{"id":817,"date":"2013-05-27T10:55:03","date_gmt":"2013-05-26T22:55:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/?p=817"},"modified":"2013-05-27T10:55:03","modified_gmt":"2013-05-26T22:55:03","slug":"it-was-in-the-local-paper","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/?p=817","title":{"rendered":"It was in the local paper"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"SouthCourier\"<\/a>I was having lunch with an old friend recently.\u00a0 She\u2019s an old friend in at least two senses.\u00a0 First, I have known her for about 30 years.\u00a0 And, second, she has had rather a lot of birthdays \u2013 certainly a lot more birthdays than I can lay claim to.<\/p>\n

I think that she recently celebrated her 127th summer.\u00a0 Something like that.\u00a0 And for most of those summers \u2013 and a good few winters too \u2013 she\u2019s been a volunteer driver for Meals on Wheels.<\/p>\n

But her Meals on Wheels days may be coming to an end.\u00a0 You see, the government apparently has a plan to produce all future meals in a big factory just off the coast of New South Wales.\u00a0 These mass mass-produced meals are to be frozen solid and then shipped in trucks the size of freight trains to various hospitals, from where they will be distributed to those elderly and infirm house-bound citizens who are in need of a bit of pre-prepared sustenance.<\/p>\n

\u2018It\u2019s ridiculous!\u2019 my friend said.\u00a0 \u2018Half the people getting Meals on Wheels don\u2019t have a microwave.\u00a0 And most of those who do have one don\u2019t know how to use it.\u00a0 They won\u2019t be able to eat the meals until the next day.\u00a0 That\u2019s no good.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u2018You\u2019re not thinking of the cook-chill plan that\u2019s currently being considered for some hospital food, are you?\u2019 I asked.<\/p>\n

\u2018Cook-chill?\u00a0 No.\u00a0 Frozen.\u00a0 All of it,\u2019 she said, emphatically.<\/p>\n

\u2018And did the Meals on Wheels chaps tell you this?\u2019<\/p>\n

\u2018They didn\u2019t even know about it,\u2019 my friend said.\u00a0 \u2018I don\u2019t think the government wants them to know.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u2018So, how did you find out?\u2019<\/p>\n

\u2018It was in the local paper.\u00a0 Not our local paper; Maude\u2019s local paper.\u00a0 She gets a different one.\u2019<\/p>\n

Now it is entirely possible that either my friend \u2013 or her friend, Maude \u2013 misread the story in the local paper.\u00a0 But I\u2019m more inclined to think that the story was so badly bent out of shape that a misinterpretation was almost inevitable.<\/p>\n

Some local newspapers do a great job of \u2018crusading\u2019.\u00a0 But there\u2019s a fine line between whipping up local interest and seriously distorting the facts in order to ensure a good headline or two.<\/p>\n

Greenpeace\u2019s co-founder, Paul Watson, has been quoted as saying \u2018It doesn’t matter what is true; it only matters what people believe is true.\u2019\u00a0 But I don\u2019t think that\u2019s right.\u00a0 What is presented as fact should at least be factual.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I was having lunch with an old friend recently.\u00a0 She\u2019s an old friend in at least two senses.\u00a0 First, I have known her for about 30 years.\u00a0 And, second, she has had rather a lot of birthdays \u2013 certainly a … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3,6],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/817"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=817"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/817\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":818,"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/817\/revisions\/818"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=817"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=817"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=817"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}