{"id":6334,"date":"2019-03-04T09:00:46","date_gmt":"2019-03-04T09:00:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/?p=6334"},"modified":"2019-03-04T09:06:40","modified_gmt":"2019-03-04T09:06:40","slug":"dont-jump","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/?p=6334","title":{"rendered":"Don’t jump!"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"
Boris jumping off cliff\/Eric Chan\/flickr<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

I assume you think this blog is going to be all about my heroic actions in persuading a highly distressed individual to step back from the window sill\/top of the bridge and reconsider their future. Well I am relieved to say I have never been in this situation and don\u2019t think I\u2019d be very good at it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Actually I\u2019m talking about conclusions and the assumptions\nwe make that lead us to jump to them. I had an interesting example of this on the\ntube the other day. As most people who know me are aware, I am passionately pro\nEurope and have been spending much of my spare time volunteering with a cross-party\ngroup called \u2018the European Movement in Wandsworth and Merton\u2019. No it doesn\u2019t\neasily trip off the tongue but hey..<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So one day last week I spent some of the morning crafting a\npress release on our support for a crowdfunder to get people from the Highlands\nof Scotland to London for the March for Europe coming up on March 23rd<\/sup>.\nI sent the release out to our media contact list and then scrubbed up to meet\nthe inspiring Rosena Allin Khan, MP for Tooting, at Portcullis House at\nWestminster. The aim was to thank her for her support for a People\u2019s Vote and\nask how we could help her going forward.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Feeling pleased with my activities, later that day I set off\nfor my evening class on the tube, and there was a guy sitting opposite wearing\na prominent pro EU badge. We exchanged a few pleasantries about how we felt\nabout Brexit, and then he looked hard at me. \u2018You should wear a badge too\u2019, he\nadmonished me sternly. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

After all my efforts that day it took considerable effort not to punch him on the nose.  Fortunately, at that moment I reached my station and got off the train, fuming.  What made him think he had the right to tell me what to do? I\u2019d given the best part of the day for THE CAUSE, and he thought could give me instructions.  Yet another mansplainer, or was this one a manstructor?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But we all do it time after time. We make massive\nassumptions based on very little evidence:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 \u2018Look at her letter! Can\u2019t even spell.\u2019 (Actually is dyslexic).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

‘Why is that guy stumbling around in the street? Must be drunk\u2019 (Actually suffers from a neurological complaint). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018She\u2019s wearing a headscarf – probably completely subjugated in her community.\u2019 (Actually is running a women\u2019s refuge).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018He looks too smartly dressed to really need a food bank\u2019 (Actually is on the way back from yet another unsuccessful job interview in the only items of clothing he owns that are not completely worn out.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So as nothing is ever quite what it seems, and to end on a\nlighter note, the world of cinema is full of examples of the wrong assumptions\nleading to erroneous conclusions.  The\nresults are variously hilarious and terrifying.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

  • In The Great Dictator<\/em>, Charlie Chaplin plays a Jewish barber who is confused with Adenoid Hynkel, tyrannical ruler of Tomania.<\/li>
  • In North by Northwest<\/em>, Cary Grant accidentally identifies himself as a covert government agent, thereby kick-starting Alfred Hitchock\u2019s dizzying cross-country race.<\/li>
  • Perhaps one of the funniest is Monty Python\u2019s Life of Brian<\/em>, where Brian Cohen (Graham Chapman) is born a few doors down from Jesus Christ, a very unfortunate coincidence. He\u2019s visited by three very confused wise men. Later, he\u2019s summoned to appear before Pontius Pilate. And in Brian\u2019s final identity crisis, thousands of wayward peasants mistake him for the King of the Jews.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n

    It just goes to show, you can\u2019t tell a book by looking at\nits cover.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Yet another mansplainer, or was this one a manstructor?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":6333,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,67,55,65,56],"tags":[76,80,92],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6334"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6334"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6334\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6365,"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6334\/revisions\/6365"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6333"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6334"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6334"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6334"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}