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Tuesday, 31 March 2009

March with MandM

March Monthly Review March was a busy month for us; we had dipped in output through December and January following my surgery, and February was kind of the acceleration month where we regained speed, but this month was as close to top gear as we can realistically get given we have 4 kids, I am permanently injured, we are studying and working, etc.

This month we have had about 4,000 unique visitors and we have gained and held a United States traffic rank on Alexa of around 10% through a couple of US sites picking up our site and publishing a few of our posts. We also have a decent following developing in the UK, Canada, Australia and the Barbados.

Our most popular posts for the month, in terms of traffic and search engine terms were:

Some Thoughts on Human Embryonic Stem-cell Research
Matt unpacked and ripped apart the most pervasive popular argument utilised by the media to advance the stem cell issue. In the ensuing discussion we got onto complexities around the twinning argument and Baylor University's Alexander Pruss and Matt entered into dialogue in Marquis, Pruss and the Twinning Argument.

Baby Abandoned in Airport Rubbish Bin, Sexist Responses Underway
I highlighted the inconsistency in the approach of media and society when faced with child abandonment cases contrasting the media response when a woman puts her child in danger with the example of a man doing the same thing. This post was also published on Pro Life Blogs.

Three Strikes: Proportion and Protection
I explored the controversy and confusion that had arisen in the wake of the Attorney General's report on the Three Strikes Bill and its potential to conflict with the Human Rights Act on the grounds of disproportionality of sentence. I argued that the issue need not be confused and that it is mistaken to apply the proportionality doctrine to the Three Strikes Bill. This post has been accepted for publication in Lex, the Auckland University Student Law Journal.

The Catholic Church, Excommunication and Abortion for Child Rape
I called for rationality and non-emotivenesss to assess the controversial case of the Catholic church's moves against the mother of a 9 year old whose child was aborted following rape by her stepfather. I pointed out that despite our revulsion at the crime committed against the child, this was no justification to turn out brains off and react in a knee-jerk fashion.

An Eye for an Eye and Turning the Other Cheek
Matt explored the Lex Talionis, the part of Exodus where an eye for an eye is called for, and contrasted it with the New Testament command to turn the other cheek. In his juxtaposition he looked at David Brink's work and explained the meaning of both texts and how they worked together.

Tooley, The Euthyphro Objection and Divine Commands: Part I and Part II
Matt revisited the divine command theory of ethics, specifically looking at the Euthyphro objection and Michael Tooley's response to William Lane Craig.

St Patrick's Day: A Protestants' Musings
I examined what the appeal of St Patrick's day might be to Protestants and found that what little history can tell us of Patrick is very fascinating indeed and that as Patrick was a pre-reformation Christian missionary, 'both sides' get to claim him.

Twitter Updates on David Bain Trial?
This was actually our most read post but I listed it last because we only wrote it to register our disgust at blow by blow reporting of high profile criminal cases.

Personally it has been a good month for us. Our 16 year old daughter began University having been home educated - a bit of a moment! Both of us began/resumed tertiary study. Our 14 year old son was offered the chance to sit NCEA a year early and one of his You Tube animations was picked up by the band whose song he had animated. I continue to recover at a snail's pace despite the news that I may need more surgery - recovering at any pace is all good! We launched Thinking Matters Auckland; we have the best Alexa stats and traffic we have ever had and on April 16 we will finally be on an even Technorati playing field with every other blog we are ranked against as it will have been 6 months since we went to our own domain - March's blog rankings will be the last where we are not being measured to our full potential against everyone else. Oh, and Matt had a decent job offer-discussion-thingy, it is not stitched up but it is looking hopeful!

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