I was about to post the following and leave it at that:
Erm I'm going to ignore pretty much everything else on this thread which seems largely unproductive and just comment on Bounty.
Would you like me to explain the poor BULLYING practices that Bounty employed on vulnerable women IN HOSPITAL that MN were opposed to.
The irony of the blog and posts on this thread are really not lost on me in that context.
The fact that they both MN and Bounty have forums is a mute point. MN make money primarily from ADVERTISING. Bounty make money primarily from SELLING YOUR DETAILS.
Since its clear that there is a lot of people on MN not to keen on having their details shared - and with fair and good reason - why is bad to be opposed to that and to highlight what has actually been going? Especially when many women were reporting that their information was being STOLEN or otherwise taken by malicious or dubious practices, some of which may actually fall into the illegal tick box....
Why is making women and hospitals and government aware of the issues surrounding the practices, what rights were being violated and why there was such an appalling conflict of interests going on at the expense of PATIENTS a bad thing?
It has afterall been touted as a 'bad thing' by several parties in various camps over the last few days to pass on personal details and data. Why is it suddenly is deemed acceptable if you through in a couple of discount vouchers and a sample pot of sudacream?
I'm not sure that there could be a more ironic comment really.
Then its dawned on me that 20something's chip probably has something to to do with me as I was a leading voice about Bounty. The funny thing is I didn't want to join in with a lot of the comments on this thread and just wanted to comment on the actual argument rather than personalities... and I didn't even remember the pro-Bounty campaign after the passage of so much time without reading this thread and being reminded of it.
Strangely, despite my feelings, when I was offered a Bounty pack, it was my DH who refused it because I felt so pressured and obliged to take one. Just a few minutes after a lengthy discussion over my mental health. Thus really illustrating to me just how inappropriate Bounty in a hospital setting is and just how hard to say no, actually is even if you REALLY REALLY don't want anything to do with them. Fortunately I never met a Bounty Lady; but then was this because by that point hospitals were a lot more aware of the problem and more sensitive and sympathetic to patients about it?
But yeah. I'm a bitch. I'll happily take that, if its changed the situation with Bounty in hospitals for the better. Next stop, improving maternity services in general....