Currently, there appears to be much debate ongoing (not least in The Guardian and on the BBC) about the rights and wrongs of referring to the victims of the Suffolk murders as ‘prostitutes’. Some argue that headlines should read ‘Five women killed’ rather than ‘Five prostitutes killed’, reasoning that the victims are first and foremost women.

I completely and utterly disagree.

Let us consider for a moment that the victims are not prostitutes, but bank managers. Five bank managers killed in the same area apparently in the same manner by what appears to be the same person. Almost certainly a targeted campaign against bank managers. What headline would you expect?

Why, then, should it be any different for prostitutes? Of course, it shouldn’t. The only argument against using the term is that, to some, it appears judgemental and pejorative. Bollocks. It is merely an accurate description of their job, which (to me at least) confers no judgement.

The alternative being bandied about is ‘sex worker’. This is so non-specific and outrageously euphemistic as to be insulting, suggesting that society is ashamed of these people and what they did for a living. Note, also, that the majority of prostitutes appear to prefer the term ‘prostitute’, and it appears in the name of ‘The English Collective of Prostitutes’, their organisation.

And why on Earth would we refer to them as ‘women’ in headlines? This merely picks out one characteristic, not particularly specific, that unites all of the victims, suggesting that the fact that ‘young women’ were murdered is far worse than murders of ‘young men’. That is insulting.

Now, just to be clear, in the everyday context, these women are not defined by their jobs any more than anyone else. That is not my point. But when the most specific link of all the victims is their occupation, and it seems likely that it is intimately linked with their death, why bumble about avoiding the issue? They may have been beautiful young women with promising young lives, but they are undoubtedly united by the fact that they were prostitutes.

People need to get over their prejudices, and accept that ‘prostitute’ is a non-judgemental statement of specific fact. If they feel that it confers judgement, then perhaps, just perhaps, it is them doing the judging.

My new(ish) Toshiba laptop developed a Hard Drive fault last week. This was more than a little annoying, given that the notebook is quite new – but the world isn’t perfect, and these things sometimes go wrong, especially when new.

So I phoned their 24/7 Global Support Line on a Sunday evening. My call was answered immediately, without queueing. The lovely technical support guy agreed with me in less than five minutes that the HD needed replacing, and organised for it to be done. I was called and emailed on Monday morning to explain the process, and to give me a pick-up slot. Communication throughout was helpful, apologetic, and impeccably polite.

The laptop was packed up and picked up by the courier exactly on time, and was back with me within three days, working perfectly and with a helpful report explaining the exact action that had been taken.

I didn’t think anyone could ask for much more from Toshiba customer support given that they fixed the laptop very efficiently at absolutely no cost to myself. But Toshiba now offer a full refund if a laptop develops a fault during the first year of operation. The company has acted absolutely impeccably.

It’s something certain companies could learn from – and something that would certainly make me buy from them again.

It’s me! I am the Time Magazine Person of the Year, joining a list of several US Presidents, Bill and Melida Gates, the Queen, and Gandhi, to name but a few. You might be more surprised, though, to find that I’m sharing this year’s honour… with you. Yes, you.

For seizing the reins of the global media, for founding and framing the new digital democracy, for working for nothing and beating the pros at their own game, TIME’s Person of the Year for 2006 is you.

Awww…

You won’t see the this on the Ten O’Clock news. But perhaps – just perhaps – it hints at the real story of what’s going on in Iraq, and the kinds of things that will always happen when ordinary young men are placed in extraordinary positions, with the power of life or death, in foreign countries. Or perhaps it’s fake.

A unique form of ‘American justice’:

[flashvideo filename=”http://sjhoward.co.uk/video/iraq.flv” /]

Is it any wonder the Iraqi people want us to leave?

For those who have ever wondered how cocaine is made, here’s the answer… And it’s grim.

Update: The original video is no longer available, but there’s a full report inspired by it over on the Newsnight website.

Tony Copperfield’s podcast is always excellent, but last week’s (If patients can make it all up, so can I) was particularly so. He was riled by patients lying to him, and so decided he would give them a taste of their own medicine.

You can listen here:

In yesterday’s Guardian, Linda Grant had a fantastic piece called Panic Stations. It’s one of those absolutely absorbing, but utterly inconsequential pieces that only the Guardian can really do. Brilliant.

Now we’re officially in December, I’ve added the usual Christmassy touches around the place. It’s snowflakes galore for the next month and a bit!

Over the last couple of weeks, there have been some more permanent changes I’ve neglected to tell you about, too.

Firstly, there’s a new ‘Share This’ function. Clicking the Share This link will make a whole raft of options appear, which will allow you to share a particular post via Email or using a Social Web like Digg. You can find the link below each post, which brings me to the next change…

The post footer has been tidied up. On pages with several posts, it’s just been made a bit clearer and neater. On the individual post pages, it’s been reinstated, with an ‘Interact with this post’ section appearing below the post. The ‘More about this post’ section in the sidebar now provides ‘Quicklinks’ to commenting facilities.

Which brings me neatly to the third change. Comments are now closed for all posts, once they reach one year of age. This helps to curb spam, and also to keep discussions to the most recent posts on each topic. To this end, a notice will appear by the ‘Leave a comment’ form pointing out the fact if a post is a little on the old side, but not yet a year old, and hence still open for comments.

And finally, you’ll notice that on multiple post pages, the post titles are now clickable. It’s a small change, but stops having to faff around finding the ‘Permalink’ link.

I hope these changes meet with your approval. Thank you, as ever, for your support for the site. November was the best month ever in terms of hits on the site, with well over double the traffic for the same period last year. So thank you!