I could not possibly support the idea of everyone doing the survey. (a) It is a badly designed, highly biased survey that lacks credibility, for the sorts of reasons that Judy Redman has spelled out. Also, there is no control over how the survey is administered, what people are told about the meaning and significance of the questions, what pressure they will experience to answer it in particular ways, who will answer it, how RA will ensure that only UCA members answer it, or how they will ensure that people do not answer it multiple times. (b) It is harmful to participants, because it fails to give adequate information about the current situation in the church and reinforces fears already aroused by misinformation, it is harmful to gay and lesbian church members by implying that they are highly questionable people, and it is harmful to the church, because it is intended to be encourage anger and hostility rather than providing education and reflection. Research should not harm people, individually or collectively. This will. If an academic wanted to run this survey, s/he would have to take it to a human research ethics committee, which would require that it meets technical standards for research in the discipline and would then consider its impact on people and society and any other relevant ethical concerns. I would fail this survey in both areas. We should not be supporting incompetent and unethical research. Ann (Rev. Dr.) Ann Wansbrough UnitingCare NSW.ACT PO Box A 2178 Sydney South 1235 Phone (61) (02) 8267 4280 Fax (61) (02) 9267 4842 Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
----- Original Message ----- From: "darren wright" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "Tom Stuart" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Monday, October 27, 2003 5:30 PM Subject: RE: EMU / Reforming Alliance > it comes to my attention then that instead of just disallowing the "survey" perhaps everyone should do it and really give a > representatives view back to the survey makers. > > ministers should take this, discuss it and then have it filled in. > > perhaps by not filling it in people are boosting the percentages of responses that the aliance wants. > > cheers > > darren ------------------------------------------------------ - You are subscribed to the mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] - To unsubscribe, email [EMAIL PROTECTED] and put in the message body 'unsubscribe insights-l' (ell, not one (1)) See: http://nsw.uca.org.au/insights-l-information.htm ------------------------------------------------------
