes to the true agenda of the SES concerning women. The girls? school has to strive for the best possible academic standards as it is the only way it will get pupils. Parents these days who are prepared to pay that amount of money think in terms of good qualifications and university places. They don?t think in terms of ?The Art of Hospitality? and making someone a good wife.

BoeingDriver?s quote reveals the true agenda of the SES concerning women. The SES sells a book called ?Woman?. It is beautifully presented with calligraphy and illustrations. It concerns itself entirely with the nature of woman and her role according to ?Natural Laws?. The woman?s role is as helpmeet and supporter to man. The scriptures say that man was created first (as some kind of direct embodiment of the Absolute presumably). Man felt lonely so God created woman as a companion. Therefore woman is only around because of man. She would otherwise have had no existence. Therefore she should not seek to fulfil herself in her own right. The analogy that springs to my mind is of a dog and its master. The dog is only there because the master wants it to be. The master does not expect to come home one day and find the dog sitting in his chair, wearing his slippers or whatever.

It?s quite clear to me that this is the SES stance on women. As far as they?re concerned, that?s what it says in the scriptures so it is not up for debate. It is the truth. It?s a natural law so you can?t fight it, you must align yourself with it. I'm sure that this is being subtly peddled in the schools.

The thing that annoys me about the so-called 'School of Philosophy' is not so much that they adopt this stance, but that it is not allowed to be rationally and openly debated as should happen in a true philosophy school. If you disagree with the stance, then it is merely your 'idea' and an 'idea' you should strive to drop.

Posted: Sun Mar 12, 2006 10:00 pm
by Goblinboy
Alban wrote:Maybe that is the trick of the SES - they take this tone, which immediately puts off everyone apart from the people who are looking for authority.


This holds true, from my experience of long-term SES members. Attracts people looking for affinity, looking to belong, people with little tolerance of ambiguity or pluralism, looking for definite answers, and prepared to put their own values and self-worth to the side.