Safety Sacraments and Rituals As Australians approach the time of year most dense with symbolism (ANZAC and Easter), it may be helpful to ponder the nature, power and significance of symbols, sacraments and rituals in relation to the safety industry. After all, the safety industry is now imbued with as many rituals as any religion, […]
Zero Harm
Understanding Harm Minimization
Understanding Harm Minimization As much as Safety might wish it, the real world is not binary black and white. Sometimes the most caring thing to do in a fallible world with fallible people is simply keep harm to a minimum. Harm minimization is the course of action that puts care at the centre of intelligent […]
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Zero Suicide and the Discourse of Denial
Zero Suicide and the Discourse of Denial One of the most unhelpful and ignorant approaches to suicide prevention is evidenced in the Zero Suicide movement (https://zerosuicide.sprc.org/ ). We see in this insane delusion with the zero discourse the: denial of death, denial of fallibility, denial of human freedom, the demonsiation of pain and suffering and, […]
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The Advisor as Skilled Helper
The Advisor as Skilled Helper The idea of ‘helping’ is essential to the professions (Susskind & Susskind., The Future of The Professions 2015). However, the absence of the language of ‘helping’ in the safety industry is not surprising. When the goal is zero and the activity is counting where is the motivation for ‘helping’? One’s […]
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Zero, A Framework for Psychological Bullying
Zero, A Framework for Psychological Bullying There can never be an Ethic of Risk as long as the safety industry is wedded to the ideology and discourse of zero. How can one be moral to another person when one denies fallibility in goal setting? Of course zero is not a SMART goal anyway! (See Understanding […]
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Risk Boldly
Risk Boldly It’s great to see that the Australians of the Year are adventurers. The idea of adventure and learning in risk is central to all they represent. Even when they were in the midst of their rescue of the boys in the caves in Thailand they expected to lose some or all of the […]
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No Zero – A Bitter Pill to Swallow
No Zero – A Bitter Pill to Swallow Despite all the nonsense speak of ‘zero tolerance’ and ‘war on drugs’ it is clear that such strategies cost a fortune and don’t work. Here are some reasons why: · http://www.doctusproject.com/2018/10/14/why-the-war-on-drugs-isnt-stopping-deaths-at-music-festivals/ · https://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_Library/FlagPost/2018/May/The_pros_and_cons_of_pill_testing The zero tolerance approach is based on a set of binary absolutes as if: […]
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Safety in The Land of Norom from the Book of Nil
Safety in The Land of Norom from the Book of Nil Chapter One 1:1 And it came to pass in the land of Norom that Adam was convinced that others were evil. These others were the Malamutes, those neighbour aliens who did not believe in Zero, the brother of Safety and Compliance. 1:2 The Malamutes […]
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No Ethic of Hope in Zero
No Ethic of Hope in Zero The denial of fallibility in the language of zero offers no hope for fallible human beings. Hope is much more than a concept of wishing, naïve optimism nor some unrealistic sense of desire. Hope is always about the unknown future and therefore should be understood as messianically, prophetically, transcendently […]
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The Safetyization of Normal Life
The Safetyization of Normal Life One of the delusions of safetyism is the naive belief that safetyism works for normal fallible people. One of the delusions of Zeroism is the idiocy of speaking absolutes to fallible people. Strangely safetyization is only a workplace thing, no one lives this nonsense at home. No one runs their […]
