The People of the Abyss

[Ally]

Harry,

The article focused on the plight of the poor, not on an individual doss house. So why would it be named? By your pitiful reasoning skills, there were no doss houses, and the poor didn't sleep on benches either.

Why? Here:

http://www.casebook.org/press_reports/pall_mall_gazette/18881115.html

Read this account of a homeless shelter, written up in the pall mall. Is there an address? Is it named? No. So by your reasoning, this didn't exist and the women spent all night standing up outside not sleeping on benches.

And your idiotic attempt to compare people who would pay to spend money sleeping on a rope IF THEY HAD OTHER OPTIONS to people making a choice to sleep over a rope if that's the only option they had is yet further example of your fervent BELIEF that it didn't happen, which isn't going to be swayed by logic.

So now the only point of being on this thread is not to convince you, because really, it's not going to happen, but merely point out, over and over, how flawed and shoddy your logic and mental acuity is.

And thanks for admitting you lied and slandered a book you hadn't read for your own agenda. Quite the devoted true believer you are willing to do whatever oily thing to promote your cause despite the evidence. Says it all doesn't it?

And since you ask. No I have never lied about someone else to get people stirred up about something I knew was false. That's the tactic of conmen. I find it rather despicable.

[The Good Michael]

Ally,

How do you know there were people in the East End? Were YOU there?


Mike

[Ally]

Cheyah...the idea of people sleeping draped over a rope...CRAZY!!






From www.sleepingchinese.com

"Whenever I linger through the boomtown Shanghai, I carry my snap shot camera with me. Because at every corner you can discover people that either are napping in the strangest positions and situations, or are even snoring, while sunk in a deep sleep. Noteworthy are the missing mattresses and pillows!""

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/3233820/Chinese-show-the-art-of-extreme-napping.html

Go and take a look at some of the snapshots of hard sleepers if you even want to think about arguing that people can't sleep in some of the weirdest positions imaginable if they need to. There are pictures of people sleeping while STANDING.



And just because I found it amusing...


"What is more, the human being's ability to sleep in virtually any circumstances is well documented in history. The phrase 'hangover' does not come from some alcohol-related source but from the bedtime tradition in Victorian workhouses. Workers lined up along a bench and a rope was tied from one end to the other, allowing them to sleep by draping their arms over the rope which they 'hung over' as it supported them."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2006/apr/09/health.healthandwellbeing

[Ally]

We've got the rope thing all wrong...this was how they actually did it...

[Robert]

Rope-sleeping somnambulist funambulist.

[Robert]

Irish Times November 6th 1954.

[smezenen]

replace the back of the bench in this picture with a rope and it would be much like what i have read in the liturature.

[harry]

Of course none of the above photos show a rope and length of time spent sleeping slumped over one,in a doss house.A pitiful attempt posters,I know its April 1st,but it is a long way from proving people in 1888 slept that way in doss houses,for hours at a time,night after night.The 1954 paper proves nothing either,its just another claim."It is said',those words speak volumes,emphasising everything I have claimed.It didn't say,'it is proven'.That would have been something.Now to the contempory newspapers.Which papers and where in the papers is a mention of the sleeping practice of slumped over a rope.Show the relevant page,either on the boards or in an email to me.I ask nothing more than has been asked of me.I did make claims of what was said in a certain paper,and provided proof.A certain well respected poster can vouch for that.So come on,put up or shut up.Do the same,no more of your lies.I know there is an excuse for Ally,she was born with a deformity,but what of the rest of you.Do you not know the difference between a claim and proving a claim?
I am only interested in one position,Ally.Slumped over a rope for hours on end,sleeping,so it's you who is now straying from the topic.And despite what some posters are insinuating,that is the only subject I differ on.

[truebluedub]

Harry,
The article Robert posted clearly uses it being said in relation to the practice going on at that location, not the practice itself. Note the relevant sentence:
"Such an establishment was said to have existed in Castle Street, Belfast".

Given the date of 1954 older people at the time would have been able to remember that the twopenny hangover happened at this place, without there being benches with ropes attached available for inspection. Considering the social structure of 19th century Belfast it is unlikely many of the inhabitants would have had cameras to take photographic proof, and the fact that the concerns in Ireland were around religiosity not class meant that people who could afford cameras were not taking images relevant to class. So the Irish Times could only say it was said.

It should also be remembered that a picture itself will not present a fact. When I'm writing papers or teaching visual methods (I love semiotics) I emphasise this. They are easily manipulated and can be used to hide evidence, such as what goes on behind the cameraman/photographer. Take this from Howard Becker's work for example: http://home.earthlink.net/~hsbecker/.../evidence.html

Chris Lowe

[Brenda]

I don't think the proof that Harry wants is going to be found on the internet. That one is a "hit the library and search old books" proposition. Who has time for that???

[Ally]

[QUOTE=harry;77813]

Of course none of the above photos show a rope and length of time spent sleeping slumped over one,in a doss house.

of course your pathetic and lame attempt to continue to argue somethign you know you've been beaten on is pitiful as well. The object is not important. What is important is the sleeping position. If it can be done on handlebars, a fence, a post a railing it can be done on rope. It's the position that matters, not the object. And by your increasingly poor reasoning skills, by the logic you display above, then an actual photograph of people sleeping on ropes in the 19th century wouldn't convince you either because there is no way of proving they were in a doss house, or how long they slept or even if they were asleep in the photo and not just resting.

Harry, the longer this goes on, the more irrational you look. It's nice to know that there are people who don't mind looking ridiculous for the amusement of others, and I thank you wholeheartedly for volunteering.

Now to the contempory newspapers.Which papers and where in the papers is a mention of the sleeping practice of slumped over a rope.Show the relevant page,either on the boards or in an email to me.

Are you doddering or just senile? Page 2 of this thread Robert provided you with contemporary newspaper accounts of doss houses in america where the practice was described in detail and the doss houses were named. And I linked a newspaper article from the time in ENGLAND where the practice was described. You have already been given contemporary explicit newspaper descriptions. You are just arguing from stupidity at this point. I suggest you get checked for alzheimers'. No kidding. Forgetting what you've already been shown and told doesn't bode well. I've seen it before in my grandmother.

[perrymason]

Not that it champions historical accuracy or anything like it, the movie From Hell showed a scene where all the Canonicals are on a bench in a doss house...(as I said, accuracy wasnt the goal).... in the basement I think, sleeping sitting up with a rope across them as a pseudo seatbelt, holding them upright somewhat. When the manager unties the rope they tumble forward.

Is this the type of arrangement that is being discussed?

Best regards all.

[Ally]

I would just like to point out a photo has been located that shows men sleeping over a rope who could not afford a bed. It's from Germany, it's a couple of decades later, but I think it fairly much kills any rational person's argument that the poor didn't pay to sleep on a rope.

http://forum.casebook.org/showthread.php?p=79181&posted=1#post79181

[Jon Guy]

It's from Germany, it's a couple of decades later, but I think it fairly much kills any rational person's argument that the poor didn't pay to sleep on a rope.

..might be a somnambulistic tug-of-war competition...

[WARSPITE]

Ive just read People Of The Abyss for the first time. Great photos,amazing insight,only wish he could have made more references to specific streets/places where he was.