Now you can look at this superficially and get pompous or you can think about it and learn something. If you think Iris should be banned, you`re a “blithering idiot”.

It is funny, and like the very best lokes contains a serious message……..it goes like this.
NB obviously, I make no claims to be able to reproduce Allen’s masterly delivery.

Following the death of a hunchback a rather earnest, and pompous village priest is admonishing the parishoners at the mans funeral.
“I don’t know how you lot have the nerve to show your faces”, snorts the Priest.
“None of you ever had a kind word to say for the hunchback when he was alive”.
“When kids weren’t throwing rocks at him, adults were either taking the piss, or ignoring him in the pub”.
“You lot are a disgrace” concludes the vengeful priest.
“Now, I’m going down to the vault to pay my final respects”.

The priest makes his way deep into the bowels of the spooky old church.
The tormented hunchback lies alone in the crypt.
His final resting place is an open coffin………….heavy coins covering both eyes.
Due to the severity of spinal curvature his chest is bound by a creaking old leather strap.

Suddenly the ligature gives way and the hunchback appears to lurch forward.
The pennies fall from his eyes as he emits an involuntary gasp of air.

“Holy mother of god”, screams the Priest as he turns to run.
But in his frantic attempt to escape the sleeve of his billowing cassock catches on the door handle, impeding his desperate escape.

“Let go, you humpty backed bastard” screams the priest, “get your fucking heathen claws off me”.

Allen was notoriously scathing about religious bigotry in Ireland.
I would much sooner he [or commentators like him, since Allen is sadly no longer with us] dealt with the likes of Iris Robinson, rather than suppressing the admittedly discriminatory bilge she seems to believe in, or expects others to.

I wonder if it’s worth asking hubby Peter if she ever takes it in the arse?

Don’t be so sanctimonious Z expressing an opinion is all any of us are doing. Or is it your opionion that no one else has the right to express their opinion except when it agrees with your opinion. And what is a diagnostic opinion any way?

“Why is advocacy a less acceptable form of voluntary work than any other? Through it, she can acquire valuable transferable skills that would appeal to many employers.”

Advocacy is a perfectly acceptable form of voluntary work and if it were to lead onto paid employment so much the better. My point is that this lady’s advocacy work has I suspect become an end unto itself rather than a means to a better life.

Lorna,

The point I was trying to make is that trying to “prove” that ME is a real complaint as opposed to a “social construct” is an exercise in futility as so much of what we take for reality is itself socially constructed or constructed in a social setting.

“If she were to spend a 1/10 of the effort she puts into advocating for ME sufferers she might be able to get herself to work and spend a half day a week doing voluntary work and then build on that, which would I suspect do her more good for in the long run.
Thing is, you really don’t know that”

And you don’t know it isn’t

“she can not speak up, and have her life suck, or she can speak up, and be accused of doing too much activism and being able to get better if she only wanted to.”

No one is accusing this woman of doing “too much” activism (how much is too much activism) and whether this woman’s life sucks is I suspect up to her to a large extent. If she finds meaning and purpose to her life arguing that ME is a “real” illness then good for her I wish her well. I was trying to suggest a more productive way that she might spend her time and energy.

As I said before ME is a cause celebra for some people and like all deeply held political and religious views is not a subject for debate which is a shame.

But she *is* doing voluntary work, namely her advocacy. Why is advocacy a less acceptable form of voluntary work than any other? Through it, she can acquire valuable transferable skills that would appeal to many employers…

“The woman with ME who was interviewed on You and Yours’ was I think getting her self caught up in the is ME a natural type and therefore “real” vs is ME a social construct and therefore imaginary debate”

I’m gonna guess that’s because she’s had to spend a lot of time justifying herself as having a “real illness”. What’d it used to be called? “Yuppie flu”?

“If she were to spend a 1/10 of the effort she puts into advocating for ME sufferers she might be able to get herself to work and spend a half day a week doing voluntary work and then build on that, which would I suspect do her more good for in the long run.”

Thing is, you really don’t know that. And you’re doing that thing again, when you say this, where you insinuate that she her disability can’t be a real problem if she’s got the energy to do X other thing. I mean, you don’t know about this woman’s life. And I don’t know much about ME, but if it’s a condition where you get good days and bad days, remission and relapse, that could account for an apparent difference between what she says she can do and what she seems to be able to do.

“The problem for this unfortunate lady is that ME is what she feels passionate about”

I’d imagine that she knows what her problem is, and I’d imagine she’d say it’s ME, rather than her activism. She’s caught between a rock and a hard place - she can not speak up, and have her life suck, or she can speak up, and be accused of doing too much activism and being able to get better if she only wanted to.

I’m sure you didn’t mean your points as an attack on this woman, but as someone who’s damn sick of explaining that yes, my illness is real, and yes I’ve tried thinking positive and perseverance and all that, especially to people who probably mean well but should know better, it really does read that way.

Not CBT like for depression though. The therapist got him first to write down everything he did and time each activity for 2 weeks, also rating it as easy, medium, hard, and resting. After weeks, they totted up the total for each category and divided by 14.

That gave him the number of minutes of each type of activity he was to do every day. On days when he found it tough going, he was to push himself to reach that many minutes, on days when he ad more energy, he was not to do more than that. The aim was to know what was a reasonable amount to push himself by and not to overdo it when he was feeling a bit better.

It worked. He was, once more, able to plan his life, set goals, get his thesis finished - albeit at a much slower pace than if he wasn’t ill. Every few months, in consultation with the therapist, he’d increase one of his forms of activity daily by 15 minutes.

It took years, but he was able to continue with his life and eventually the ME went away.

Since lack of energy and mood sensitivity to energy levels are a big problem for me in depressive episodes, I’ve been using a less strict version of this technique for the past 8 months (eg this week I am going out once after work only, and am getting to bed by 9pm the other days to make up for it, or I won’t be able to move by Saturday) and I can definitely give it the thumbs up.

CBT for ME does not mean telling people to think positive or push themselves too hard. In my friend’s case, it seemed to be, well, we don’t know what causes this and we don’t know how to cure it, but we can try and deal with it and have it not get any worse until it hopefully decides to go away.

I like the idea of a virtual pint, but not as much as I like the idea of a real one.