Low? yes but it is the best you can do!
My family has its dead in France and others here bought home.
In debate the need to change the subject points to an admission of defeat.

Dear Belly,

Hell's Bells mate you are one thin skinned so and so.

Some of my family had their heads removed by Samurai sword on some island beach and their bodies fed to the sharks. But so what? Why go there?

I have attempted to lighten things up a little in that time honored fashion of the Australian male by taking the piss. You shot one back which was all to the good, then got your knickers in a knot when I lobbed it back into your court.

Jeez on some of the sites I work on you wouldn't last two minutes.

Couldn't you have just said something like; "let me know when you want your helmet back oh and by the way the picture of your girlfriend you left inside tells me she had better leave off the sauerkraut or possibly the clover".

For the record while I probably can find my way around the Internet to support my positions with a little more skill it doesn't count for much in the grand scheme of things and I don't think I'm any better than you.

But you should lighten up a little or you will end up being that touchy loner at the end of the bar moping into his beer.

csteele do not be too sure.I have far more Friends than enemy's and most on any site I worked on.
our post seem a little more constructed than mine, I understand why some thought you to be a woman.
We clash, and will continue to, your total support for people of the middle east,and the Muslim faith, remember that woman who lied to try to get a cop?
The grubby thugs out side that court in support?
Do you remember your blind and total support for her?
I will not back down to you.
I think humanity must consider birth control as a start, in stopping starvation.
I see, you may if you wish say I am wrong, More than one religion is too controlling in the matter of birth control.
And in fact sponsor deaths by starvation in defense of myths.
Equality will not be handed to third world country's without effort.
That effort must be a willingness to join every country in controlling population.
As the thread has become us slandering each other I leave it to you.
But support my views every one of them.

Dear Belly,

From memory our exchange way back then was more about my defence of the judge in the case from your slanders, but memory and prejudices tend to play tricks on us all.

But hell isn't it time you let it go? This constant rehashing is childish, boring to other readers, and must be taxing to you especially.

As to me being a woman you were the first to label me as such and others followed your cue. Given your often misogynistic comments on OLO I assumed you attempted it as an insult and my non-reaction confused you. As I in no way take being referred to as a woman derogatory I have never felt the need to clarify my sex to you as it would have been playing to the notion it was a slight which it most definitely isn't.

Dear Danielle,

Thank you for the link. I have heard the incredible Australian woman Dr Catherine Hamlin interviewed several times on Radio National and I thought your link was to her organisation. However the only reference was;

"The Fistula Foundation was founded as American Friends Foundation for Childbirth Injuries in 2000 by Richard Haas and his daughter Shaleece. The Haases visited the Addis Ababa Fistula Hospital and were moved by the oasis of healing created by Dr. Catherine Hamlin and her late husband, Dr. Reginald Hamlin."

Dr Hamlin's tireless work should make every Australian proud and is marvellous to see her efforts inspiring others.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catherine_Hamlin

Yet fistula is surely about the access to and provision of decent medical care through childbirth rather than a population question per say. Less babies would reduce any woman's chances of fistula but to say “The best future is for these women to have access to free contraception and reproductive education” is exactly the type of pontification and proscription you are accusing me of.

If we are not prepared to assist in raising them from want through providing more stable food resources, education and medical care then why shouldn't concentrating purely on supplying birth control as the panacea be regarded as self serving.

Dear Steele,

Women must have choice. They should decide the number of children they have and the spacing between them. It is insensitive to say to them just keep on having children and we will feed them. It is much, much more than this.

Having children for a woman is an enormous event in every area of her life. These women frequently see others dying in childbirth or experiencing horrific injuries. Can you imagine how impotent, and often frightened, they feel if they do no have choice.

When they have children, the protective and natural instinct is to ensure these children survive and have a future ... a future not dependent upon hand-outs from charity.

Have you no concept of the stress and fear women endure if they have to worry not only about the present circumstances of their children, but the their future as well; and if they themselves will become incapacitated or worse through childbirth.

Do you fear that if they do have choice, they are not going to have so many children. Why is this so wrong?

Some women may keep on having children, others may not. Surely it is for them to have the means to make such a decision, and their right .. not for some stranger in another country to make it for them.

Yes, I am indeed familiar with the wonderful organization you mention.

Yes, Steele,

I agree that wealthy countries should step up to the plate regarding putting education, medical and self-sufficiency programs in place. Women having 'choice' is right up there with this.

I can't understand your apparent (is it real) inability to recognise that women should have choice - to adopt, or not to adopt, contraceptive methods.

You write of 'self-serving' as if these women are going to be forced to take contraception ... Or do you think proponents of 'choice' actually mean putting contraception in their drinking water.