Sid the apology - sack him

Yes, one would really despair if one felt one's efforts at making a difference were wasted!

Nanaej - I am sure your contribution helps the causes. I hope to get involved myself when I am living in New Zealand.

Gracesmum, I would love to get even, but the system won't let me hire some heavies! The surgeon was close to retirement so being suspended is no real punishment and all the damages were paid by his insurers, or the NHS. He now still lives in his million-pound farmhouse in Canterbury which he hires out as a wedding venue. I thought he should be charged with causing GBH .
All I can do about the treatment of women is sign petitions and donate to charities which campaign on their behalf.
Yes, my rage does not do me any good but I don't let it rule my life.

When I feel anger /rage/despair/ offence about something I get actively involved:e.g. Amnesty /MAP/UNICEF . I offer a bit of time..it is not much and will not cause an earthquake but organisations are looking for volunteers and it helps me feel I am contributing something to awful situations that i would like to see change. A bit like the ripple in a pond...

Is impotent rage not very negative and frustrating? How much more useful if ti can be channelled into something positive? If personal, I have always liked the advice "Don't get mad, get even" but can't see how to apply it to the bigger pcture.

www.pbs.org/wnet/need-to-know/security/pakistans-paradox/6195/

I used up quite a bit of my own rage (are we born with a quota?) on the surgeon who butchered my daughter and the system that protected him, but I still have plenty left for Pakistani Penal Code No. 295C

This would make an interesting debate in itself. I tend to think what you feel, ie. rage, despair, disgust, is tempered by your personality, your physical state and your life experiences.
Even truly horrific events like the Sandy Hook massacre did not provoke me to rage but to despair. Honour killings fill me with disgust. I think perhaps all my rage instinct has been used up by events in my own life.

Shall we agree on rage and despair?

Yes, despair

I don't think it's rage I feel in those cases so much as despair.

Yes, Bags, it does help any debate if we all clarify our terms. I suppose I could substitute 'angry' for 'offended' - in fact, angry does not do justice to the rage I feel when I read about some girl being murdered for some perceived insult to her family's 'honour'.

Reading your post, greatnan, has made me realise that where someone else might say they a offended (on their own behalf or someone else's), I say I'm angry. I've been wondering for a while why it is that I don't 'take offence' at something that clearly offends other people. I think it just comes down to my possibly over-subtle use of words. So I would say that the abuse of women does not offend me but makes me angry – sometimes in a rather helpless way because there doesn't seem to be anything one can do except argue against the ideas that perpetuate such offences.

I guess it boils down to the same thing but I prefer not to use the word 'offended' because so often it is used indiscriminately.

I don't get the impression Bartoli was 'offended' by Inverdale's remarks, but she could well feel angry that there are still such dinosaurs around in Europe. She could be upset too. But that's not the same as offended either.

Sorry for the blether. Just straightening something out in my own mind. Trying to anyhow.

I am happy to admit to taking offence on behalf of other people - I am deeply offended by the treatment of women in many countries, and the racism that I still know exists in some police officers, as evinced by the stop-and-search statistics.
Can it be right to shrug when you hear other people being insulted or demonised?
'They came for the Jews, but I was not a Jew so I took no notice.......'

absent, NZ has not blunted your style (well it wouldn't would it - you probably get on rather well with those forthright Kiwis)
How about "Well my boy, you're no oil painting and you have limited social sensitivity so why not get into sports commentating and hang around with rugby players. Then your looks and lack of sensitivity won't matter a jot."

I think the article is saying, at the end, that the public response to insulting (and sexist) remarks such as the one Inverdale used is enough to tell others that "that sort of thing" is not acceptable. To my mind that's enough to gradually change attitudes – many of which clearly have already changed from a generation or two ago when such things were allowed to pass.

It's good to know we already have adequate laws to deal with threats, but the article (I forget whether it was Dailey or someone else) seemed to be suggesting that locking the American gamer up for several months before his trial by setting too high a bail was unreasonable. Hopefully it will discourage other silly people from writing such stuff on social media sites.

I guess judging whether something is a real threat or not is the key. It's bound to be subjective.

Thanks Bags. It's shocking what some people will post on line. These are clear threats which could not be ignored especially in light of Sandy Hook. These idiotic people do need to be prosecuted if only 'pour discourager les autres'. But there is a difference between threats and insults.
Can we legislate against insults? Should we?
I'm wondering if the very fact that the insult has received such publicity and negative feedback is exactly the weapon of choice against such Neanderthals.

Article by Kate Dailey in BBC mag in which a professor of criminal law says that we already have adequate laws (from as long ago as the early 1800s) to deal with insults and threats.

I wonder if John Inverdale owes his career to his daddy saying, "You're an ugly little bugger with no talent so you'd best work in radio where a) no one can see you and b) you just have to talk about other people's talents." Just a thought...

Well, that's what has been done (an amendment made where the 1986 law was shown to cause problems) with the law Zoe Williams was talking about, which does make speech that is deemed to incite violence a crime. At least, so I understand.

Bags what about the notion that we can amend censorship, in the spirit of the plans for amending human rights laws that are proving problematic? Censorship and freedom of speech don't have to be mutually exclusive.

We can shut Clarkson up and let Edward Snowden blow his whistle, in harmony!

I'm off out to cuddle my grandson - he's grown whilst Wimbledon has been on! Back later!

Excellent article in the Guardian May 2012 by Zoe Williams: why insults are a political issue.

If Inverdale or Clarkson want to get on a soap box (it would be a blog these days) and proclaim any personal views they like then that is fine. Object to licence fee payers paying them while they are rude, or glorify breaking speed limits. Quite a different matter.

I completely agree, when. I just don't think that censorship is a good way forward. I think censorship is dangerous to a democracy. Schools do a lot of work on discrimination, but there will always be people who flout society's unwritten rules.

Do we have any gransnetters who know more about the current laws? It would be good to know exactly what is against the law.

Yes, difficult to find the line, but it's been argued before that starting isn't the slippery slope that people are afraid of. Do we try to improve society by taking a stand about insulting and belittling certain people, or allow them to continue to broadcast their unpalatable bigotry, and hope our children get it because we don't agree, and we will just swallow it because we want free speech? This horrible aspect of free speech is becoming normalised, and now the internet providers are putting in more obstacles to accessing abusive images of chidren, we may need to decide on where that line is regarding name calling and insults towards people who have certain discrimination and protection acts to call on.

I don't want my grandchildren adopting the style of banter that Clarkson and co like to dish out. It's disrespectful and cruel. Inverdale's judgement of a gifted tennis player in terms of what she looks like is as oppressive as extreme censorship. There's a happy balance somewhere - not a slippery slope.

Quite. Once you start, where do you stop? I really can't recommend enough Nick Cohen's book about censorship: You can't read this book.