Letters: Worried sick

Groundless worries dispelled by a real disaster

At the end of last year I went to my (very helpful) GP suffering with anxiety, and she put me on a short course of beta-blockers, followed by regular check-ups. My main symptoms were exactly as described in Celia Dodd's article "Worried sick" (21 April), particularly a constant, nagging fear that something terrible would happen to my loved ones. I've always suffered these worries, but excess stress sent them out of control, leading to palpitations and insomnia.

Then, this February, the expected happened – my brother died, aged just 34, from complications of pneumonia. He had been the person I worried about the least. He didn't drink, smoke, or drive, he lived in a quiet cul-de-sac, worked from home and spent most evenings with his wife and three children, so I had very little to focus my worries on. He was a genuinely wonderful person, and his loss is a catastrophic one.

But an unexpected side-effect of grief, one which I hope might help other sufferers, has been that my anxiety has disappeared. Partly, it's because I've discovered first-hand that worrying can't stop bad things happening to the people you love. But more importantly, it's because I've realised that my main worry – the one that hid behind fears of stabbings and cancer and car crashes – was that I wouldn't ever be able to survive a tragedy, when in fact the opposite seems to have been true. As a family we are still reeling, but we're still here.

I would advise sufferers of anxiety to believe in their own strength, to realise that yes, terrible things do happen, but it is possible to survive them, and to make sure that they spend more time with their families than worrying about them.

R Mullender

Lodon W1

Weak government needs tough police

To continue to govern without principles, New Labour has bowed to popular opinion during its 10 years in power. But governments have to take hard decisions, such as choosing how we are to produce electricity.

Building wind farms has high carbon-dioxide costs, and has to be backed up by other ways of generating electricity during the time when the wind does not blow. Coal produces carbon dioxide; we have delayed too long in developing carbon capture. Nuclear power is widely demonised and feared, though France and Japan have safely relied on it. We have left it too long to get energy from the tides: imagine the howl when the Severn Barrage is built.

In response to this dilemma, New Labour has curtailed the right of protest so as to overcome the inevitable public demonstrations against whatever form of electricity generation is chosen. To curb these, the highly trained police Territorial Support Group is now giving us a taste of what will happen to those who attempt to resist. Knocking a paper seller to the ground, slapping a woman with the back of a glove, not wearing identifying numbers – these are just a few of the dangers of populist government.

Dr Martin Rosendaal

London NW5

In the 1980s I spent a considerable amount of my time as a solicitor in the local magistrates' court, both defending and prosecuting. I came to know fairly well a number of police officers of all ranks.

During the miners' strike of 1984 one police constable in particular would rub his hands in glee at the thought of the massive overtime payments he would receive for policing the miners, while also being able to bash a miner with his baton without the fear of retaliation or retribution. It seems to me that over the intervening 25 years some policemen both of low and high rank have not learnt the lessons of the miners' strike.

P A D Richardson

Leighton Buzzard, Bedfordshire

The press coverage of the policing of the G20 meeting, including your own, appears to be very one-sided.

I fully accept that if the police break the law they should face the legal consequences, but it needs to be borne in mind that the police officers had no choice but to be where they were. The demonstrators all had a choice as to whether they attended or not, and, in the light of the press coverage of the potential for violence before the event, cannot claim that they expected a peaceful event.

If the police had done nothing and the demonstrators had achieved their objective of invading and destroying the financial institutions in the City they would have been pilloried by the media, including no doubt The Independent.

Peter Kilburn

Pontefract, West Yorkshire

While there must be an absolute right for people to assemble in an open space and express their views, they cannot be permitted to disrupt the lives of those people who do not share their opinions. Protesters cannot expect to prevent people from going to work, boarding aircraft, or simply using electricity generated in power stations using coal or nuclear energy. Protesters who seek to impose their views on others must expect to be treated as criminals and accept the consequences of their actions.

Martin Copsey

Peterborough

I wonder how long it will be before this ultra-repressive Labour government considers the banning of mobile phones that take still pictures or live video?

The state may have 2 million closed circuit TV cameras watching us, but there are probably in excess of 20 million cameras with the potential of watching the state and its representatives.

Tim Francis

St Leonards-on-Sea, East Sussex

Very British way of preventing leaks

Your report "Raids on 'bomb plotters' fail to unearth explosives" (10 April) misled your readers by saying that it was the Ministry of Defence that issued a "D-Notice" concerning the "Bob Quick photograph".

The body responsible for issuing D-Notices – more accurately Defence Advisory (DA) Notices and related guidance – is the independent joint government/media Defence Press and Broadcasting Advisory Committee. The DPBAC oversees an entirely voluntary compact based on five standing DA Notices which define the core issues of UK national security.

This unique and very British arrangement is based on the premise that while editors retain ultimate authority to decide what is printed or broadcast, a system of guidance is needed to help them avoid inadvertently disclosing information that would damage UK national security. Although the DA Notice system is unsupported by any form of sanction (legal or otherwise) it nevertheless works well because both government and media recognise that national security is an issue of critical importance to everyone. The "Bob Quick" affair clearly demonstrated its usefulness.

Andrew Vallance, Air Vice-Marshal

Secretary, Defence Press and Broadcasting Advisory Committee, London WC2

There is only one of them

Guy Keleny (Errors and Omissions, 18 April) seems to think that the use of "they", "them" and "their" with reference to a single person of unknown gender is a recent phenomenon. However, I'm sure that my primary-school teacher taught me this was the correct usage nearly 50 years ago. A few years ago, I was discussing this with some friends, and several of us remember this to be the case, mainly those of us who went to school in Scotland or the north or England, so it may be a regional variation.

The Oxford English Dictionary has this example from 1526: "Yf a psalme scape ony person, or a lesson, or else yt they omyt one verse or twayne."

Paul Dormer

Guildford

Abiding legacy of a much-loved hymn

As another "Brixham dab" in exile, I would like to add to the comments of Nigel Harris (letter, 18 April).

The bells of H F Lyte's church in the town used to play the tune of "Abide With Me" every evening at 8pm, and the fishermen's choir at the annual Harvest of the Sea service traditionally signed off with the same tune while the congregation were leaving the church. The words are, in fact, a swan song of the vicar, having been composed after he had taken his last service before retiring to the south of France, where he died soon afterwards from tuberculosis.

Jim Snell

Chippenham, Wiltshire

Arabs in Israel face apartheid

Israel and the situation in the region is a constant vortex of spin, and the truth is not helped by the President of Iran's inaccurate grasp of history. The sources of modern Israel's existence can be traced to Russian anti-Semitism and the rise of nationalism in the 19th century.

But what must be clear to anyone who has spent time in the Arab areas of Israel is that there is a clear system of apartheid. Arabs are discriminated against in terms of housing, education and healthcare as well as opportunities after education.

For anyone to ignore this is to ignore one factor which will do great harm to Israel: and any lover of Israel needs to seek for Israel as a state to be a more pluralist society.

The Revd Stephen Griffith

Woking, Surrey

No wonder Durban II was boycotted by Israel and the USA. No wonder the British delegate led out a flock of others after hearing (but obviously not listening to) Ahmedinejad.

As my mother used to say whenever she rebuked me: the truth hurts. The simple truth in this case being that the Palestinian people have, with the help of colonialist Britain initially, been made to pay the price of crimes against the Jewish people. When will the world understand that two wrongs do not make a right?

Elizabeth Morley

Aberystwyth

Perhaps the BBC Trust should study President Ahmedinejad's text at the UN conference and learn to appreciate the accuracy and restraint of Jeremy Bowen's reporting?

Colin V Smith

Rainford, Merseyside

Jeremy Sharman (Letters, 18 April) does nothing but repeat Zionist propaganda when he intimates that the Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza settlements was some sort of concession. The abandonment of these settlements was not a concession or even part of the peace process but, as Ariel Sharon said at the time, a disengagement from the peace process.

To understand the thinking behind such a move one only has to read the teachings of Chief Rabbi Kook (1865-1935), one of the leading figures in combining religious and political Zionism. Kook often stated that to achieve the aims of Zionism, those outposts (settlements) which prove not to be viable should be abandoned to strengthen those that are (West Bank).

Michael W Cook

Soulbury, Buckinghamshire

Briefly...

Foreign saints

I expect that we English will be subjected to the usual "but St George wasn't English" comments this St George's Day. St Patrick wasn't Irish and St Andrew wasn't Scottish, but that doesn't seem to be a problem.

Derek Marshall

Romsey, Hampshire

Out of tune

Well done to Helen Widgery (letter, 16 April) for the excellent case she makes against loud background music in museums and other public places. Radio and television producers, too, need to take note of the intense irritation caused to many by the fashion for backing speech programmes with snatches of "music". Some of BBC Radio 4's trailers are incomprehensible now that they are backed by such cacophonies.

Shirley Leuw

Stanmore, Middlesex

Iraqi mystery

While reading John Rentoul's article (16 April), in which he says, "Never mind allegations that Blair or his people lied about the case for military action, which they did not," I found myself momentarily transported to an alternative universe. May I politely request that John Rentoul take a deep breath, and hold it just until Iraq's weapons of mass destruction are located?

J Samuel

Reading

Stay and fight

As a Labour Party member I respect and share many of the concerns of Alice Mahon, but I feel she should have stayed and fought for what so many of us believe in. All she has done in resigning is get newspaper headlines which are fuel to the Tories. We need to take back the Labour Party from the clique that hijacked it. The alternative is a Tory government, and that is a truly horrible prospect which none of us should be helping to bring about.

Chris Gale

Chippenham, Wiltshire

Lost her sheep

Mary Dejevsky (18 April) won't be alone in missing the "distinctive sight of sheep . . . crowding the green slopes of the South Downs" as she emerges from the Channel tunnel on the Kent side. They will be on the North Downs.

Rod Daunton

Wingham, Kent