Stupid writers

On Criminal Minds tonight they they had someone poisoning people with an "irradiated poison".

I was willing to accept that, though it was kinda silly. and it apparently *swiftly* (like within a couple of minutes) induced symptoms of a heart attack. Then, besides radiation poisoning it was cause multiple organ failures. The radiation was short half-life so it was "harmless" with in a day or two.

Turns out the perp had been stealing the stuff for six years or so from various hospitals radio-medicine units.

Which just plain *doesn't work*.

If it has that short a half-life it'd not be capable of causing radiation poisoning within *days* after it was stolen.

Also, nothing these used for radio-medicine is *remotely* that toxic. Nor would it do the "induce a heart attack" bit.

Also, they evacuated a neighborhood because the perp had dumped some down a sink. Yet at the same time, the perp who *worked* with this stuff and thus knew how to safely handle it, carried a container around in her *pocket*

Basically, if it can be safely carried in a pocket, even for a short time, it winding up in the sewer isn't a big deal.

So, essentially, the writers did *no* research.

Just a reminder

If you are being *really* traditional (ie going by the position of the sun) Beltane won't be until 07:28 GMT on May 5th.

:-)

on gaslighting

(this is an edited version of a comment I made on one of Fayanora's posts a few years back. Figured it deserved wider distribution:

"There’s a form of mental torture called “gaslighting,” its name taken from a play in which a man..." http://t.co/bMtUp2LccQ

Abuse survivors deal with this a lot, and even more so when they are still being abused.

It's due to a major disconnect most folks have.

They (wrongly) believe that *intent* matters. So if it wasn't intended as abuse, it's not actually abusive.

But in reality, intent *doesn't* matter. You can do something with the best of intentions and still hurt someone if they are wired that way.

A good example is allergies. I don't care *how* much care and love you put into that dish of X. If I'm allergic to something in it, you'll put me in the hospital (or the morgue) by making me eat it.

Same thing applies to abusive behavior. Even the racial stuff and GLBT stuff.

But people will fight bitterly to avoid acknowledging this. Because if they do, it means they have to accept several things that they don't want to.

That good intentions don't matter. That other people are not like them, and thus don't react like they do. And worst of all, that being different that way is *not* wrong.

And that last is why so many reactions to getting called on stuff boil down to "you're doing this just to be contrary" (because they *literally* can't conceive of someone actually being/thinking "that" way)

I blame the golden rule for a lot of this. It *inherently assumes* that other people are just like you. The allergy example I used above points out the problems with that.

And gee, ever notice how many people don't *really* believe that allergies exist, they think that they are just people being unreasonably "picky".

Funny how that looks like the folks who claim that they aren't being insensitive/abusive.

The version of the "golden rule" used in metalaw works better but people really hate it:

Do unto others as they would have you do unto them.

People immediately jump to "but they can abuse that for all sorts of things". Which says a lot about how they think...