The ‘Still Face’ Paradigm and the Department for Work and Pensions
Kittysjones - Politics and Insights
by Kitty S Jones
1y ago
In 2017, I wrote an article about the Still Face Paradigm, and the decline of empathy in Neoliberal societies. It was about Edward Tronick’s Still Face experiment, in part. Tronick is an American developmental psychologist at the University of Massachusetts, Boston. His studies illuminate the importance of trusting, communicative relationships and consistent human responses in ensuring the well-being, development and learning of children. Tronick’s experimental design was very simple: mothers were asked to play as they usually would with their six-month-old infants ..read more
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Nudge: the expedient alibi of Conservative neoliberalism
Kittysjones - Politics and Insights
by Kitty S Jones
3y ago
Government policies are expressed political intentions regarding how our society is organised and governed. They have calculated social and economic aims and consequences. In democratic societies, citizens’ accounts of the impacts of policies ought to matter. But we are systematically excluded from policy decisions, which are not ‘for us’: Instead, policies ‘act upon us’, and contain instructions from the government about how we must be. How we must be is very much aligned with government ideas about ‘ideal’ neoliberal policy outcomes. However, in the UK, the way that policies are justi ..read more
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NHS is being ‘protected’ from those who need protecting most by rationing treatment based on eugenic ‘guidelines’
Kittysjones - Politics and Insights
by Kitty S Jones
4y ago
  The National Health Service (NHS) was born on 5 July 1948. It was the first time anywhere in the world that completely free healthcare provision was made available on the basis of citizenship rather than the payment of fees or insurance. The NHS was founded on the principle of universal healthcare. It upheld the most fundamental principles of human rights: that each life has equal worth, and that we all have a right to life. In 1946, the new Labour government passed the National Health Service Act. The model they used was based on one used in Tredegar in the 1930s, which was like an early ..read more
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I have SLE, so I’m staking my claim on hydroxychloroquine
Kittysjones - Politics and Insights
by Kitty S Jones
4y ago
  I can’t manage without my medication for systemic lupus erythematosus (otherwise known as SLE or lupus). Not being able to access my essential treatment places me at a significantly high risk of serious infections more generally, and specifically to covid-19 or a relapse, with severe complications such as severe pneumonia and sepsis. I was prescribed hydroxychloroquine in 2017 by my rheumatologist following life-threatening complications when I caught ‘flu. It happened during a flare-up of my autoimmune illness symptoms. Because lupus often lowers people’s immunity to pathogens, it leaves ..read more
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Opposition parties call for emergency legislation to protect Universal Credit claimants from impacts of Covid-19
Kittysjones - Politics and Insights
by Kitty S Jones
4y ago
Both Labour and the SNP have called on the Prime Minister to provide emergency legislation to protect workers’ rights and ensure people receiving Universal Credit do not face sanctions if they are unable to make an appointment due to the coronavirus outbreak. In Prime Minister’s Questions, Ian Blackford MP asked that while the Governor of the Bank of England suggested a ‘financial bridge’ may be available to assist markets through any economic volatility, would there will also be a ‘financial bridge’ for ordinary workers and those on social security. He said statutory pay must be in line ..read more
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Price hikes of sanitizing gel throws perverse incentives of neoliberalism into sharp relief
Kittysjones - Politics and Insights
by Kitty S Jones
4y ago
Demand for hand sanitizer is surging around the globe as the new coronavirus spreads, prompting retailers to ration supplies and online vendors, despicably, to hike prices. Many high street shops and pharmacies have no stocks left at all. There are also price hikes on antibacterial hand wash. The surge in demand has prompted some third-party sellers to inflate their prices on platforms including Amazon and eBay.  In the UK, a Defendol hand gel retailing at £3.49 ($4.46) in stores is being sold for £109.99 on Amazon.  Neoliberal economies, based on a ‘competitive market place’ model definitely ..read more
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COVID-19 reveals the unacceptably indifferent political attitude towards 20% of the population
Kittysjones - Politics and Insights
by Kitty S Jones
4y ago
Thirteen new patients were diagnosed with the coronavirus on yesterday. The latest cases included 12 more in England and the first patient in Scotland, meaning the virus has now reached all four parts of the UK. A health worker at an NHS cancer centre in Middlesex is also among the new cases. Another is a staff member at Wimbledon College in south-west London, which has closed for deep cleaning.  Three of the new cases in England were linked to a man from Surrey, who was the first patient to not have been abroad recently and was instead infected within the UK. This indicates that the virus h ..read more
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DWP destroyed reports linking benefit sanctions and cuts with suicide
Kittysjones - Politics and Insights
by Kitty S Jones
4y ago
Errol Graham, who starved to death in 2018, following his social security support being cancelled by the Department for Work and Pensions. He left a heartbreaking letter which described his circumstances leading up to his death. His family found the letter after he died, weighing less than five stone. Department for Work and pensions (DWP) officials have admitted that up to 50 reviews into deaths following harsh social security cuts and sanctions have been destroyed. The government has been accused of a ‘cover-up’ after destroying the reports which link suicides to sanctions and peoples’ bene ..read more
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Eugenicist adviser leaves eugenicist government of ‘misfits and weirdos’
Kittysjones - Politics and Insights
by Kitty S Jones
4y ago
In 2016, I wrote a critique of a very controversial book called The Welfare Trait: How State Benefits Affect Personality, by Adam Perkins, a lecturer in neurobiology. He claimed that generous welfare states create an “employment–resistant personality profile”, and that social security is “warping the personality profile of the population”. This, he argued, is because children of claimants ‘inherit’ the personality trait. He also stated his concern that people with ‘desirable’ traits of ‘solid citizenship’ were having fewer children than those in receipt of welfare, a view threaded though other ..read more
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The impact of government policy on free speech in universities: Once you hear the jackboots, it’s too late
Kittysjones - Politics and Insights
by Kitty S Jones
4y ago
Freedom of speech is generally considered an integral part of a functioning democracy. In 2014, I wrote about how the process of dismantling democracy started in earnest from May 2010 here in the UK, and has been advancing by almost inscrutable degrees ever since, because of pervasive government secrecy and a partly complicit, dominant right wing media. In order to “protect democracy” governments are subverting the law. This is a fundamental paradox, of course and Edward Snowden saw this could lead to the collapse of democracy and critically endanger our freedom of speech. Snowden reminded us ..read more
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