Heather Mills to appeal against £24.3m settlement!

[mumemma]

How can that not be enough? The papers are going to have a field day.....

I'm often quite envious of people who have lovely things I can't afford, or am ever likely to - an hôtel particulier with a large garden in the seventh arrondissement would be very nice, for example . Though I don't lose sleep over it .

Footballers and popstars make so much money these days because of technology - they appeal to the masses and can attract a worldwide audience. There is nothing (morally) wrong with that - they are currently winners in a technology-driven world...

And really, honestly, would you swap lives with a WAG? I can say, hand on heart, NOT FOR ONE MINUTE!!!

It's just market forces that some things are well paid - like successful footballers and others are not quite so much. I don't feel a need that things have to be evened out and made fair

Don't think you can say that Clam until you have been in that situation.

Don't judge until...blah blah.. but this thread just illustrates than too many are far too quick to judge.

No it isn't Xemia. Get your head out out your laissez-faire arse, erm, ivory tower, I mean

Xenia is talking sense here.

Where? What about?

Just cos you agree with her doesn't mean it's sense.

But if some are born pretty, some ugly, some with an IQ of 80, some 140, some with a pleasant nature etc, surely the whole of life and mankind is riddled with inequalities and someone born with a lovely voice or talent for football is going to be more in demand, just as the pretty girl will get more men interested than she who looks like the back end of a bus - these inequalities are all over the place. Jealousy and envy are some of the seven deadly sins for good reason.

Xenia, clever doesn't equate to unattractive, though it sometimes sounds like you think pretty equates to stupid.

And the world is riddled with inequalities. That doesn't mean society shouldn?t try to lessen them where it is possible to do so - such as in education for example, where it has proven results for individual and society alike.

You personally don't demonise a woman for just using her wits to get a good life, but you do regularly denigrate beautiful women using their looks denigrate - as if one road were better than another.

I just smell a bit of hypocrisy that's all.

What most people are found to find most attractive are intelligence and kindness actually and the most successful people are found not to be the kindest.

People make trade offs depending on what they value most.

Rhymenocerous I find your argument confusing.

I agree with her and therefore believe her to speak sense.

I agree with her about the following:

1. Market forces (to some extent driven by cultural values) determine which occupations which are well-paid and which are not.
2. It would never occur to me to be envious of someone who had made a lot of money (although at the same time I do believe in a system in which the State tries to ensure an even distribution of wealth among the less well-off)
3. We all have ways of making money and should put our talents to good use.

My main objections to this whole sorry tale are that women have no moral entitlement to an ex-husband's income or assets (saving a situation in which she has contributed to his income or assets). Once divorced I think a woman ought to support herself, I can see no reason why any self-respecting woman would not. Provision for children is different, and should ideally be 50-50, unless one parent is providing full-time care and is thereby prevented from working to earn money.

Easy peasy.

This all applies the other way round, too.

Hmmmn, what about in the case of my friend's mother, whose husband walked out on her unexpectedly after 25 years of marriage. She'd never worked, but been a SAHM, and supported his career the whole time. What was she supposed to do, nearing 50 with little or no entitlement to his pension etc..
Well, to her credit, she went out and established herself as a music teacher (obviously was qualified to do so) and has made a very comfortable living for herself. But, had she not had that up her sleeve, what would she have done? So, I think there are exceptions, namely generational ones. Our mothers' generation had it differently.......

Well I'm arguing from a broader argument, not just what Xenia says in this thread - we know each other of old, so you much forgive me if some of this thinsg I am referring to encopas other threads that we (Xena and I) have discussed things on.

1. I am not challenging this
2. (1st clause) is difficlut to take on face value - we are all evious, that's what drives capitalism, we want what we think everyone else has. The second part is somehting that Xenia does not subscribe to. I know this from past experience. 3)again, no problem.

Easy peasy? How do you seperate what is provision for a child from that of his mother I ask you? The childs happiness is very much dependednt on their mothers.

I dont' care about Mills - she might well be a crack pot, but the enjimty directed at her on threads like this is just shocking - its a feeding frenzy. It just makes me go that's all. I'm interetsted in what feeds it.

After all the nasty things said on here about Mills, I don;t see why that would especially get peoples back up.

Well Clam, in the very sad story of your friend's mother, for me that would come under where I said "saving a situation in which she has contributed to his income or assets" - clearly if she has spent 25 years supporting his career or looking after their children in order to enable him to work, that is very different from a four-year marriage in which no career sacrifice was made by the mother for the sake of the children or father's career.

Rhymen, obviously I don't know about previous discussions between yourself and Xenia.

1. We agree

(a) I do not agree one little bit. I do not work to make money to be like rich friends or slebs. I work to fulfil myself, provide for my child (soon two!!) and to have the life I want. (b) I am absolutely committed to an essentially socialist state and I don't find this incompatible - I don't benefit (directly, financially) from a welfare state, but we all as human beings benefit indirectly from it and those in need benefit directly and financially, which is as it should be.

1. We agree.

To be honest I'm not that pushed about HM and I don't hate her, etc etc, but I do feel it has raised issues which for me are deeply feminist and need a good shaking out. What you call the feeding frenzy is highly unpleasant in brings out the worst in all of us.

Okay.

And I was channeling a bit of Custy

Call me Rhyme, as in;
"I'm the Rhymenocerous,
my lyrics are bottomless"

Still waiting for the Hiphopapotamous to show up

What, no fisticuffs??!!

Nah

I'm a lover not a fighter

Post-lobotomy Monkeytrousers

Aaaahhhh.

The mist lifts.

No, I think we should use all the talents we're born with and we live in a particular society so it's a bit silly to say I'll shave off my head and put on 4 stone so I'm not using looks. But I do think women tend to be happier making their own money than getting a man's because of how they look.

"pretty equates to stupid" - absolutely not. I was in Mensa and am reasonably bright and I'm quite pretty too - loaded with all these natural advantages, aren't I, such is the unfairness of the lottery of our genetic birth... laughing as I type - I do of course have many flaws too which I am sure dilute the advantages.

I'm sorry Xenia, but I can't think of anyone who actually had all those things wouldn't also have a hint of humility about it too.

I just don't buy it.

i would love £24m but equally i would hate to be voted "most annoying person of 2007" and "top ten most hated people" as HMM

"But I do think women tend to be happier making their own money than getting a man's because of how they look."
those aren't the only two options though Xenia, are they?

i think xenia right, i would rather feel good about making £24m - like writing a really good song or being a business succes rather than marrying/divorcing some rich codger

Well feeling good is an emotion - thjinking you would feel good about it is an opinion.

You never know unless you are actually feeling it.

..and of course Harpsi is right ? things in reality are never that simple. They are only made to look that simple in order (on this thread for example) to make people feel better about their own decisions - which just smacks of insecurity anyway.

Not that there?s anything wrong with insecurity ? except when you pretend you don?t have any, but then harshly judge others whose only crime is to have made different decisions to you, kind of says the opposite to me.