The recent episode of Emmerdale where we saw the assisted suicide of Jackson has certainly caused a lot of controversy. I havebeen looking through a few websites that have covered this article and have message boards attached. Some people really haven't minced their words. Here is a quote by simon from hampshire

"Do not call these people scriptwriters and actors because it is an insult. Emmerdale is pure rubbish watched by the thick and stupid. Emmerdale, Coronation Street and most of the others are so bad they are torture. The people who watch these simple dumbded down shows are normally so thick they think the drivel is real life. Shoot the idiot writers, well at least the ones over 14 years old."

Well Simon I get the impression you're not a soap fan? What puzzles me is if they are torture, you must be watching them? I wonder if you could do any better at writing scripts, or acting come to think of it? I very much doubt it. This silly immature outburst was really uncalled for. If you don't like watching soaps and think they are rubbish then that is your prerogative, but posting messages like this only goes to show that you are the only thick and stupid person around here, this blog post was about the storyline, not an open invitation to blast every soap on the television.

There is a name for people like you "Internet troll"

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I have posted this message on The Sun website because I feel that I was misquoted regarding the article that they wrote which included some of my comments and information from my website. Unfortunately I didn't realise that there is obviously a limit on how many words you can put on The Sun's comment section on their website. So this is the full article.

I feel that I must put a couple of points straight regarding the article that was published in the Sun today. The reporter obviously found me via my website because I had previously written a blog post about the tetraplegic character in Emmerdale. At the time I had no idea where this plot was going, nor how much controversy it was going to cause. I want to put straight that I did not state that Emmerdale was "losing the plot". It's quite the opposite actually, I think they carried it off really well and I doubt whether any of the other big soaps could have done quite such a good job and made the plot look credible. I saw nothing horrific about the scenes where we saw him ingest a lethal concoction of drugs contained in a drink. I could understand if he threw himself under a train, or got somebody to slit his wrists, but I just don't see what all the fuss about the scenes we saw the other evening.

A lot of people are up in arms and would rather see a positive storyline regarding disability, rather than all doom and gloom. The script writers have been extremely brave in going down the road of assisted suicide, maybe there wouldn't have been such an outcry if it was somebody suffering from Motor Neurone Disease, I think the fact it was a young 20-year-old who could have possibly lived for another 40 years. That said, this is not fiction, this has happened in recent years so I see no harm in addressing this very sensitive subject. The soaps have covered just about every other subject, rape, child molestation, murder, domestic violence, why not assisted suicide? Somebody on here quoted that this is just a television drama, I totally agree, this is a drama at the end of the day, the script writers have got a duty to write scripts that will keep people interested and not flip the switch and go and watch something else. There is only so much you can write about somebody in a wheelchair who cannot move anything apart from his bed. We saw Jackson carry out a parachute jump, that was great, but do we want to see him do it over and over again? I suppose they could have turned him into some kind of super crip where we saw him scuba-diving, skiing, mountain climbing, but that isn't going to keep the public's interest. My hats go off to the Emmerdale script writers for approaching the subject of assisted suicide and carrying it out with such sensitivity and credibility. 

I think that Marc Silcock portrayed somebody with a spinal cord injury extremely well and to the untrained eye, could probably pass himself off as a genuine disabled person. I'm afraid the same thing can't be said about other storylines which saw people suffering brain injuries after being shot. These people have now made a miraculous recovery after both being unable to walk or talk properly, less than a year later they're trotting around as if nothing has ever happened. These are the type of storylines that we should be slating as they could give false hope to people in the same situation. It was obvious that Jackson Walsh was never going to recover and saw no other way out of the situation than ending his life prematurely. Way to go Emmerdale

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This is a really fabulous advert that is doing the rounds on the television at the moment

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q4-Qyu9KbBo

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Many of you will probably watch the reality show "I'm a Celebrity, Get Me Out Of Here". I never watched the first few episodes but got into it about three years ago. It's harmless fun takes up an hour of your time every evening. Well, when they say harmless, not to many of the animals it isn't, which brings me onto why I am writing this entry. Two contestants who took part in this year's show have been charged with animal cruelty because they killed and cooked a rat on the show. Now they have been charged with animal cruelty by Australian authorities.

Apparently it is illegal to carry out this type of practice for show, in other words in front of the cameras on a reality show. It's okay to go off on your own into the woods, catch a rat, bash its head in and eat it, you might get in trouble then. But oh no, give a bunch of people rice for dinner every day and then start moaning because they have killed and eaten vermin. Did they boil the rat alive? No, they killed it very quickly and humanely and made use of the meat. I think it is rather hypocritical of the authorities to take this action.

It is a rat any different from a cockroach? Both of them are classed as vermin in most countries and certainly not dealt with humanely. It seems that it's perfectly okay for these contestants to eat all these little critters while they are still alive, cockroaches, grabs, worms and god knows what else. I really think the Australian authorities should get a life and concentrate on something a little bit more serious.

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I recently bought a really fantastic television wall bracket that I first saw at the spinal unit in Salisbury. These brackets are totally adjustable which means no matter how you are lying in bed, you can watch television without ending up with a crick in your neck. 

They are available from a company called IAG technology. Unfortunately they are not exactly cheap, around about £400 once you have paid for shipping and VAT. But if you are like me and occasionally have to stay in bed for periods of time than this piece of kit is absolutely invaluable. I also have my computer next to my bed and before had the television on the wall on the opposite side of the room. I can now angle my television so it sits next to my computer screen, using the PC and watching the television at the same time, the best of both worlds. 

I have included an image and also a link to the website where you can obtain one of these brackets. You will not find the bracket on the website, contact them and they will help you.

http://www.iagtechnology.co.uk/

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Unless you've been under a rock for the last few months you will be aware that the country is slowly switching from analog to digital television. I'm not going to get technical because to be quite honest, I'm not a technical person. However digital television is supposed to offer you a far more varied array of programs than analog. The old analog days gave you four channels. Digital now makes it possible to have any number of channels and more can be added quite easily. Sorry, but about as far as my knowledge goes.

So we are waving goodbye to analog and welcoming in digital with all these television programmes at our disposal, brilliant isn't it? Unfortunately I wish I could agree with that statement. Now I'm going to try and refrain from getting angry now because if I do, I'm going to start ranting and raving and shouting obscenities. I'll get straight to the point, I ABSOLUTELY DETEST DIGITAL TELEVISION. It's absolutely rubbish. I'm not talking about the programs themselves, I'm talking about the signal and reliability of digital television. Digital television is just not stable. At the time of writing I am having to watch all my television programmes through sky because the main channels I watch are down, I've just got "no signal" on the screen. If you had a poor signal with analog then maybe your picture would not be quite so good, but you could still watch the television. If you have a poor signal with digital then it is totally unwatchable because the screen becomes pixelated and just freezes.This can't be right? I don't recall ever having problems like this on analog television. But then again it has been around for many many years. Digital television is in its infancy in its present form and it seems that those of us who live in areas where analog has now all but disappeared, we are testing it for everyone else who has yet to switch over. I'm sure that the powers be will deny that but if digital television was a brand-new car, I would have taken it back and got a refund months ago.

I truly hope that when the time comes for analog users to switch over to digital, there is a huge improvement from the service a lot of us down here in the South West are receiving at the moment

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