Free speech/more TBAYS/Philip Nel/authority

[Debbie]

Carolyn:

> BTW (purely for reference, you understand), could one of you tell 
me 
> whether a US 'slap upside the head' might mean the same thing as a 
> UK 'clip round the ear' ? I've always wondered. Does the US phrase 
> sort of equate to 'doh, what an idiot' or something tougher ? The 
> English phrase is a bit sharper, as in 'that lad deserves a clip 
> round the ear', ie a pretty sharp (actual) slap (before they 
banned 
> it).

You mean that's not an English phrase?

> Ah, now, Philip Nel is from, erm, Kansas is he not, a professor of 
> English I believe. He asked the list a lot of good questions at 
one 
> point, which they had a fine time answering. I think the elvish 
folk 
> would find it helpful to have these marked up, so I am going to 
add a 
> Philip Nel code down in the Admin section. (They have a plan to 
> revive some of the questions I think for the main list).

Professor of Children's Lit, who has taught a course on HP and 
written a study guide, which is where the questions came from, 
though he did post to the list for awhile in late 2001.  The plan is 
to revive the questions with an OOP/HBP twist,  As you code these, 
if you remember and could point me to any good post-OOP threads on 
the same topic, I would be greatly appreciative. We'll also be 
looking for discussion leader volunteers.

> Still thinking about this one. Here's some metaphysics for those 
that 
> fancy it. Is the notion of respecting or disrespecting authority a 
> moral question, perhaps even a sin or a virtue? Or might you 
classify 
> it under freewill, choice and fate ? And what would you call it 
> anyway, if you had a new heading?

>From my corner of the universe, it's a moral question.  Not a sin or 
virtue because the circumstances and degree of disrespect that would 
be considered virtuous depends on which corner of the universe you 
happen to be in.  And not under free will, choice or fate because we 
can always choose to respect or disrespect, whether or not the 
choice is right or ethical or virtuous.

And I'm finished with my last batch as well.  I, too, tried to 
finish before the update, but discovered that attempting to finish 
an assignment at midnight on Saturday after a pleasant evening 
enjoying delicious food, good conversation and fine wine, followed 
by a walk home through fresh-fallen snow, is not a good thing.

Debbie
who can't have a piece of birthday cake until she improves her 
reject rate