Sticks and stones may break my bones, but insults? Hmmm.

The low-slung jeans/navel-gazing saga continues...
Now the Media Development Authority (MDA) has come out to support the Advertising Standards Authority of Singapore (ASAS) in the latter's campaign to get American fashion retailer Abercrombie & Fitch to remove a shopfront wall ad of a male model in a pair of low-slung jeans (see yesterday's posting and TODAY, 30 Sept, page 8).

The retailer has so far stood by its statement that it is "investigating the matter and is not in a position to comment at this time". But methinks that the conclusion is foregone, once a government agency steps in.

So, what will eventually adorn that shopfront wall along Orchard Road? I still think this is a silly storm-in-a-teacup but there seems to be something more to it, beyond the mere navel-gazing of a male model in contrast to the gawking at ubiquitous ads of female models wearing even less bits of clothing. Hmmm.

The OB marker strikes again?
An entertainment company decided to do a musical titled "When Tan meets Tan," a spoof on the recent presidential election. Scheduled to open in October, its ticket sale seemed to be doing very well. But now, the company has announced that the production is being canned.

The story first appeared in Lianhe Wanbao. As reported by insing.com, the company declined to elaborate on the reasons why the show has been "indefinitely postponed". Here is insing.com's story:

http://news.insing.com/tabloid/presidential-election-parody-musical-shelved/id-14c83e00

This saga too, methinks, calls for a "Hmmm".

The art of the classy insult... it's getting rarer?
Thursday's Mind Your Body supplement in ST had an interesting article by regular contributor Gary Hayden titled "Insults are best ignored". Here's the gist of the article:

Hayden asks, "What is the best way to respond to an insult?" He offers three possible options, but recommends the third approach.

The first is the witty comeback. "If you are quick-witted and confident, you may choose to respond with a witty riposte," he says. He cites Winston Churchill as a master of this art (see the link to a blog I have put up below, where Sir Winston is cited quite a lot).

Hayden observes that most of us are not as quick-witted as Sir WC... "We find ourselves momentarily stunned into silence, or else floundering for words."

So, option two finds one typically lashing out, ie, dispense with the jokes and simply hit back hard, verbally, that is. And it should be publicly administered, to shame the offender. The bottom line: Insist on being treated with respect; and you will be treated with respect.

The third option for dealing with an insult is to simply ignore it. One model Hayden uses for this approach is the ancient Roman statesman Cato. He cites the Roman philosopher Seneca (4BC to AD65) as being in awe of how Cato reacted to slights and put-downs.

Seneca wrote: “Cato does not respond to insult; he does not blush; he does not defend himself; he does not play the game; it is beneath him.” The point, Hayden insists, is not merely to ignore the insult, but to rise above it.

"Ignoring an insult, in a calm and dignified manner, can be a very assertive act. It can rob the aggressor of the pleasure of upsetting us. And the wonderful thing about this strategy is that anyone can adopt it," Hayden says.

My wife insists she is able to embrace this option, and that she has done so. I guess I still have a long way to go along that steep uphill road (for me, anyway).

Meanwhile, I feel that the art of the classy insult is being lost. One blogger, who calls himself "AngryAussie", has the same view. His blog below has what amounts to a compendium of classy insults, including some very goods one from the 155 people who responded to his posting. Here it is:

http://angryaussie.wordpress.com/2007/08/04/when-insults-had-class/   

A job ad that brings out the smiles, and a silly 'navel gazing' fuss!

A tongue-in-cheek job recruitment ad which appeared in ST (23 Sept), with a vacancy for a "slave", went viral. Here is the insing/com story that I came across:

http://news.insing.com/tabloid/hilarious-recruitment-ad-goes-viral/id-0bc63e00

It is so good to find humour among boring job ads. The bicycle parts company in question said it is looking for "an additional slave". The applicant needs to have a minimum two years' "talking cock experience... be shameless and fearless... and like to suck up to bosses".

Also, he (or she?) must have "own horse. We provide the fodder". And the punchline...

Only Singaporeans/PRs need apply! Here's the ad:

On the other hand, the Advertising Standards Authority of Singapore (ASAS) seems not only to have no sense of humour, it offered a lame excuse for calling for the removal of a large wall advertisement -- of a bare-chested man wearing a pair of low-slung jeans -- on the Orchard Road shopfront of fashion retailer Abercrombie & Fitch. It breached the local advertising code of decency, the watchdog said (ST, 29 Sept, page B1). Its lame excuse?

"The general consensus was that the portrayal of the human anatomy had crossed the path of decency because the navel line was very much exposed," ASAS' chairman said! Here's the "indecent" ad:

Come on! What about this typical print ad (for a slimming company), with the navel line clearly exposed!

  

Heard of the 'God Complex'?

Time flies like an arrow...

On 28 Sept 1924, two US Army aircraft landed in Seattle, Washington state, having completed the first round-the-world flight in 175 days (from the New York Times' "On This Day").  

The God Complex

My medical jokes aside, I guess I am like most people. We mostly trust our medical doctors.

The New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd, however, asks us to reflect on this sentiment. She begins her recent opinion piece by noting a trend emerging in medical schools in the US -- they want the new doctors to be less intimidating to patients.

She believes, too, that there are patients who have begun to wean themselves from what has been called the "God Complex". The Internet, with its trove of medical information albeit not all accurate, has played a part in such incipient patient empowerment.

This complex was coined from the movie Malice, when a surgeon tells the character played by Alec Baldwin: "When someone goes into that chapel and they fall on their knees and they pray to God that their wife doesn't miscarry or that their daughter doesn't bleed to death or that their mother doesn't suffer acute neural trauma from post-operative shock, who do you think they're praying to? You ask me if I have a God complex. Let me tell you something: I am God."

Ms Dowd goes on to detail how a medical couple -- oncologist Jerome Groopman and his wife, Pamela Hartzband, an endocrinologist -- have written a book that demystifies medicine.

They want to see patients regain confidence and control by understanding how doctors think, and in the process enable the two sides of the bedside to understand each other.

"The answer often lies not with the experts but within you (the patient)," they write, adding that Albert Einstein once said: Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted.

They are for a lot less medical jargon, and if jargon has to be used, it's gotta be explained (see!). Apart from citing Einstein, they quote (not too seriously, I'm sure) Voltaire too: The art of medicine consists in amusing the patient while nature cures the disease.

Ms Dowd says: "Dr Hartzband and Dr Groopman warn against excessive reliance on overreaching so-called experts and nebulous metrics and statistics. The unsettling reality... is that much of medicine still exists in a gray zone, where there is no black or white answer about when to treat or how to treat."

Her piece ends on an optimistic note. The two authors are both "optimists" who warn against the "focusing illusion" -- focusing on what will be lost after a colostomy, mastectomy, prostate surgery or other major procedures. Yet, ordinary people do have the "extraordinary capacity to adapt, to enjoy life with less than perfect health".

That's very true. On this note, I'll end this posting with, yes, a medical joke:

Five surgeons are taking a coffee break. First surgeon says: "Accountants are the best to operate on because when you open them up, everything inside is numbered."

Second surgeon says: "Nah, secretaries are the best. Everything inside them is in alphabetical order."

Third doc says next: "Try geologists, man! Everything inside THEM is colour coded."

No 4 says: "I like engineers... they always understand when you have a few parts left over at the end."

So, what did the fifth surgeon, who has been quietly listening to the conversation, say?

"You're all wrong. Lawyers are the easiest. There's no guts, no heart, no spine and their head and butt are interchangeable."

Safe sex? A bit cramped, isn't it?

One cartoonist had a literal interpretation of "safe sex". Here it is:

http://www.offensive-jokes.com/joke354-safe-sex.html

Anyway, the hook today are media reports citing a survey that said eight in 10 Singapore residents, aged 20 to 35, had sex with a new partner without using any contraceptive method such as condoms.

There were 200 Singapore residents (equally divided, gender-wise) involved in the global survey covering 6,000 young people from 26 countries.

Interestingly, some 25 per cent (about one in four) of the Singapore respondents believe in at least one contraception myth. Top of the list: withdrawal before ejaculation (34 per cent). Here're some others:

Having a bath or showering after sex (6 per cent).
Staying "upside down for two hours" (3 per cent)... [I don't get this one; shouldn't the person be jumping up and down for two hours?]
Rinsing the genital area "with Coca-Cola" (3 per cent)... [Hmm, Coke -- not Pepsi -- is preferred because it's the real thing, right? Actually, this might work if the girl does it right. She should fill a glass with Coke, put ice in it and, just as the (unsuspecting) guy is ready, dunk his pecker inside the glass. Safe sex is guaranteed... in fact, it would be safe non-sex!]

The study also found that among Singapore respondents, the Internet was the most common source of misinformation on contraception, followed by friends and religious leaders.

Huh, religious leaders? Was that after a sermon titled "Go forth and multiply?"

But, seriously, I think it is really tough for today's parents who have children in their teen years and above. I am sure very few children today look to their parents on the topic of the birds and the bees. [But, then, neither did young people in my time]. I also do not envy the people who must devise and conduct Sex Education modules. Just the question of whether and when to teach Safe Sex, and how to do so, is still a minefield in Singapore.

-----------------------------------------------------

Sex, however, has always been a favourite topic for punsters. Here's a selection:

What is the world's oldest profession?
Which came first, the chicken or the egg?
Why are Singapore women finding it so hard to conceive?
How do you tell which pencil in the bunch practises safe sex?

Answers:
Nope, it's not what you think. It's apple picking.
The chicken, of course. Have you ever seen an egg come?
Because of the men's short comings (ouch, ouch, ducking all the eggs thrown at me!)
The pencil with the rubber. Abuthen. [This joke was actually told to me by a Primary-level child.]

A man walks into a drug store with his eight-year-old son. As they walk by the condom display area, the boy asks, “What are these, Dad?”
The man matter-of-factly replies, “They are called condoms, son. Men use them to have safe sex.”
“Oh I see,” says the boy. “I’ve heard of that in health education class at school.”
The boy then looks over the display, picks up a package of three and asks, “Why are there three in this package.”
The dad replies, “Those are for high-school boys. One for Friday, one for Saturday, and one for Sunday.”
“Cool!” says the boy. He notices a pack of six and asks “Then who are these for?”
“Those are for college men,” the dad answers, “Two for Friday, two for Saturday, and two for Sunday.”
“WOW!” exclaims the boy. “Then who uses these?” he asks, picking up a 12-pack.
With a sigh, the dad replies, “Those are for married men. One for January, one for February, one for March…”

A boy was assigned a paper on childbirth and asked his mother, "How was I born?"
"Well honey..." said the mother, somewhat uncomfortably, "the stork brought you to us."
"Oh," said the boy, "and how did you and daddy get born?"
"Oh, the stork brought us too." "Well how were grandpa and grandma born?" the boy persisted.
"Well darling, the stork brought them too!" said the mother who, by now, is really squirming.
Several days later, the boy handed in his paper to the teacher who was puzzled by its opening sentence:
"This report has been very difficult to write due to the fact that there hasn't been a natural childbirth in my family for three generations."

And finally...
"I like my sex the way I play basketball, one on one with as little dribbling as possible." (Leslie Nielsen)  

The wonder of the English language

In my posting yesterday, I forgot to include the website of the Speak Good English Movement (SGEM). A PDF copy of the quiz I referred to is available for downloading from this site:

http://www.goodenglish.org.sg/improve/quizzes/assessment-test/

The site is actually quite useful, as it has sections on "Improve Your English", workshops and resources. There is a pronunciation guide plus more quizzes.

The British Council too has a resource section titled "Grammar and words":

http://learnenglish.britishcouncil.org/en/grammar-and-vocabulary

And although I had a couple of quibbles with the quiz I highlighted, it is generally a useful self-check. My own position on English usage here is from the perspective of a journalist. I will be the first to admit that I am no grammarian but I think I can modestly say that I am still not yet a compleat (correct, not a misspelling) wordsmith.

I will defend the selective use of Singlish, especially when the audience is primarily Singaporean. But I also think that as many Singaporeans as possible must be given help and enabled to speak and write English sentences that are clear, free of jargon and -- importantly -- devoid of usage errors.

Usage errors go beyond just grammatical errors, as a number of my postings have tried to accomplish. In one recent example, I tried to show the absurdity of stating "$xxxx for two eyes" in an eye clinic's ad for the fee for a particular procedure. Given that, ordinarily, people have two eyes, the phrasing should be "$xxxx for both eyes".

Certain usage evolves over time, and I am no longer pedantic about "myriad". I can now, to cite Wikipedia's (slightly modied) example, accept "there are myriad people outside" as well as "a myriad of people are outside".

But, as a journalist, I will insist that jargon is explained or replaced. Meanwhile, many words and phrases continue to be misused, even by "role models". Just the other day, at a local TV discussion on language usage here, the SGEM chaiirman himself referred to "less people are...".

People are countable, so the correct phrasing should be "fewer people...". But the English language can be exasperating to learn! It can be argued that money is countable, but the correct expression in such a case would be, say, "less money is now needed".

Finally, I love the English language because it lends itself to the creation of myriad/a myriad of funny and punny (as well as corny) jokes!

How good is your English? And when the Grammar Nazis come knocking!

Don't discard today's Sunday Times yet! There is a "How good is your English?" quiz in the Lifestyle section, on page 8. The prizes to be won are a pair of tickets to London (I suppose they are air tickets!), an iPad and a MacBook Air. Best of all, the answers are provided!

This means the organiser -- the Speak Good English Movement -- is, really, giving out the prizes as lucky draw items, and that the quiz is not a true test of skill. But try it first without cheating, hor.

The test was created by the British Council. But, looking at the quiz questions and the answers, I found a couple of slip-shod instances. Question 3 is:

At the end of the lesson as the student was clearing his desk, he asked his teacher, "Can I ______ my file in my bag now?" While there are multiple choices here, the correct answer (put) is given. But my quibble is on the quiz setter's use of "can" and not "may". The question-within-question should begin with "May I...".

[See my posting on my tribute to Mr Earnest Lau on this point.]

Question 15 requires you to pick the correct answer from three given options:

a. This one finish already.
b. I have finished already.
c. I have already finished.             

The answer, as provided, is (c) and an explanation for this choice is given. But, in fact, all three options are poor examples of Standard English, including (c) because it is incomplete... I have already finished (doing what???).

Yes, I am being a spoil-sport but someone should have gone over the quiz with a fine toothcomb before it is approved for release.

To wrap up today's posting, here's a fun YouTube video in which one Grammar Nazi hunts for a fugitive Jew and eventually shoots himself because he found himself committing the sin of using a dangling participle:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N4vf8N6GpdM

William Tell... was he the first yodeller?

Had a long day at work, so nothing cerebral here...

Here's a "knock, knock" joke that is supposedly a classic:
Knock, knock.
Who's there?
Little old lady.
Little old lady who?
Hey, I didn't know you could yodel!

Of course, everyone knows that yodelling started in the Alps. But Swiss or Austrian? The debate between these two countries went to and fro, much like a cuckoo clock's refrain, until a Swiss chap claimed that the legendary Swiss hero William Tell started it. This is what supposedly happened:

William Tell was still an energetic (and virile) handsome young man, traipsing the Alps often. One day, he spent the night in an Alpine lodge perched on a mountain top. The innkeeper's wife and three daughters were, well, comely.

That night, young William wasted no time as soon as the innkeeper fell asleep.

The next morning, he was well on his way and had already reached another mountain top, but within view of the lodge and within the valley's echo range, when he heard the innkeeper's angry voice berating him, clearly repeated by the echos across the valley: "You young rascal, how dare you seduce my three daughters!"

Cocky young William, from his safe distance, shouted back: "Haha, so I did". And the echoes went: Haha, so I did, haha, so I did...

William, after drawing a deep breath, next cried out: "And your old lady too!" which then echoed on and on for some time, enraging the livid old man even more.

And that was how yodelling started. If you believe all this, start yodelling away!