Popular and influential talk show host Randy Simms is now firmly in the gun sights of the provincial government’s official advisory organization on women’s issues.
The Provincial Advisory Council on the Status of Women is planning an opinion piece for the province’s newspapers and is encouraging people on the PACSW e-mail listserv to join in by writing pieces of their own for local papers and calling both Simms and Bill Rowe on air to voice their opinions.
The controversy centres on remarks Simms made Tuesday to Long Harbour deputy mayor Ed Bruce which didn’t make a headline until Simms was challenged on Wednesday, on air, by newbie St. John’s councillor Sheilagh O’Leary.
An e-mail Thursday from PACSW communications director Elaine Condon described her having the “unfortunate task” of listening to Simms’ show Thursday and hearing what she described as “blatant sexism rear its head over and over.”
The e-mail also included the text of a front-page Telegram story by Alisha Morrissey. That’s not online but an earlier BP post linked to an shorter version of the story that appeared yesterday.
What the Telegram story on either day didn’t make clear is that O’Leary was working on the basis of a half-baked version of Simms’ remarks posted on a local blog.
But as it turns out, the Signal writer also got a half-baked version of events:
I didn't hear it myself and heard it from a third party I trusted. I had never done that before, even for a blog, and I definitely learned my lesson.
Anyway, the transcription is up on Signal now, with a little apology.
And indeed the correct version and an apology has been posted.
The only question that remains is whether or not the half-backed version of Simms’ remarks fed to Signal and O’Leary was an honest misunderstanding in the first place or a deliberate misrepresentation to advance some unknown political agenda.
Simms may well have earned the hatred of some locals for criticising an event featuring only women municipal candidates in the middle of the election. He pointed out that such an event gave an unfair boost some candidates based solely on gender during the campaign and was clearly not in keeping with an effort to encourage more women to come forward as candidates. Simms might now be targeted for payback as a result of his earlier criticism.
The 11 members of the PACSW governing board are appointed by the cabinet under the Status of Women Advisory Council Act. Under the Act, its permanent staff are covered by the Public Service Pensions Act.
The minister responsible for the status of women is natural resources minister Kathy Dunderdale.
-srbp-
11 comments:
i think they should include you
Say nothing. Whatever you say can and will be used against you in the court of public opinion.
Count on it.
And now for a grammatical question:
Misogyny Hmm... does it have a counterpart for the other gender? You know, when a female has male hatred and distrust in its heart? I don't know if there's a word for that, and I'm just curious. Nothing more!!
I know, I know. I should not ask such questions. We live in a police state.
Misandry.
Seriously? The word is misandry?? Wow, how about that. One doesn't hear that very often in our misandrist society. Odd isn't it?
OK, I've added a word today. Wild.
And 2222, if you had the personal integrity to stand behind your words such a comment as you made might actualy mean something.
As it is, it is merely part of the crap that has started to fly on this issue.
Maybe trying to impress the Williams Government.There is always a different motive.
"The only question that remains is whether or not the half-backed version of Simms’ remarks fed to Signal and O’Leary was an honest misunderstanding in the first place or a deliberate misrepresentation to advance some unknown political agenda."
Ed, were you wearing your tinfoil hat when you came up with that one? The misquote may not have been DLP, but the spirit remained. And you can be sure the Provincial Advisory Council on the Status of Women aren't making any moves based on what you keep referring to as the half-baked version of events. They know what Simms said. Get a grip old bean.
Nice to see dar cy that since you have no argument you resort to attacking the person, as some are wont to do all the time.
The quote was fed to the reporter as it was fed to O'leary.
Was it a deliberate misrepresentnation or a version half-baked by accident?
But there is no question the version originally presented in Signal was wrong and misleading.
And the writer acknowledged so.
before you spew your hatred and venom, Darcy and desperately try to be condescending, try and find something to stand on because you keep coming up very short. in fact, all you do is dig yourself further into the ground. It's pretty hard to look down on people and sneer, as you try to do, when you are in ahole.
Meanwhile:
"But there is no question the version originally presented in Signal was wrong and misleading.
And the writer acknowledged so."
When did the writer acknowledge that it was misleading? I don't see any sign of it on Signal, nor on BP.
It's possible I could have missed it. Or are you just putting words in people's mouths again?
Darcy your extremely hositle aggressive reaction likely means you have some direct involvement in the misrepresentnation of Simms words.
What part did you play in the misrepresentnation?
Were you Kerri's original source or did you put kerri onto a source that was trusted but turned out to have it wrong in this case?
If memory serves the last time you came on quite this obnoxiously and aggressive, it was a case where you personally had screwed up big time with a simplee matter of historical fact.
You then took to blasting me in particualr rather than acknoweldge the error and move along.
Did you put words in Simms' mouth and start this off? based on previous experien ce I am thinking you had some direct involvement and are noqw resorting to the old bully boy crap to try and deflect from your own role.
But make no mistake: the original versionw as wrong. The question is whether someone deliberately got it wrong or just made a sdimple mistake.
you seem, in my easriler comment I made a simple mistake: in the haste of typic a responose, I should have made it clear that the acknwoeldge was in getting the quote wrong. But to be perfectly honest when a writer ackoweledges the quote is wrong, it also suggest - note the language - that the incorrect quote may produce a problem. This is not a pedantic issue but a substantive problem.
In this case the misrepresentation/misquote took Simms' words grossly out of context and turned them into something - anti-female, mysogynist, sexist - which they weren't.
All the subsequent reaction appears to have come from that original misrepresentation.
Now, as I said, the last time you came on like this, you had in fact been the one to shag up. Odds are the same dynamic is at work here again on a story which is effectively dead.
Care to disclose your role in all this? That would seem to be the most likely real problem here.
So save, the lectures, the presumption, the arrogance, the personal attacks and your other usual flame-war crap. Just deal with the facts simply and professionally.
Were you the source of the misquote?
Ed, if you really wanted to know the answer to your question, you'd quit playing your little game of paranoid detective, contact the author personally and ask her yourself.
But it seems to me that you'd rather plant seeds of doubt than nurture trees of knowledge.
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