I still think a man who shared your views, your style of thinking and your quick intelligence would be hated in very much the same way. Minus the phoning other men, but the reaction would be the same.

The need to be vulgar, to repeat being so, and to do so in the glare of self-sought publicity, does no credit to the perpetrator.

Or, indeed, to the persons who permit him to be so offensive.

One of my tasks as Duty Officer at Police Headquarters was to release a press statement informing the media of the goings-on of the day.

I did also have the experience of having to deal with suicide cases varying from death by hanging to overdose to inhaling of the entire contents of a 10kg gas cylinder.

I shared with the families of these people the grief, the pain, even the stigma that at times haunted them from society. Writing of things that serve no purpose other than have people satisfy their roaming curiosity makes me sad and brings to mind certain scenes, feelings, emotions, tears, pain that cannot be wiped from memory.

In my tour of duty I never released such news. In fact, a feather in the cap of the Police Corps, we were among the first to advocate and practice that such news should not go public.

We were in unison that consideration for the families and friends of the deceased by far outweighed any other consideration coming from whichever quarter it could come from. Some journalists objected strongly.

This is also to show how certain journalists could be immature, irresponsible and I dare say, heartless.

[Daphne – Union Press was always the greatest culprit, publishing pictures of car crash victims in close-up even when they were entirely private persons, but all the newspapers seemed to find it necessary to describe deaths by overdose in great detail, as though it was a murder scene rather than a personal tragedy. It is not, however, consideration for the families involved that is paramount here (everyone has a family whatever the reason they are in the news) but straightforward privacy rules: if you are a private person, then the manner of your death is nobody else’s business, unless you are murdered.]

Anything that doesn’t come out of a toaster.

I don’t think the hatred is misogynist, except perhaps to a small degree. Most of it is just hatred because you disagree with things and you have a point of view, but that point of view is not tied to tribal politics.

I’m a man, but I’ve experienced some of the same hatred, except in my case they found it very easy to shut me up by shutting me out.

In Malta, you’re expected to go through life pressing the Like button. You know, as in Xarabank. The only points of view that are allowed are those defined by the Great Schism of PN and MLP. Anything else, and you’re l-istramb negattiv. I mean how many original thinkers has Malta produced, ever? It’s smile, smile, grovel, ingratiate, praise, smile and applaud.

I don’t know if it’s Mediterranean mercantilism or colonial self-preservation or good old Catholic love, but it’s certainly not Western. Hellenic dialectic might as well be Klingon as far as Malta is concerned.

[Daphne – Not really, H. P. All you have to do is consider how very different events would have been had Franco Debono and Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando been women. They would have been classified as hysterical, menopausal or premenstrual crazy witches and nobody would have taken a blind bit of notice. However, because they are men, even though they really do have psychological problems, one of them is a drunk and both of them speak in a neurotic repetitive way that is a dead-cert indicator of never-mind-what, they were taken literally and seriously and given credibility. I live with this kind of thing every day, you know. The people who want to stop me never ring me or even try to speak to me. Instead they ring every man in my life or who they think is in my life to exert his authority over me. If it were not so sad it would be risible.]

You have a point there. I am a man and all I can say to that is Aye, aye.

Indirectly, you have also answered the other objection that among your detractors are a number of your own sex.

Same reaction here… An(other) excellent and instructive post, argued clearly and logically. Gives a good insight into how your mind ticks. Those who condemn you for ‘poisonous jealousy’ should at least try to understand your viewpoint.

[Daphne – Pointless. We’re dealing with completely different cultures here. The sort of people you describe are rooted in a primitive and long-standing culture of Mediterranean misogyny. They have hundreds of years of it bred into them. Their hatred is directly linked to the fact that I’m a woman who doesn’t conform to their standard of what a woman should be like. All their primitive hate-and-fear buttons are pushed – the very same ones which had women tortured and killed for ‘witchcraft’ as recently as 250 years ago. No difference at all – the exact same sentiments. Look at the way they speak about me: ‘that woman’, ‘this woman’, terms used for crones and witches and evil murderesses, ‘going too far’ (too far for what?), ‘must be stopped’, ‘speak to people to stop her’ & c & c. Primitive as hell. You don’t hear them speaking that way about any man, because men have a Godsent right in Mediterranean society to dominate the public sphere with their views. And they certainly wouldn’t speak about me or feel that way about me if I had been a man. Living in a Mediterranean island society is most trying for women unless they are prepared to pass themselves off as rag-dolls or whores, or are in constant ‘silly flirtatious’ mode. So much for liberal and progressive.]

I tend to agree with you that (many of) those who persecute you so vociferously don’t even read your blog because it is simply beyond them. It is not just a question of education but more importantly a mental attitude (or lack of it).

Unfortunately, this is all so evident on the comments board under the many news items of online newspapers. Prejudice and lack of clear thinking is so rampant it is small wonder we got the government we have (with all the faux pas we’ve witnessed these past 9 months).

Many people prefer to ‘compartmentalize’ their life and life in general (e.g. private-public issues) leading to a contradictory statements and conclusions.

Finally, many thanks for your selfless and thankless efforts in the service of unearthing the (real) news behind the news.

God save us all from such a day…

And anything that Saviour and Roger don’t like or agree with.

That’s easy for Muscat, closing the buttons on his jacket.