tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10878630062864738102024-03-06T11:37:36.386+11:00head vs desk(an experiment in procrastination)james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.comBlogger179125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1087863006286473810.post-66006324861549193252016-02-23T12:13:00.001+11:002016-02-23T16:03:46.967+11:00"When the polls go down, the vileness goes up."<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">It’s been a while (over a year, in fact) since I’ve added anything to this so-called blog, but this morning I watched the video linked below and felt the need to respond.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">The simple response is this: “Yes! This! What Adam Bandt said!”</span></div>
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<span class="s1">A more considered response is this: </span>I have a grudging respect for John Howard, not because I agreed with his policies or cheered when he led us into a complex, deadly and endless war in the Middle East, but because of a political shrewdness that allowed him to hold the top job for eleven years. The very best example of this shrewdness came during the “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Children_Overboard_affair" target="_blank">children overboard</a>" affair of October, 2001, when Peter Reith and John Howard, in the lead-up to a tight federal election, alleged that asylum seekers on boats had threatened to throw their children overboard in order to secure safe passage to Australia. This very quickly spiralled into reports that the asylum seekers had done precisely that. However, when it emerged that this was untrue, John Howard showed what a clever politician he really was by saying, “I never said that those people threw their children overboard – I simply asked if we as Australians would want to welcome the kinds of people who <i>would</i> throw their kids overboard.” Back covered, bullets dodged, election victory secured.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">From Fairfax Media.</td></tr>
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<span class="s1">And now Peter Dutton, a man with all the political acumen, nous and dexterity of a fifth-grade debating alternate, suggests that some babies and children in our camps on Manus Island and Nauru might follow Baby Asha’s case and turn to self-harm in an effort to get to Australia via the world-class socialised health system that others in his party are concurrently trying to weaken. But not content with suggesting the absurd, he went on to suggest the outrageous and despicable – that Baby Asha’s mother might have deliberately thrown boiling water on her baby in order to circumvent the harsh no-settlement-for-boat-people policy shamefully adopted by both major parties. Refugee advocates have told us that the mother was repeatedly asked whether she had been "coached" by advocates to burn Asha. </span></div>
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There are two things I need to say about this. First, to even make such a suggestion is disgraceful, even with the convenient Howard-Reith “I was speaking in hypotheticals” caveat that is certain to come. All I can hope is that when Dutton’s statement is related back to Asha’s mother, some of the disgusting innuendo is lost in translation, just for her sake. Second, if it were to emerge that parents were harming their kids in order to get them into Australian hospitals, as unlikely as that might be, I would hope that rather than allowing that to be seen as some kind of xenophobic reflection on their worth as people and parents, we might recognise it as a symptom of the absolute desperation of these men, women, children and babies held in prison for a period without an end in sight. But to be completely clear, I would be very surprised if this turned out to be the case.<span class="s1"></span></div>
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It was infuriating to hear Dutton say yesterday that refugee advocates have used the Baby Asha case to “raise their own media profile, which is disgraceful”. No, what is disgraceful is finding a way to turn this thing around to reflect badly on the good and kind people who are standing up in representation of voiceless people. And speaking of voiceless, it was revealed three nights ago that Asha's mother was not allowed to make or receive phone calls or meet advocates, on the orders of Serco staff. To put it another way, the distraught and frightened parent of a burned infant was treated like a common criminal and denied basic rights of communication, not by police or correctional officers, but by private contractors hired by our government. Just let that sink in.<span class="s1"></span></div>
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<span class="s1">Finally, note the timing – all this is happening just in time for what is sure to be a closely-fought election campaign. As Adam Bandt said, with the L/NP brand of politics, when the polls go down, the vileness goes up.</span></div>
james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1087863006286473810.post-43608401010492712302014-12-27T08:43:00.004+11:002014-12-27T08:54:02.196+11:00Interstellar - movie review<div class="p1">
<a href="http://ia.media-imdb.com/images/M/MV5BMjIxNTU4MzY4MF5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTgwMzM4ODI3MjE@._V1_SX214_AL_.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://ia.media-imdb.com/images/M/MV5BMjIxNTU4MzY4MF5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTgwMzM4ODI3MjE@._V1_SX214_AL_.jpg" /></a>(Spoilers yada yada...)</div>
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Cards down: I don’t know much about quantum physics, black holes, wormholes or how differing gravities affect the way time behaves. I guess I was sick the day we covered all that stuff in Mr Webster’s physics class circa 1985. I certainly don’t know much about the fifth dimension – I have enough of a struggle navigating the three I can experience first-hand.</div>
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But this much I do know: if I were a retired astronaut/the last chance for humanity and had been asked to pilot an against-all-odds lifeboat mission to another part of the universe, and knew that I would really need to understand how wormholes worked, mainly because a crucial part of said mission was piloting a spacecraft through a wormhole, I’d probably ask the eggheads at NASA to explain that stuff to me before I took off. I certainly wouldn’t want to have that stuff explained to me using a pen and a scrap of notepaper mere moments before I gunned the throttle and blasted through said wormhole. You know, because boy scouts.</div>
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So that’s a good concern, I think. Quite reasonable. However, for me this concern is much less of a problem than a symptom of the several much larger problems Christopher Nolan faces in <i>Interstellar</i>.</div>
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But first here’s what I liked.</div>
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Matthew McConaughey. I was never much of a fan, at least until I saw <i>Dallas Buyers Club</i>. I always found him a bit smug. Cocky. Too pretty for his own good. Plus it’s always seemed clear that he’s allergic to whatever they make shirts out of. But it turns out he can actually act. I mean, <i>really</i> act. So that’s something. Yay for epiphany!</div>
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The girl who plays his daughter, Mackenzie Foy; she can act, too, as can Jessica Chastain, who plays his grown-up daughter. Anne Hathaway is never given much to work with in this project, but we know she’s a good actor because... <i>Les Mis</i>? Michael Caine can act as well - it’s just that we don’t get to see it in this performance. ("Do…not…go...gentle…into…eurgh…beeeeeeeeeeeep…” Please.)</div>
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Oh, do you see what’s just happened? I’ve already digressed from the bits I thought were good. Fortunately I don't have much more to say in that vein anyway. The visual exploration of the fourth and fifth dimensions is mind-bending in a good way, the sound editing is dynamic (if a little too loud for the dialogue), Hans Zimmer plays the hell out of that pipe organ, and much of the cinematography is very good, although not to the standard that was set by <i>Gravity</i>. The science is…well, not my bag, as I pointed out at the top, so in that regard I will have to defer to greater minds than mine and stick with what I do know, which is storytelling.</div>
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So these are my main concerns.</div>
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Length. Yes, it’s just too damn long. The pacing around the beginning is all right, but the bit between him learning about the mission, making the decision to go, pissing off his kids and then actually being in space doing the mission is ridiculously rushed. And after than…more slow bits, punctuated by a couple of less-slow bits. Christopher Nolan is a seasoned film-maker, so I’d assume that he should be able to count to three. That is to say, the number of acts most movies need and/or manage to make do with. But if the experience of making <i>Inception</i> taught Nolan nothing else, it should have been that just because you can have the standard number of acts, then have another, doesn’t mean you should, even if you’re the writer, director and producer. But evidently <i>Inception</i> didn’t teach him this at all, because he counts to three then, like Guy Pearce’s character in Nolan’s best film, <i>Memento</i>, forgets where he’s up to and decides to start over. Sidebar: perhaps its the rising price of movie tickets and the resultant fear of a decline in multiplex-style entertainment, but it seems to me that movies seem to be getting longer with no real added benefit to the viewer (<i>American Hustle</i>, <i>Wolf of Wall Street</i> and <i>The Hobbit</i>, I’m looking at you.)</div>
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But it’s not just the amount of film stock Chris Nolan and the other producers allow Chris Nolan to burn through for his own self-indulgence. I question the very premise under which McConaughey’s character Coop finds NASA, which is (apparently) run by a committee in a board room, an old scientist still working on a chalk board, and some teamsters in a concrete silo. In the mountains just near Coop’s inexplicably verdant farm. Undetected by the rest of the world, and accessible by dirt roads. Which (presumably) also serve as the supply route for all the stuff an interstellar lifeboat mission would require. Which is, by any estimation, a <i>lot</i> of stuff, not least of all the ageing Saturn V rocket which, bizarrely, later turns into something vastly more advanced, and capable of getting in and out of the gravitational orbits of roughly earth-sized planets with the ease of a Suzuki Swift delivering pizzas on a Saturday night.</div>
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Perhaps the greatest error in the storytelling of this film isn’t the plot holes (<i>Back to the Future</i> is like Swiss cheese, yet remains completely satisfying) or even the over-arching premise, but that Nolan seems unable to decide which story he’s telling. Is <i>Interstellar</i> a science-fiction adventure/thriller? Then plot holes and pacing are a legitimate worry, as is as the implausibility of the requisite science being explained on a scrap of paper (for instance). Is the film about being forced to choose between family, personal legacy, and the survival of humanity? If that’s the question one really wants to ask, it shouldn’t take almost three hours to answer it. Or is this movie a morality tale that asks that most troubling of questions – what happens if we continue to treat our planet like a frat house during mid-semester break?</div>
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Let’s assume it’s the latter. If <i>Interstellar</i> is intended as a morality tale, it has, at its heart, a disturbing caveat: that if and when science finds an escape clause for humanity's self-destructive narcissism, our social and moral imperative must be to grasp that opportunity as soon as it appears. In other words, don’t miss the lifeboat when it’s being lowered from the sloping deck. But who amongst us wants to be waiting for a mysterious wormhole to be discovered so a committee can send a reluctant corn farmer, a woman who acknowledges her own level of emotional compromise, and a packet of Mr Fothergill’s winter vegetable seed mix to the far reaches of the next galaxy in the hope we can start over?</div>
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Here’s an interesting stat. <i>Interstellar</i> cost almost $165 million to make. In 1979, George Miller made <i>Mad Max</i> for $400,000. Indexed, that would be roughly $1.7 million today. About one hundredth. As two cautionary tales of dystopia borne of environmental neglect and social decay, I know which one made me think twice about the world we hope to leave for our kids.</div>
james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1087863006286473810.post-42138044227503653622014-09-28T17:46:00.000+10:002014-09-30T20:16:53.832+10:00Stop the train, we want to get off.<div class="p1">
It takes no more than a passing interest in history to recognise that Adolf Hitler had a real talent for harnessing public mistrust and dissatisfaction, and using that to cultivate the Nazi brand through the first third of the last century. As a result the so-called ‘War to end all Wars' was followed by an even more devastating global conflict barely two decades later. Or to put that into a timeline with some contemporary context, if the first World War ended when John Howard came to power, the second would be kicking off… oh, about now. </div>
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A brief glimmer of hope shone on Germany during the period between the end of WW1 and WW2. In the 1920s, she shook off some of the deep shame and humiliation of losing the Great War and the pain of reparations and treaties subsequently imposed upon it to enter a period of relative stability known as <i>Goldene Zwanziger</i>, or literally 'The Golden Twenties'. This period lasted from around 1924 to 1929, in which time the economy grew, civil unrest began to settle and, remarkably, Germany started to find her feet.</div>
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But in late 1938 came <i>Kristalnacht </i>- the 'Night of Broken Glass' - during which German paramilitaries and sympathetic civilians destroyed Jewish businesses and homes, killed around one hundred Jews, and arrested thirty thousand Jews who were placed in ‘internment camps'.</div>
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And we know where those actions ultimately led - to the second global war, and the Final Solution, and of course what is now known as the Holocaust, with those ‘internment camps’ rebadged as ‘concentration camps’, ‘extermination camps’ and ‘death camps’.</div>
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So far this is all old news, and mostly common knowledge. Sobering, troubling, even distressing old news, naturally, yet it is somewhat tempered by frequent retelling. Plus there’s the feeling that all of this horror ostensibly took place in the grainy black-and-white of newsreels rather than in the vivid, living colour of HDTV.</div>
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So with that said, here’s a thought to ponder: somewhere between <i>Goldene Zwanziger</i> and <i>Kristalnacht</i>, Germany society was in the same place as Australia finds itself today. </div>
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Too much? In my lefty hysteria, have I overstepped some line? Perhaps, but let me finish.</div>
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Somewhere on the continuum which features peace, recovery and growing prosperity at one end and murderous fascism, summary executions and gas chambers at the other, there must have been a comparable point to the one on which Australia currently stands as a society. Without wanting to attract accusations of hyperbole, it seems clear to many that we’re heading in the wrong direction along that continuum. We’ve found ourselves on the wrong line, and one of the next stations we pull into will be Press Gagging, followed shortly after by Kangaroo Court. We didn’t spend very long at the last station, but the stench of Mandatory Detention is still funking up the carriage. We can’t get into the cabin or the guard’s compartment to raise the alarm, and the emergency brake isn’t working. But we are being told that everything’s under control.</div>
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Many will argue that in young, naive, lackadaisical, larrikin Australia, with our famous ‘fair go for all’ ethos, we don’t need to worry. We’d never let it reach that point, would we? After all, it’s 2014, not 1934! Plus we’ve got all of that history to inform us, and to view as a cautionary tale. It might have happened in another hemisphere, but we’re not idiots. I mean, we can read. And we wouldn’t let that happen <i>here</i>. Not in Australia. No way!</div>
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Ah, complacency, tyranny's best friend.</div>
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One of the quotes doing the rounds on Twitter of late is by one Hermann Goering - you might have heard of him. At the Nuremburg Trials he said the following:</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6TMy3XDRVF07645dhzkxi6uqhWviBnHnLPvIArlEEvyktUf30JntnvcrBM6rnIM8SifeKwsj4yJtkAPP_VGd-OWN3rKxvANF0u0ldI65COwZkRL7Cdwk9l1wHZE9S3ja-SSEDDBdklqs/s1600/goering.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6TMy3XDRVF07645dhzkxi6uqhWviBnHnLPvIArlEEvyktUf30JntnvcrBM6rnIM8SifeKwsj4yJtkAPP_VGd-OWN3rKxvANF0u0ldI65COwZkRL7Cdwk9l1wHZE9S3ja-SSEDDBdklqs/s1600/goering.jpg" height="125" width="200" /></a>"Naturally the common people don't want war: Neither in Russia, nor in England, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country."</blockquote>
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I think it’s rather appropriate that this quote is getting such a run on Twitter in particular. In the world of the early 21st century, social media is playing an increasingly important role in political dissent. This is no less true in Australia. The Marches in March and subsequent associated protests such as the 'Bust the Budget’ rallies all around the country were organised and their details disseminated almost entirely through social media. (Sidebar: It also seems likely that the conservative side of the debate has not embraced these techs as well as the left, judging by the fudged numbers on internet polls and the army of troll-bots that emerge whenever Tony Abbott and Peta Credlin get jumpy. Shhh - don’t tell them that we’re onto ‘em...)</div>
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At this point I feel slightly hesitant in my convictions, since I am mindful of Godwin’s Law which, in one of its forms, states that in any heated internet debate, eventually someone will accuse the other of being a Nazi. Or of being like Hitler. Sometimes it’s as simple as 'You know, this is exactly how Nazi Germany started.' But you get the idea.</div>
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The problem with Godwin’s Law is that by its very nature it can often shame us from making those comparisons. It makes us queasy about drawing those parallels. But here’s something else to think upon: Nazi Germany wasn’t a fictional place, like Westeros or Middle Earth or Narnia. It was real. It <i>happened</i>. Which means there was a time when it <i>was</i> exactly how Nazi Germany started. Which presumably - and tragically - means it could happen again.</div>
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Now that I’ve invoked the dreaded Godwin’s Law, I figure in for a penny, in for a pound. So check this… </div>
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Hitler achieved power by infiltrating the legislature and then, bit by bit, persuading that legislature to change the laws to grant him additional powers and, in the end, ultimate power. He also did what Goerring articulated above - he identified a cultural scapegoat to blame for the parlous state of the nation, and denounced anyone who spoke out against said blame-shifting. Meanwhile he encouraged the people to carry on, go about their normal lives, let him get on with fixing the mess. Hitler cosied up to like-minded leaders of like-minded countries. Driven by braggadocio, he engaged in mission-creep. He almost certainly burnt down the Reichstag and blamed the Communist Party so he could crush the Communist Party with full approval of the people who democratically elected him. And perhaps most relevant to the events of the last week, Hitler controlled information, both in terms of using flagrant propaganda through sympathetic news outlets, and by directly threatening the press. </div>
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A few years ago I visited Dachau, and was surprised (and slightly embarrassed) to learn that that camp was never an extermination camp in the style of Auschwitz, Sobibor and Treblinka. It was initially set up in 1933 to hold political prisoners - journalists, academics, rabble-rousers, union leaders. By 1945, around 3.5 million such prisoners had been locked up in the 1,500 Nazi camps.* </div>
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Of course you can see the comparison I’m making. And it’s an uncomfortable comparison, isn’t it?</div>
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Yet the point does bear consideration, especially in light of George Brandis' recent knee-jerk (or opportunistic, if you prefer) amendments to our surveillance laws. If, on first viewing, the outstanding German film <i>The Lives of Others </i>seemed to be an earnest yet quaint examination of another, simpler time, then I urge you to watch it again without the popcorn. Or if you’re fortunate enough to find yourself in the German capital, visit the Hohenschonhausen Stasi Memorial Centre in the back blocks of old East Berlin. Or, at the very least, read Anna Funder’s <i>Stasiland</i>. Any of these experiences should remind us of what happens when secret police, spy agencies and, by extension, the government overseeing these bodies can watch, report and detain their citizenry with what amounts to impunity. Of course, we are a very long way from <i>Kristalnacht</i>. Except we’re not really. An excellent, savagely beautiful piece by Alex McKinnon over at <a href="http://junkee.com/heres-a-quick-recap-of-all-the-times-australia-treated-muslims-like-complete-garbage-this-week/42244" target="_blank">Junkee</a> lists just a handful of the multiple attacks on unrelated Muslim Australians by non-Muslim Australians in just one week by the press, politicians and, yes, civilian Australians in the wake of the terrible events outside Endeavour Hill police station.</div>
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It can happen again. It shouldn't, but it can. Perhaps the case can be made that Hitler and the Nazis would never have gained the traction they did had Twitter and Facebook been around to help inform and forewarn the people in the absence of a free and balanced media. But that such a case need even be considered should be alarming in itself.</div>
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Earlier, I alluded to a train. I should tidy up that metaphor. This ‘train' isn’t charging along apace. It’s not a runaway train full of passengers holding one another and mouthing silent prayers as they brace for the impact. No, this train has a driver, and he is being very careful to keep it rolling along smoothly. After all, gently rocking trains can have a profoundly soporific effect, and who doesn’t like to snooze on a train? The driver is also being very considerate of his passengers. He’s frequently on the PA, telling us all that he’s got everything under control. </div>
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We’ve all seen the bumper stickers helpfully suggesting that if we don’t like where the train is going, we should get off. And maybe that’s it. Perhaps for those of us who don't like the scenery or the destination, our best choice is to leap bodily from the doors and windows and take our chances ‘out there’. </div>
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Except most of us don’t want to leave the train. Many of us have been on this train all our lives, others joined at an earlier station. This used to be a nice carriage going to a nice place. With each passing day it becomes incumbent on those who can still see out the windows to wake up the rest of the passengers and find that damned emergency brake. Maybe then it won’t be too late to get things back on the right track. </div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="p4">
<span class="s1"> *Yes, you read those <a href="https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Holocaust/cclist.html" target="_blank">numbers</a> correctly.</span></div>
james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1087863006286473810.post-20975357514208112532014-06-30T01:03:00.000+10:002014-06-30T01:07:38.531+10:00Who said anything about fair?<div class="p1">
Last evening, on a social media site, I was part of a debate around the left's collective outrage in response to the government's asylum seeker policy and "we've stopped the boats" claim, a triumphant claim immediately followed by the arrival in Australian waters (we think, since the government won't talk about it) of two boats carrying around two hundred refugees. This was written by one participant in the discussion:</div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span data-reactid=".4b.1:3:1:$comment10152579591487049_10152583110157049:0.0.$right.0.$left.0.0.1:$comment-body.0.0" style="background-color: #fafbfb; color: #4e5665; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11.818181991577148px; line-height: 13.963635444641113px;"><span data-reactid=".4b.1:3:1:$comment10152579591487049_10152583110157049:0.0.$right.0.$left.0.0.1:$comment-body.0.0.$end:0:$0:0">Ok... So to clarify...are we speaking about illegal asylum seekers...eg boat arrivals? If we are I find it interesting that what you are all advocating is an open door immigration policy where right of passage is granted to the highest bidder. After al</span></span><span data-reactid=".4b.1:3:1:$comment10152579591487049_10152583110157049:0.0.$right.0.$left.0.0.1:$comment-body.0.3" style="background-color: #fafbfb; color: #4e5665; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11.818181991577148px; line-height: 13.963635444641113px;"><span data-reactid=".4b.1:3:1:$comment10152579591487049_10152583110157049:0.0.$right.0.$left.0.0.1:$comment-body.0.3.0"><span data-reactid=".4b.1:3:1:$comment10152579591487049_10152583110157049:0.0.$right.0.$left.0.0.1:$comment-body.0.3.0.$end:0:$0:0">l, that is exactly what is happening is it not? Those that can afford it pay for illegal passage to Australia whilst those that can't afford it rot in some cesspool of a refugee camp somewhere while they wait for their spot. Hardly sounds fair to me...</span></span></span></blockquote>
<div class="p1">
First, I don’t know anyone credible who is advocating an "open-door immigration policy". No one - not Labor, not the Greens, not even the asylum seeker advocates I’ve spoken with. What a great many are saying is that the off-shore processing should end, on-shore expedited processing should occur forthwith, and that having unattended kids (or in fact any kids at all) in detention is unacceptable. Now, Labor has disappointed many by not voting against offshore processing, myself included. But you can oppose the govt’s approach without aligning with the ALP’s approach.</div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
The greater concern at this stage is that it seems clear that the government is using the harshness of the conditions under which asylum seekers are detained as a disincentive to seeking asylum. This suggestion seems to be reinforced by the stern tenor of the recently-leaked Scott Morrison video message to detainees on Manus. This is further reinforced by the incidents mentioned above - the kids taken from school, and the detainees at Villawood being moved in the early hours of the morning, clearly to avoid detection and protest from concerned citizens.</div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
Furthermore, we have an Immigration Minister who is saying that unless a person's chances of being tortured or murdered on their return are 50% or higher, they'll be returned, all whilst not telling us anything about the operations being undertaken by our navy in our name, while boats of up to 150 people, down to 20ml of water per person after two weeks at sea, and with sick and vomiting kids on board, basically disappear. In other words, policy and politics trumping kindness and compassion. Not to mention “there are no boats to report” despite several journalists and advocates having actual conversations with people on board those boats. Unless they’re all lying, but this govt is daily proving itself less and less worthy of being believed, so for now (and until proven otherwise) I’m going to throw my hat in with the Fairfax journalists and refugee advocates.</div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
Oh, and meanwhile, we have a prime minister who, in a piece of political sleight-of-hand that would make Howard and Reith proud, is quite happy to draw a loose but clear connection between jihadists and boat arrivals, despite having no evidence of any such link, in the most cynical of dog whistling exercises.</div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
And finally, we have the oft-repeated “all they’re doing is paying Indonesian people smugglers while the real refugees are languishing” line trotted out by Bolt/Devine/Jones etc. Which might have some merit, except that one of the two boats from the weekend originated not in Indonesia, but India, and according to the "passengers" spoken to, no people smugglers were paid. </div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
So is it fair? Of course it’s not fair. No one is saying it’s fair, and no one is saying it’s easy. But when you’re genuinely scared for the life of yourself, and your kids, you’ll do anything. You don’t give a shit about fair. So the onus is on Australia, as the more fortunate party in this drama, to find a way to handle things that doesn’t require punishing people who have done nothing wrong apart from “jump" a non-existent queue, and find a way to get their families to relative safety.</div>
<br />
<div class="p1">
Once again, no one is saying it’s simple, and no one is saying that it’s fair. But do we have to be cruel? Or is that the actual point? Because there must be a better way than that. Doesn’t there? </div>
james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1087863006286473810.post-84536420037255150082014-06-07T00:31:00.000+10:002014-06-07T23:20:19.195+10:00Why I'm not embarrassed to read YA<div class="p1">
So then there’s <a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/books/2014/06/against_ya_adults_should_be_embarrassed_to_read_children_s_books.html" target="_blank">this</a>, an article by Ruth Graham on Slate titled <b>Against YA</b>, with this tagline: <i>Read whatever you want. But you should feel embarrassed when what you’re reading was written for children.</i></div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
I won’t lay out every argument Graham makes – you can go read it for yourself – but suffice to say that the tagline is exactly representative of the rather superior position she takes.</div>
<div class="p3">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
In her article, Graham makes many points with which I take issue, but I’m going to focus the convergent beam of my disagreement upon a couple of her more general points, precisely because that’s what they are – extraordinarily generalised.</div>
<div class="p3">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
As far as I can tell, all books written for adults are about people having affairs. Or people being missionaries. Or about surviving cancer, then not surviving cancer, then saying goodbye to the rest of your family as they watch you fail to survive cancer. Of course this is an absurd claim, and to make such a claim is to make it abundantly clear that I’ve only ever read books about affairs, missionaries and people failing to survive cancer. </div>
<div class="p3">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
This from Graham’s article:</div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Most importantly, [YA] books consistently indulge in the kind of endings that teenagers want to see, but which adult readers ought to reject as far too simple. YA endings are uniformly <i>satisfying</i>, whether that satisfaction comes through weeping or cheering. These endings are emblematic of the fact that the emotional and moral ambiguity of adult fiction—of the real world—is nowhere in evidence in YA fiction. These endings are for readers who prefer things to be wrapped up neatly, our heroes married or dead or happily grasping hands, looking to the future. But wanting endings like this is no more ambitious than only wanting to read books with 'likeable' protagonists.</blockquote>
<div class="p3">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
This is a little like saying that all country music is simplistic and sentimental. One can make a strong case, using myriad examples both prominent and obscure, for precisely this assertion. Except it’s not true. And it can be demonstrated to be untrue by anyone with a more than passing familiarity with country music. </div>
<div class="p3">
<br /></div>
<div class="p5">
<span class="s2">Okay, I think that’s enough of that. That point needn’t be laboured, except to quote Graham from later in her piece:</span></div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
I do not begrudge young adults themselves their renaissance of fiction. I want teenagers and ambitious pre-teens to have as many wonderful books to read as possible, including books about their own lives.</blockquote>
<div class="p5">
To acknowledge the breadth of variety within YA in one breath, but to then generalise so bluntly in the next feels lazy at worse, dishonest at worst. But to then double down by characterising John Green’s juggernaut <i>The Fault In Our Stars </i>as 'a nicely written book for 13-year-olds' as she does is at once arguably true and unarguably narrow. Add to this her suggestion that YA is all about 'escapism, instant gratification and nostalgia' (apparently we “defenders” of YA fiction “admit” this) followed by this quoted line from Jen Doll: 'At its heart, YA aims to be pleasurable'; and you have a wilfully restrictive view of what is not so much a genre as an entire market. Restrictive and, in many, many cases, downright wrong. Demonstrably so.</div>
<div class="p3">
<br /></div>
<div class="p5">
But even that’s not my greater concern. My greater concern is touched on ever so slightly by Graham, when she opines: '<span class="s2">There’s of course no shame in writing about teenagers; think Shakespeare or the Brontë sisters or <span class="s1">Megan Abbott</span>.'</span></div>
<div class="p3">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
I’d go considerably further than that. I would argue that a great many of the books and stories now considered classical mainstays would, if published today, find themselves on display in the young adult section of our bookstores. <i>Wuthering Heights</i>, <i>Pride and Prejudice</i>, <i>Great Expectations</i>, <i>Nicholas Nickelby</i>, <i>Oliver Twist</i>, <i>Tom Sawyer</i> and <i>Huckleberry Finn</i>, and <i>Tess of the d'Urbervilles</i> are all about young people finding their way in the adult world. Finding a place of belonging, if you will, or an identity beyond that of their childhood. <i>Romeo and Juliet</i>, published and premiered today, would be YA. Even the greatest of Shakespeare’s plays, <i>Hamlet</i>, calmly and systematically checks off many of the tropes often associated with the YA 'genre'. We can list them: </div>
<div class="p1">
</div>
<ul><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiP6z06E4K71ACyl0DP3y6ou_TJkzeKaH-li726fIoW3lw6sgB6k6wQtDsB6UR7X9OhByJebCTLUcV7UmajCssBpbqyKItw4EQqZO-_vPE6aKLOZi4GA8YJCaJTYjaAlbk4os_NYVXB9Cc/s1600/hamlet.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiP6z06E4K71ACyl0DP3y6ou_TJkzeKaH-li726fIoW3lw6sgB6k6wQtDsB6UR7X9OhByJebCTLUcV7UmajCssBpbqyKItw4EQqZO-_vPE6aKLOZi4GA8YJCaJTYjaAlbk4os_NYVXB9Cc/s1600/hamlet.jpg" height="320" width="232" /></a>
<li>Hamlet is an “emo”; </li>
<li>his father is dead; </li>
<li>his mother is in a bizarre rebound relationship; </li>
<li>his best friend is so cool that it hurts; </li>
<li>his girlfriend is so crazy she ends up face-down in a pond; </li>
<li>he’s suffering from suicidal ideation; </li>
<li>he’s talking to himself <i>a lot</i>; </li>
<li>and in the end, pretty much everyone dies.</li>
</ul>
<br />
<div class="p1">
So Graham is right – there is no shame in writing about teenagers. As I hope I’ve pointed out, there is a long history of doing just that to be found amongst the work of some fairly handy writers. But even in making that point, I think a greater point is at risk of being missed: that there is no shame in writing <i>as</i> a teenager. And I don't mean teenagers who write, necessarily, but adults who write from the teenaged part of their experience.</div>
<div class="p3">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
You see, while I can’t speak for any one my YA-writing colleagues, writing <i>as</i> a young adult is what I see myself doing. All the time. Finding those stories that resonate so strongly with the fourteen-year-old James that the forty-five-year-old James <i>has</i> to tell them.</div>
<div class="p3">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
If you'll indulge me, let me offer a tiny slice of my own history. I grew up in a missionary family, and every two or three years our parents would announce that we were moving. Friends, relatives, everyone was going to be left behind while we headed off to do our Christian duty. As a result of this, I got to grow up in some fairly remarkable places. But the down-side was a crippled sense of identity. A kind of arrested social development. An itch between my emotional shoulder-blades that even now I sometimes struggle to reach. The only way I’ve found to scratch that itch with any kind of satisfaction is through my writing, so as a result, that 'trauma' (a dramatic word, I know, but it’s the best I’ve got) has also been one of the great blessings of my life. Without it, I wouldn’t be doing this, right now. Writing for a living. And I love this. </div>
<div class="p3">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
Graham, in her Slate piece, says: 'I have no urge to go back and re-read [the books I read as a child], but those books helped turn me into the reader I am today. It’s just that today, I am a different reader.'</div>
<div class="p3">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOiTS7YMQs9-pEM6y9P1oDXe6-htrUcYQ2uSZ7oDEkGEIQnuIW0GAWx_gBnK1_zcz97Yriig_iMvQQXC_31QmvhgrZE3njRyfsS247yZqNbxKY52_qq-ubNFEqwfGAK1pVbouGRb2S0T4/s1600/parttimeindian-jacketpb.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOiTS7YMQs9-pEM6y9P1oDXe6-htrUcYQ2uSZ7oDEkGEIQnuIW0GAWx_gBnK1_zcz97Yriig_iMvQQXC_31QmvhgrZE3njRyfsS247yZqNbxKY52_qq-ubNFEqwfGAK1pVbouGRb2S0T4/s1600/parttimeindian-jacketpb.jpg" height="320" width="210" /></a></div>
<div class="p1">
In response to this, I would say the following: I’m happy for you. I’m happy that the books you read as a young person set you up so neatly for all those 'real' books you now enjoy. But for every 'literary' reader such as yourself, there’s at least one of me. You see, I couldn’t give a tinker’s cuss about someone’s affair, or the search for the code to the identity of the Illuminati, or a glass cathedral floating down a river, or Thomas Cromwell’s rise to power. I'm not saying you shouldn't either – if you want to read about an Indian sweet-maker defying the odds to become a successful businessman, I say fill yer boots! But no, I’m much more interested in a story like that of Arnold in <i>The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian</i> by Sherman Alexie. Because I’m a native American kid from a reservation in Washington State? Of course not. Because I was – and in some ways remain – a kid who, like Arnold, is trying to find my place in the world.</div>
<div class="p3">
<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="p1">
And while I thank you for your concern, I refuse to be embarrassed by that.</div>
james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1087863006286473810.post-91314010825537594122014-05-21T21:40:00.004+10:002014-05-21T22:05:48.133+10:00Dear Mr Abbott...<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">Dear Mr Abbott,</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">I’d like to tell you a story.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">The football commentator Warren Ryan tells the story of a player who marched up to a referee he believed to be biased. ‘What would you do if I called you a cheat?’ he asked.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">‘I’d send you off,’ the referee replied.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">‘What would you do if I thought you were a cheat?’ the player asked.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">‘I can’t do anything about what you think.’</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">‘Then I think you’re a cheat,’ said the player.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">Mr Abbott, we’ve all seen what happens when someone in the press says something nasty about one of your team. Your friend Joe Hockey has just this week filed papers against Fairfax for suggesting that maybe he was selling his influence. Maybe. You know, because of the evidence. It’s a little like the words Joe himself tweeted in July last year to suggest that Kevin Rudd was for sale. What were those words again? Oh yes – <i>Access to Rudd, at a price...FACT.</i></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">But I digress. As I say, we all know what happens when someone criticises you or one of your team. That’s right – you file papers against them. Because, like, it hurts real bad, you know?</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">Right now I’m actually not in the best place financially to defend myself against saying bad stuff about you, Mr Abbott, and with Joe needing the lawyers to get heavy with one of the three independent mainstream media outlets in Australia, I doubt that you want the trouble either. That’s why I’m going to save us both some trouble by not actually calling you anything.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">That’s right. I’m not going to call you a liar, even though I <i>think</i> you are. I think you told everyone one thing before the election but had no intention of following through. I think you and Joe confected this entire ‘budget emergency’ so that you could pursue your long game, which is to help the big end of town get bigger without interference from those pesky peasants. I think you deliberately denigrated the economists here and overseas who tried to tell us that the budget emergency wasn’t. And I think you lied when you told us that John Howard’s poll numbers also fell after his first budget when, in fact, they did the <i>precise opposite</i>. Likewise, I wouldn’t dream of saying that you’re an ideologue, but I do <i>think</i> that. Nor would I say that sometimes invoking Godwin’s Law is exactly the right thing to do.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">Something else I’m not going to say is that you definitely found it funny when that retired lady called you at the radio station and told you that she has to work on a sex line to pay the bills. But I <i>think</i> you found that distressing and degrading story quite funny, mostly because of the smiling, and the guilty look at the camera when you remembered what a camera does, and I think it made you look creepy because I think you’re creepy. I also think you found really odd parts of Joe’s budget funny, because I saw you laughing and grinning during the sad bits, which was most of it. And I think you looked like a petulant jock when Bill Shorten was giving his budget reply speech.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">And Mr Abbott, I wouldn’t dream of saying that you’re definitely a coward for not turning up at Deakin University because you were frightened of the students. But I definitely <i>think</i> you are, just as I also think you don’t give a shit about students or Australia’s higher education system as a whole, or in fact education in general. Again, just to be clear, I’m not saying that you were happy to take your free university education thanks to the reforms brought in by that awful socialist Gough Whitlam (even though you weren't actually an Australian citizen at the time), only to be equally happy to make this generation of students pay more. But I do think you were happy to take your free education, and I think you’re a complete bastard for making it so much harder for young Australians to get educated enough to land a good job and eventually join you in your leafy, beachside electorate. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">Some of the other things I’m not saying about you, (because lawyers), are these: that you’re scared of gay people; that you are either oblivious to or willfully ignorant of the overwhelming evidence in support of the idea that climate change is being caused by people; that you want to undermine state health and education so you can blame the state governments for the inevitable GST hike; that you don’t care all that much for women, indigenous people, asylum seekers or the disabled; and that you keep knocking back invitations to be on Q&A and 7.30 because you’re between skins, and it takes so much time to rub against the corner of the desk before peeling off that last layer. But I do <i>think</i> that all of the above might be true.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">That’s right, Mr Abbott. I wouldn’t dream of saying that you are quite possibly the worst Prime Minister we’ve ever had, a man who is a terrible leader and a gormless, cowardly, hypocritical bully. But be in no doubt that I do <i>think</i> each of those things.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">I also think you should read something other than the Murdoch press, accept that your personal numbers are now unsalvageable, and resign. But you won’t. You definitely won’t. And that much I <i>do</i> know.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">Thank you. I shall waste no time reading your reply.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<br />
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">James Roy</span></div>
james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1087863006286473810.post-80582148363545566572014-05-14T08:55:00.001+10:002014-05-14T08:55:04.006+10:00Mean, mean bastards. This won't be a surprise to anyone who knows me, but today, the day after Joe Hockey's first budget, I'm thoroughly pissed off.<br />
<br />
Why am I so angry? I could provide a long and exhaustive list which includes but is not limited to cuts to the ABC/SBS, the increase in the retirement age, the 6 month freeze-out of Newstart applicants, the smack-down of the arts, and the half a billion dollars cut from important Indigenous programs.<br />
<br />
But in the interests of my own mental health I'm going to limit myself to two of the new tax/levy/surcharge increases.<br />
<br />
So, a thought experiment. Imagine you're a single parent. You have three young kids. You're already finding things to be a bit of a struggle, but you're getting by on your minimum wage. Just. But then one of your kids gets sick. It's nothing life-threatening - just an ear infection - but a visit to the doctor is required.<br />
<br />
Now, I bet you think you know what I'm about to say. An extra $7 to see a doctor, even a bulk-billing one, right?<br />
<br />
I know, it's only seven dollars. It's not really such a big deal, and besides, now you can get in to see a doctor more easily, since the time wasters have been scared away. Sometimes Andrew Bolt does make sense!<br />
<br />
But there's more to this story than finding the price of two coffees in order to get your sick child to a doctor. Because hidden in the less fashionable corners of the 2014 budget is the extra five dollars per PBS script. So that single parent is now up for an additional twelve dollars on top of the cost of those antibiotics. And the ear drops, so that's actually nineteen bucks. Nineteen dollars MORE out of pocket than would have been the case. Chris Bowen is right - this is not what Medicare was set up to be. This is not universal health care. This is a clear and cynical move towards adopting the US health system. Mind you, considering how well it's worked for them... Oh, wait, my mistake - it's been an utter disaster.<br />
<br />
But for the single parent we met earlier, a shift in public health philosophy is the least of their concerns. They're too busy trying to decide what they'll do without so they can get their kid to the doctor and pay for those meds. Unless they hit the local emergency department... Oh, wait, that's being headed off as we speak, with talk of adding the co-payment to emergency department visits.<br />
<br />
This is a real issue, not a fanciful "extreme example". This exact situation is going to be played out many, many times over if this budget passes.<br />
<br />
Now, based on past experiences I fully expect a number of rather strident responses to these, my bleeding heart ravings. If you think you might be tempted to do this, take a hard look at yourself before you post, and ask whether you're responding out of ideology or a place of kindness. If it's the latter, then let's talk. But if it's the former, don't bother. I'm really not in the mood.james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1087863006286473810.post-1678402926448496642014-05-13T18:44:00.001+10:002014-05-13T18:45:11.261+10:00Kylie - a tribute<div class="p1">
This is a tribute to my friend Kylie, who passed away last Friday. She was one of the kindest, coolest, sweetest, toughest people I ever met, and she will be greatly missed.</div>
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I remember meeting Kylie for the first time within my first couple of weeks on Wade Ward, the adolescent unit of the Children’s Hospital at Westmead. Cystic fibrosis kids spent weeks on end on our ward, usually having a “tune-up”, sometimes fighting infections, and all too often spending their last days with us. Over the years, as treatments improved, less kids were passing away at the kids’ hospital, since they were transitioning over to adult care, and having transplants.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Photo of Kylie by Stephanie Kent</td></tr>
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Kylie was cheeky. Tiny and cheeky, and we connected immediately. She had a laugh like an ewok, all giggly and manic, and a quick smile. But she also had toughness and directness like you wouldn’t believe. On more than on one occasion she had to call me into her room to read me the riot act. ‘Listen, I know you’re having a shit night out there,’ she told me one time, pulling her oxygen mask to one side, ‘but at least you can <i>breathe</i>. So why don't you take a breath, shut the f*** up and get on with whatever it is you gotta do, because no matter how bad your shift is, you get to go home in four hours. Now, I’d appreciate it if you’d hand me that magazine on your way out – I’ve got boys to fantasise about.’</div>
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I remember the day I accessed her portacath for the first time. It was high on her chest, next to her collarbone, and as I was doing my thing, her top slipped down. I slid it back up in the interests of modesty, but it slid back down almost straight away. This happened again and again until, sensing my embarrassment, Kylie dead-panned, ‘It’s just a boob, James.’</div>
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We were still laughing about that about a year ago, when I last saw Kylie, all grown up but just as cheeky. We had a few private jokes, Kylie and I. One was more absurd and ridiculous than the others. 'Knock knock,' she’d say.</div>
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'Who’s there?'</div>
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'Fire extinguisher.'</div>
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'Fire extinguisher who?'</div>
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'Stand real still while I hit you with this fire extinguisher.'</div>
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It wasn’t always a fire extinguisher – sometimes it was a chair, or a pot plant, or a medication trolley, or a 'cappa-cheeneo machine' in the worst Texan drawl she could summon. Some nights, in the middle of a hellish shift, she would phone the desk from her room, and when I answered it, she’d just say, ‘Fire extinguisher!’ and hang up. Then I’d hear that crazy cackle from her room down the hall, and it always lifted my mood.</div>
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And you could always bring a smile to Kylie’s face, no matter how much pain she was in, by adding the word ‘wang’ to any other word. The original idea came from a mitchell and Webb sketch, but we stretched the joke to the limits of its usefulness, and far beyond. </div>
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But there was so much more to Kylie than toughness, directness a</div>
nd laughs. She was so incredibly kind. Long after she would have been forgiven for curling up on the couch with a stack of movies, long after her countless post-transplant complications, she was still dragging herself out to speak at events, to support kids with chronic illness, and to improve her counselling and youth work skills. She once told me that since she was one of the last standing from her generation of CF kids, she felt the burden of responsibility to speak on their behalf. It wasn’t always a burden that sat comfortably up her little shoulders, but she accepted it nonetheless.<br />
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A year or two back Kylie asked me for my advice on writing a memoir. ‘I want to tell my story,’ she said, ‘but I don’t know what to write about.’ When I asked her what she meant by that, she said, ‘There’s so much. Should my book be about living with a chronic illness, having transplants and spending most of my life in hospital? Or should it be about my family having to accept that I won’t be around forever? Or should it be about my friends who’ve died, like Rachael and Lisa? Or maybe it should be about Ben. I guess there must be other people like Ben out there who love someone like me. Maybe there’s things that they need to know. All I know is that this book needs to help people.’</div>
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‘Can’t it just be about you?’ I asked. ‘You’ve got quite the story to tell.’</div>
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She just shrugged. ‘I’m just me,’ she said. ‘I’m not that exciting.’</div>
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I disagree, Kylie-wang. I thought you were fascinating.</div>
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____________________</div>
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Cystic Fibrosis Australia can always use more support – please go <a href="https://www.cysticfibrosis.org.au/" target="_blank">here</a> to find out how you can help.</div>
james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1087863006286473810.post-4192322242629125942014-03-30T23:30:00.000+11:002014-03-30T23:30:41.215+11:00"Noah" - a movie review<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihTzMZPLnrSqjdlcx3u3A3ED1jydZ1hCM48B3NGwJPXtcgMQDaIhbTC_x5UPsayrz1Pyt-qaeQi1zOotLYh8Kwx_HXRqKOymXWyvfthvQ8JA8W6IaTzIdws5yJexJeSFYLzw0dgPCxOjs/s1600/web_08_Noah2014Poster.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihTzMZPLnrSqjdlcx3u3A3ED1jydZ1hCM48B3NGwJPXtcgMQDaIhbTC_x5UPsayrz1Pyt-qaeQi1zOotLYh8Kwx_HXRqKOymXWyvfthvQ8JA8W6IaTzIdws5yJexJeSFYLzw0dgPCxOjs/s1600/web_08_Noah2014Poster.jpg" height="400" width="268" /></a></div>
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<span class="s1">(Spoilers - most of the cast dies.)</span></div>
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<span class="s1">The release of Darren Aronofsky's CGI pre-apocalyptic juggernaut raises all manner of interesting questions, not least of all being this: where does this film squeeze into the whole religion/atheism debate? Come to that, does it even need to? Is it so far removed from Biblical accounts of a Great Flood that it is rendered utterly irrelevant in that context?</span></div>
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<span class="s1">It seems likely that the answers to these questions – and how any one individual feels about the movie – will depend in large part on where that individual is positioned on the religion/atheism spectrum. But an even more nuanced question is the effect your personal level of ambivalence will have on your opinion. In other words, do you even <i>care</i> whether this retelling of the Noah’s Ark myth accurately follows the Biblical record (it really doesn’t) or whether it takes such liberties with the implausible story of an old man building a floating zoo in order to preserve the entire animal kingdom that it becomes its own rather silly piece of escapist nonsense (it does). And in the case of the latter, is it made well enough to even fill that brief?</span></div>
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<span class="s1">In a word, no. But more on that in a moment.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">I suspect that one can’t help but bring one’s own understanding of the Noah story to any showing of this movie. If your exposure to this story is predominantly from colouring-in books, birthday cards and Fisher-Price toys, then you’ll possibly see this as the forgettable piece of noisy fluff that it is. But like many raised as devout Christians, I can’t do that. I grew up believing that the creation story, the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve, the talking serpent, and the Great Flood were all literally true and accurately recorded in the Book of Genesis, and as such literally took place within the last six thousand years. I no longer believe those stories, preferring to see them as what they undoubtedly are – one of our earliest attempts to explain the natural world in much the same way that Native Americans and Indigenous Australians constructed their own creation myths. And yet I found myself sitting in a dark cinema becoming increasingly agitated by the ‘inaccuracies’ in the movie. Noah couldn’t have known how to forge steel! His wife wouldn’t have had a home herbal pregnancy test! Methuselah wasn’t a magical hermit! And I’m damn sure that if Noah and his family really built the ark, they’d did it without the assistance of granite-encrusted fallen angels, stomping around the place and reducing the heathens to dust like villains from a Jerry Bruckheimer bad acid nightmare. And corrugated iron? Really? (Yes, I’m completely serious about the corrugated iron.) And steel bear traps. And gunpowder. Besides, the Old Testament clearly states that there were two of each of the ‘unclean’ creatures, but seven of the ‘clean ones’, rather than the traditionally held ‘two-by-two’ scenario. What right do the makers have to take such a liberty? Yes, I did find myself scoffing at these – and many other – gross ‘inaccuracies’. But then I’d pause to remind myself that not only was <i>this</i> version fictitious, but so too was the original.</span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQgd1et6VpScLFvMRmi8TH-rz4EP2zvjipXBt_40SFIrJgQcG5oty6WaVIKqwd9ziMggeHF1JG_D83SMFbxHW3WkkKCpDwMNX5nWLqTVWRqPqY27mdczP78DpcQKTbnjSG9dGAJ-cWsv0/s1600/noah-movie-trailer.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQgd1et6VpScLFvMRmi8TH-rz4EP2zvjipXBt_40SFIrJgQcG5oty6WaVIKqwd9ziMggeHF1JG_D83SMFbxHW3WkkKCpDwMNX5nWLqTVWRqPqY27mdczP78DpcQKTbnjSG9dGAJ-cWsv0/s1600/noah-movie-trailer.jpg" height="160" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"You're gonna need a bigger boat."</td></tr>
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<span class="s1">All that said, the holes in this movie and the lazy, stupidly convenient explanations to many of the glaring narrative questions raised by the original tale are, in my view, ridiculous beyond measure. How <i>did</i> Noah get all those animals to behave themselves on a big shared boat for a year? How did he feed them? Well, it turns out he didn’t have to, since he had knowledge of a special soporific incense to which he and his family were immune, but which could knock out a sizeable cross-section of Africa’s fauna in mere seconds. How did he make fire? Well, he had these little glowing nuggets which, when hit with the handle of a Bowie knife, flared into very useful barbecue heat beads which somehow made damp wood burn instantly. Perhaps most impressive of all was the giant gimbal on which the interior of the ark was presumably fixed. This can be the only possible explanation for external shots showing the vessel being tossed like a cork on tempestuous waters while within the ark we see Noah and his family sitting around the fire, calmly drinking soup from a cup. </span></div>
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And on it goes, with a kind of bizarro-Ockham’s razor taken to most of the social and anthropological questions raised by the original story. Who did the kids mate with once the waters had receded? Each other? Mum? Some of the surplus livestock? Noah’s son Ham, in a poignant confirmation that the middle child syndrome isn’t a new thing, wanders petulantly into the wild yonder, either to die alone or, if the early Mormons are to be believed, to somehow spawn dark-skinned children. Alone.</div>
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<span class="s1">I readily confess that my issues with this retelling are almost certainly due, at least in part, to my deeply ingrained ‘knowledge’ based on a literal reading of Genesis – that God wiped out all of humanity save for the one righteous man. Perversely, after seeing <i>Noah</i> I now have a certain sympathy for the uniformly batty Ray Comfort, who is protesting because of how ‘inaccurate’ this movie is, and how, when the account given in Genesis is read as a literal historical record, the story is rendered almost unrecognisable from the original.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Trying to approach it with the eyes of a a non-believer isn’t much more helpful. Can this movie be viewed as a stand-alone work of apocalyptic fantasy, perhaps a story staged in a parallel universe? If we agree to approach it as a good yarn, a tense drama of one man’s struggle against the forces of evil, of an honourable man torn between love for his family and duty to his God, does <i>Noah</i> stand up? Can we forgive its shortcomings?</span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"Hold the boat! Hold! The! Boat!"</td></tr>
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<span class="s1">In my view we cannot, since most of these shortcomings are anathema to good film-making of any stripe. The pacing and the attention to the chronology of the story is desperately uneven. Characters drift in and out of the narrative with seemingly little connection to one another, and certainly scant underpinning in back-story. The acting is, in some cases, solid enough. Russell Crowe reprises his role from <i>Gladiator</i>, all steely glares, curt responses and makeshift javelins. The kids aren’t bad, and Ray Winstone is, as ever, arresting. But Anthony Hopkins as Methuselah is completely wasted (sometimes literally, it would seem), reduced as he is to a doddery grandfather who spends his twilight years in a kind of DIY bronze-age opium den, able to pull himself together only long enough to hypnotise his great-grandkids to facilitate a private conversation with their father, or to perform healing miracles in the style of Uri Geller. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">Sadly the women miss out on most of what few good lines there are, despite having fairly pivotal roles in the story. Emma Watson, playing Noah’s adopted daughter, seems to have lost all the acting ground she made in the transition from <i>Harry Potter</i> to <i>The Perks of Being a Wallflower</i>, and is back to doing Hermione Granger, but without the range. And Jennifer Connelly as Noah’s wife is given very little to work with, and as such delivers very little. Very little indeed. Repeatedly.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Make no mistake, as pure spectacle this movie has its moments. Watching the entire world engulfed by ‘the waters below’ made the ocean scenes in <i>A Perfect Storm</i> look like ripples in a bath. But that simply highlights one of its greatest flaws; at no point does this feel like a depiction of a <i>global</i> flood. As a hundred or so of the doomed victims cling to the last remaining peak like extras in a medieval chapel fresco, it’s hard not to be underwhelmed. In fact, the flood depicted feels much more like whatever <i>actual</i> event spawned the original myth, probably a prehistoric flash flood that wiped out a village, ultimately leaving nothing but a sad, bedraggled goat stranded on a hillock.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">More than once I wondered if that mightn’t have been the more interesting story.</span></div>
james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1087863006286473810.post-30684512484648737212014-03-13T23:17:00.002+11:002014-03-13T23:17:44.397+11:0012 Years a Slave - film review
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<span class="s1">(This review contains numerous significant spoilers. You have been warned.)</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Some years ago a friend who is a very fine amateur photographer showed me one of his favourite images, of a woodpecker clinging to the trunk of a tree as it pecked away at the bark. He showed me two versions of the same photo. The first - the original - had the tree positioned on the left of the frame, with the bird on the right. The second version was simply reversed, so that the woodpecker was now facing right, hammering away at the dark shape that ran down the right side of the picture. 'The second one is better,' Mark said, quite correctly. By why? Other than being mirrored, the images were identical. 'The tree trunk on the right stops the eye,' he explained. ‘Since we read from left to right, our eye approaches images the same way. The first version allowed the viewer to linger briefly on the bird before "escaping" out the right-hand side of the frame. Reversed, the eye comes into the picture, and is then blocked from leaving by the tree.' Such is the psychology of the visual.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Consider now the poster for 12 Years a Slave. Solomon Northup (Chiwetel Ejiofor), the New York free man kidnapped and thrown into slavery in the deep South, is running. Escaping, presumably, at full sprint. To the left. Back into the arms of the slavers rather than the arms of his family. To present him running to the right would be to offer him freedom, liberation. Hope. To the left lies utter hopelessness and despair.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">This is a review of a film, not a poster. After all, we don't pay our hard-earned to stand in the foyer and admire the artwork. So why the focus on the poster?</span></div>
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<span class="s1">To me, this is simply one sign of the attention to detail the director and producers of this film have shown. Miss-steps? There are few, if any. The sudden jump to Mistress Shaw, a black lady of means we had hitherto not met had me briefly wondering if the projectionist had spooled the wrong reel. (But since 'projectionist' isn't a job any more, that couldn't have been it.) Of course, it wasn't a miss-step at all. On reflection it is jarring in precisely the way it was intended to be. (Read about the screenwriter's take on this <a href="https://www.google.com.au/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CCsQFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.vulture.com%2F2013%2F12%2Fjohn-ridley-12-years-a-slave-toughest-scene-i-wrote.html&ei=OKEhU69IiOuQBcDJgdgP&usg=AFQjCNGAc1oZOGTaZNAhmbbrebZcJA1miQ&sig2=BKqhsmxgZvkJqM7Ue5Gqkg&bvm=bv.62922401,d.dGI" target="_blank">here</a>.)</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Jarring moments are many in this film. Each is good for the way the story is told, most not so good for the characters. The extended scenes of violence, sparing nothing, do not feel like torture porn. Mel Gibson could learn a thing or two from director Steve McQueen about using cruelty and violence in a deeply troubling, 'please make it stop' kind of way, rather than rejoicing in the gore and splitting flesh. In the way it should be used. At no time does the violence in this film feel gratuitous. Excessive, yes, but then, slavery was nothing if not an excessive use of violence.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">In one scene that had me practically hiding behind my hands, Patsey (Lupita Nyong'o), the beautiful, delicate young slave girl and reluctant lover to the slaver owner Epps is being lashed for possessing soap. Egged on by his stony, jealous wife, Epps is determined to lash her to death, to strip the flesh from her back. Except he hasn't the guts to do it himself, so he hands the task to Northup. What follows is one of the hardest things I've ever watched. In the end, as her cries turned to whimpers, I actually found myself hoping that she had died, in much the same way that we hope a badly injured animal will soon breathe its last and feel no more pain. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">'A badly injured animal.' There it is - in one scene McQueen had managed to make me deeply sympathetic to a character, whilst forcing me to adopt some of the distorted psychology that allows the powerful to dehumanise the weak. It's powerful film-making, powerful storytelling, utterly immersing and involving and implicating the viewer.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Equally impressive were the moments of silence, and the moments of confusion. To deal with the first: in one of the brief flashbacks, Northup is in a store in New York, about to spend a far too much on a travel bag for his wife. Another black man, also well dressed, comes into the store, only to be followed in by his master, who apologises to the storekeeper for the 'intrusion'. Off camera, someone says, 'It's no intrusion'. It sounds like Northup, or perhaps it's the storekeeper. The white master's expression suggests it is Northup, but before you've a chance to be certain, the black man has been bustled out and normality returned. And you get on with the story, the 'intrusion' forgotten. And again, we become faintly complicit in the world we are watching.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">One viewer review I read complained about some of the 'long, boring, pointless scenes where nothing much happens.' Perhaps they were referring to the scene where Northup is being hanged, but is then lowered barely enough for his toes to reach the muddy ground below, just to make sure he learns his lesson. Ankles and wrists bound, we watch his toes scrabble for purchase as he dances a silent, desperate dance. Meanwhile his fellow slaves go about their work around him, too terrified of reprisal to cut him down. He hangs like that well into the evening, and we watch for a full five minutes, maybe more, an eternity in cinema-time. Like the lashing of Patsey, it is long, and excruciating to watch, even from a comfortable cinema seat.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">But perhaps the greatest achievement of this film is the way it forces us to re-examine that old question, 'What would I do?' Would I stand up to the SS guard, would I offer sanctuary to the Tutsi refugee being hunted by men with machetes, would I climb into the carriage and ride away to freedom, leaving other black men and women behind to continue to be slaves?</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Of course, that is precisely what Northup does when his chance at liberation comes knocking, and it hits the viewer like a sledgehammer, especially as the last thing we see, just as a blur in the corner of the frame, is Patsey fainting and falling to the ground in front of the plantation house. As we wonder how he can possibly go back to his old life with a clear conscience knowing what he is leaving behind, we remember a scene much earlier in the film, where a friend is liberated at the dock and hurries away without so much as a glance back at a shocked and incredulous Northup.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">The performances in 12 Years a Slave are flawless. Both Ejiofor and Nyong’o were rightly nominated for Academy Awards (Nyong’o won) but equally impressive are Michael Fassbender as Epps, Sarah Paulson as his cold, heartless wife, and Benedict Cumberbatch as the relatively kind slave-owner Ford. But the performance amongst the secondary characters which really stands out is Paul Dano, the vindictive, petty overseer Tibeats. When we first meet him, he sings a chirpy Southern ditty titled 'Run Nigger Run' which, in a sublime piece of editing, goes on to overlay a montage of hard manual labour, gleefully cruel overseers, and a pressed and ironed Cumberbatch presenting a Sunday sermon to his assembled 'property’. The topic of the sermon? The biblical extolment of owning other humans. With the sinister soundtrack of Tibeats’ song, this scene is properly chilling.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">As with so much good cinema, it’s hard to say that this is a movie to enjoy, so much as one to appreciate. If there is a weakness in <i>12 Years a Slave</i>, it is its slightly hamstrung narrative arc, entirely by virtue of being a true story. But if the final scene ends with what feels like something of a cliche, it is rightly followed by an awkward moment as the viewer, along with Solomon Northup, is forced to wonder, ‘What happens now? Does life just go on? Do things go back to normal? And how can they, knowing what we now know?’</span></div>
james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1087863006286473810.post-3221724764852021012014-02-27T20:06:00.004+11:002014-02-27T20:20:14.564+11:00"Hi Pot, this is Kettle" - Miranda Devine screams hypocrisy on behalf of the right<div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.63636302947998px; line-height: 20px;">
This is the original Devine piece in question, from <a href="http://blogs.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/mirandadevine/index.php/dailytelegraph/comments/the_hypocrites_of_the_left/" target="_blank">The Daily Telegraph</a>...</div>
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And this is my response...</div>
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The temptation with anything written by Miranda Devine is to immediately dismiss it as shrill and unreasoned, based on a long and established history of writing shrill, hysterical op-ed pieces for Fairfax, and now Murdoch. In any other forum she would be labeled a troll, and the best evidence of this is in the dreadful tone of the majority those commenting on her blog. Perhaps they are trolls themselves, but the tone is so uniformly dreadful that one has to assume these people actually think this way.</div>
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But, despite this temptation to dismiss Devine’s latest blog post, I will attempt to address a couple of the points she makes.</div>
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First, I find that the use of the word hypocrite is fraught, not least of all because it tends to attract a “tit for tat” series of accusations. “That was only one time, but it wasn’t as bad as when someone else did some other much worse thing.” “Yeah, but what about when this guy said that thing about that other guy?” ”Sure, but remember when you called me this after I said that?”And so on, ad nauseum. Achieving nothing.</div>
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But, that said, let’s do some of that anyway, ergo… Devine railing against the Abbott effigy-decapitators and the Abbott-haters on Facebook. Any reasonable person will argue that that kind of extreme protest is unhelpful at best, utterly destructive at worst. As Australians, I would hope we’re collectively better than that. And someone needs to explain this to Andrew Bolt, for instance, or to <a href="https://www.facebook.com/pages/Larry-Pickering/236991276355038" target="_blank">Larry Pickering</a>, who is adored by a small fringe on the right, but otherwise ignored and dismissed as the rabid loon that he is by pretty much every reasonable Australian. See what I mean? Both sides of the debate can play the indignation game, which leads the concept of hypocrisy into an Inception-esque meta spiral of dreams within dreams, hypocrisies within hypocrisies. So it’s a potentially endless exercise in accusation and counter-accusation.</div>
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What is equally pointless as an exercise, be it academic or practical, is to waste time pointing fingers at the previous government and accusing them of causing this mess. The culpability of Labor/Greens in contributing to the failure of Howard’s border policies is undeniable. Lives were lost. Many lives. Contrary to what many on the Right would have us believe, no one was happy about this. No one was crying “crocodile tears”- to suggest such a thing is despicable (if not surprising) on Devine’s part. So yes, under Howard the boats had stopped. The camps were largely empty. However, what this admission doesn’t address is the methods the Howard government employed to develop, enforce and maintain those policies, aided in part by Peter Reith’s proven and willful omission of truth around the children overboard affair (for instance) and the rising tone of public outrage which followed (and ultimately ensured an unlikely election win). But even Howard and Reith in their worst moments were nothing compared with Abbott and Morrison, for reasons I’ll attempt to explore momentarily.</div>
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The reason this endless blame game is so pointless is because it doesn’t fix the problem we are faced with now. Right now. Not just locally, but internationally. Not just in terms of actual, skin-and-bone and mental human suffering, but in terms of our international reputation (as if that matters one bit when compared with real personal suffering.) Naval vessels wandering into Indonesian waters up to six times in a month, turning boats around against the wishes of our peaceful neighbours, and a growing feeling overseas that Australians are, well, hypocrites (to quote a teacher here in Hong Kong this very week, who marvelled at our ostensibly anti-immigration stance considering we are, if nothing else, a nation of immigrants.)</div>
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Again, none of this is fixed by tossing around accusations of hypocrisy. And none of this is fixed by trying to deny that with the possible exception of the impossibly idealistic Greens, leading into the last two elections both sides of our political scene were entirely willing to exploit a growing xenophobia by endlessly chanting the “stop the boats” mantra.</div>
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And certainly none of this is being fixed by Scott Morrison, who is, in my view, approximately 180 degrees from the “competent, methodical” operator that Devine would have us believe he is. Rather, I see him as completely out of his depth. None of it is being fixed by using sneering, snarky descriptors like “crocodile tears” when the concern being shown by the “hypocritical” left. And in addition to not being fixed, it is being exacerbated by Morrison’s steely refusal to tell us anything. When he does tell us something, it turns out to be half-cocked, or just plain wrong, even a barefaced lie. The man who died last week was not outside the compound (and therefore outside of his department’s care) as Morrison plainly told us, but very much inside. And whilst he was not murdered by Morrison (an admittedly inflammatory and mischievous turn of phrase by Milne) he was almost certainly murdered. He did have his head crushed, possibly his throat cut. It’s hard, even impossible to know specifics, since more than a week later, an autopsy has not yet been performed on the body which is being guarded by the very people suspected of causing his death. And as we know from history, when there is an information vacuum, suspicion and conjecture emerge to fill it. If there’s nothing to hide, perform the autopsy and tell us what happened. Unlike almost everything else to do with this situation, this bit is actually quite simple. Unless there’s something to hide.</div>
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On that point, Devine waxes outraged about Angus Campbell being asked if there is a political cover-up. “How dare he,” she shrieks. Well, personally I think it’s a fair question. We’re not at war, and yet we’re apparently on a war footing, at least where information is concerned. A military commander is overseeing a clearly tense situation, but is gagged by his minister, citing “operational matters”. The situation is not allowed to be covered by the press. Parliamentary questions are restricted to Dorothy Dixers without supplementary follow-ups. Cameras and SD cards are confiscated and wiped at the behest of a private security company, apparently acting on orders from the minister. Translators lose their jobs for simply saying what they saw, ministers storm out of press conferences after ducking and weaving… again, if it’s NOT a political cover-up, tell us what we need and deserve to know, so we can understand the real situation. And don’t tell us that the silence is to keep the people smugglers in the dark – the LNP wouldn’t shut up about boat arrivals pre-September 2013, but now any discussion of the situation amounts to “shipping news”.</div>
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Part of the remit of the minister is to take ultimate responsibility for what occurs within his portfolio. But Morrison shows no sign of this. In fact, he only seems interested in blaming the last government for this mess, rather than doing anything about it. We get it – the last government’s policies were costly. Terribly and tragically costly. We get it – Morrison didn’t personally murder anyone, just as Rudd, Gillard and Bob Brown didn’t drown anyone. We get it – it’s a complex situation. But while ever it remains shrouded in this kind of secrecy and we accept it, we end up with the odd bloodstain on our own hands.</div>
james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1087863006286473810.post-15161631310154247642014-02-08T16:19:00.001+11:002014-02-08T16:19:30.216+11:00Who do we really want to be?<div class="p1">
Earlier today I promised a rant, and now I'm almost ready to write it. </div>
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But where to begin? With Tony Abbott insisting the a national public broadcaster has a certain unwritten obligation to cut the government some slack, and giving the navy the benefit of the doubt? With the Defence Minister seeing no need to look into significant allegations against military personnel, preferring instead to assert without investigation that there is no case to answer, and that anyway, the ABC is being treacherous, borderline treasonous? With 22 perfectly reasonable questions to Messrs Abbott and Morrison being met with the same ubiquitous catch-all: <span class="s1">"In line with the policy of not discussing what happens at sea, the Government has no response on the issues raised"</span>? Or perhaps we could go international with our outrage, and question the political implications of this government treating our sovereign neighbours with the same contempt they show the Australian people who put them in power. Perhaps the apparent ineptitude of naval crews to read a GPS and chart well enough keep their vessels out of Indonesian waters. Or maybe the boast that no asylum seeker boats have reached Australia for x number of weeks, mainly due to them being intercepted by armed patrol boats and turned around.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5TQD7qSWb1HsNp0gxe4W30NWehtoKB4R44_G_Hj_5Z3VoXFg8GiIqmB__asNbeksX05ytrMUcuaqW2Qj276qwHtvlxf52VXFyswK-c0EafLYcuQ5dDlIBQZETdhcy5hGxeMsXgobTFDE/s1600/lifeboat.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5TQD7qSWb1HsNp0gxe4W30NWehtoKB4R44_G_Hj_5Z3VoXFg8GiIqmB__asNbeksX05ytrMUcuaqW2Qj276qwHtvlxf52VXFyswK-c0EafLYcuQ5dDlIBQZETdhcy5hGxeMsXgobTFDE/s1600/lifeboat.jpeg" height="240" width="400" /></a></div>
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No, I'm going to keep it simple, and talk about this picture, published by the Guardian a couple of days ago. And rather than a rant, it's going to be more of an appeal to common decency and human empathy. You know, all bleeding heart "small-L" liberal. The kind of thing that gets Sarah Hanson-Young labelled as "evil" by some on the right.</div>
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So, to the details as we understand them. 34 people, including children as young as 18 months, were ordered into a purpose-bought orange lifeboat, turned around, and sent back. Not even taken to an Indonesian port, but simply turned around and told, "You have enough fuel to reach Java", after which they had little choice but to do just that.</div>
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Now imagine the scene, 48 hours since they've eaten, running ashore on an uninhabited coastline, opening the door and disembarking. What happens then? Where does one go? 34 people standing on a beach in the dark, hungry and lost.</div>
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Of course the response from some will be that these people should have thought of that before they paid people smugglers to ferry them to Christmas Island. I imagine that's what the government is hoping - that prospective asylum seekers will think twice. What little information the government has given us would suggest that this is exactly what is already happening. So job done, I guess.</div>
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<span class="s2">Under the circumstances I think that </span>Marty Natalegawa is being remarkably restrained when he describes the tow-back/turn-back policy as "not really helpful". I would suggest that a better way to describe such unilateral decisions around sovereign boundaries might be "potentially damaging". This has the real potential to cause diplomatic headaches that will make the temporary ban on live cattle exports to Indonesia shrink into utter insignificance. As the Guardian says, "Indonesia's navy held a meeting this week to discuss the boat turn-backs and has decided to boost personnel numbers on Java's southern coast." Does this mean more staff with boat-hooks and fenders to stop the lifeboats from landing? Does it mean having Indonesian navy vessels on patrol and ready to repel Australian ships that "accidentally" wander into their waters? A standoff on the high seas while an orange lifeboat bobs innocuously between them? All real possibilities.</div>
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So what is to be done? I don't think anyone considers it an easy problem to solve. (Well, except for those who argue that we should just shell the boats out of the water, but those kinds of nut-bars don't get a say.) For some time now both sides of politics have been culpable in demonising the desperate. I guess it's about playing for the middle ground, but that doesn't make any of the slated policies satisfactory. And it certainly doesn't excuse this bullying approach from the current government, not just towards the asylum seekers, but towards Indonesia, and towards the free press and Australian electorate who quite rightly expect better responses than "no comment". </div>
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I think it's time to ask this question, and to answer it honestly: how do we want to the seen by the rest of the world? What kind of people do we want to be? Who have we become collectively, and are we actually happy with that? Modern Australia is a multicultural country made up predominantly of boat-people, a nation which has always prided itself on how highly it values mateship and a fair go for all. It's kind of hard to make that claim at the moment, wouldn't you say? The way things are going, we're going to have our work cut out to represent ourselves overseas as anything more than a bunch of privileged, whining xenophobes who don't give a shit about how hard things are for anyone else. </div>
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But perhaps worse than that, we'll be seen as a democratic nation that is happy to vote in a government based pretty much entirely on who they aren't, before settling for letting them do whatever they please without expecting any kind of accountability. Are we really that country? God, I hope not.</div>
james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1087863006286473810.post-35129426849487306912013-07-22T14:15:00.003+10:002013-07-25T13:42:42.870+10:00An open letter to Kevin Rudd<div class="p1">
Dear Mr Rudd,</div>
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<a href="https://fbcdn-sphotos-f-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-frc3/313909_10150374850147049_1196500_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="307" src="https://fbcdn-sphotos-f-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-frc3/313909_10150374850147049_1196500_n.jpg" width="400" /></a>It was good to see you over the weekend, or at least, good to see you on the TV. I don't attend church much these days, so I was always unlikely to run into you there, but I did catch a bit of footage of you patting your minister on the arm and sharing a joke of some kind as you went into the House of God. And I have to say, you looked ever so relaxed and happy, with your cable-knit over your shoulders like a Hilfiger model. And you had every right to be relaxed - it was a beautiful day, you were amongst friends who were almost certainly telling you what a great job you were doing, and I'm sure that you and Therese had a lovely traditional lamb roast lunch planned for afterward. Aren't clear Australian winter days just the best? How lucky are we to live here? But I'm sure you know that.</div>
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I can imagine your other reason for looking so relaxed is the knowledge that pretty soon you won't have to worry about losing the job you've taken back after you lost it the first time. I know how much it hurt to lose your job like that – the wobbling chin was a dead giveaway. So of course you did the only decent thing a visionary such as yourself could do: rather than acknowledge that people couldn't work with a micro-manager as ill-tempered as yourself who liked to speak grandly of our most important challenges without doing anything about them, and thereafter throwing your considerable talents behind the elected leader of your party, you took every possible opportunity to white-ant her. Of course I take your point that it was for the good of the party and the country, although I can't help wondering (forgive me for thinking out loud here) that your nemesis' – sorry, democratically elected leader – might have been better able to focus on policy and earning recognition for the hundreds of pieces of legislation she managed to steer through hostile parliamentary waters, rather than having to fight on several fronts. But that would have hurt even more, I guess, if she'd actually been recognised as an effective PM rather than a dead duck. Not that you could have done much about that as foreign minister. Oh, wait, my mistake – there was quite a bit you could have done as a senior front-bencher with such peerless oratory gifts. But that's all water under the bridge now, I suppose.</div>
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Oh yes, you certainly had your eye on the prize, and for that I must give you credit. You established what your goal was, then you stopped at nothing until you achieved it. After all, some things are more important than others, aren't they, and when you see regaining the leadership at the expense of your own party as your most important personal challenge, you go for it. So yay you! We Aussies like a battler. (Not if they're a red-headed female battler with a big bum and a voice like a dentist's drill, obviously, but <i>your</i> kind of battler. You know, the kinds of people who have survived Kokoda and been interrogated by David Koch.)</div>
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I've got to give you a gold star for something else, Kevin. You said that you've learned a lot from your time 'out in the cold', and I believe you. After all, you seem to have learned that you can't fight on too many fronts at once, which is why you've introduced party rules to make sure that the next upstart Labor MP with the audacity to suggest that your posturing, bullying and policy capitulation is incompatible with your high office will be slapped down with a copy of the ALP Constitution. In other words, you're leader until you decide you don't want to be any more. Now that you're in. Because the first time it happened hurt just too damn much, and no one should have to go through what you went through, right?</div>
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And speaking of pain, I applaud the perfectly reasonable plea you made to the Lower House the day after you phoned for Julia's taxi. You remember the speech, where you suggested that politicians try be more gentle with one another? I had the TV turned down quite low at the time, but I'm certain I heard you say, right at the end, 'Starting … now.'</div>
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You know who else implored us to be a little more gentle with one another? Jesus. You know, the guy from the church. He also said something about taking in the weary and the needy and the oppressed and the hungry, if I remember correctly, although it's been a while since I was in church, whereas you were there on the weekend.</div>
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Look, I know you're going to claim that you just want people to stop getting in those boats because when they do, they drown. You might have a point, but it's not a terribly good one. Unless it's just me – I mean, I found myself agreeing with Paul Sheehan this morning, so maybe it's me who's lost his marbles. All I know is that a long time ago I used to wear a wrist band with WWJD inscribed on it. (The 'J' is for 'Jesus', by the way.) And I'm very confident that of all the things Jesus might do, announcing a policy like yours would not appear on the list.</div>
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You know what else Jesus would do if he were living in Australia right now? Refuse to sing the second verse of our national anthem. I'm sure you know it – it's the verse that talks about people coming across the sea, and how we have boundless plains to share. I reckon Jesus might have a bit of an issue with the disingenuity of that one. What do you think?</div>
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Oh, it's very complicated, I know. No one's suggesting it's not, Kevin. Besides, there's the very real possibility that you could effectively use this hardline policy to blunt Abbott's 'stop the boats' mantra, and thereby get yourself another three years as PM. And if you do, then maybe you'll be in a position to review and soften that policy. Except we all know what happens when a Labor PM says they'll do one thing but then does another, or says they won't do something, then goes ahead and does it after the political circumstances change. Like Julia Gillard saying we'd never have a GST under any government she led. Wait, that was someone else – hers was the carbon tax. But you take my point, I'm sure.</div>
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Look, please don't get me wrong. I sincerely hope you give Mr Abbott the mother of all canings when election day arrives. I want to see <i>his</i> lip quivering as he realises that it wasn't enough to just be constantly negative without outlining any alternatives. But that doesn't mean I'll ever like you, Kevin. In my opinion such an eventuality would hinge on exactly the same reasons as your win back in '07 – elected not so much for who you are than for who you're not. Heaven help you if Malcolm Turnbull decides to roll <i>his</i> leader.</div>
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Anyway, I should leave it there, since it's time for lunch. I think I'll stroll down to the shops and use that walking time to decide what I'll get. So much choice! Do I want sushi, Chinese, Thai, Vietnamese, some pasta or a pizza, maybe a gozleme or a pide, perhaps a curry. But most likely that great Aussie dish, the kebab, which is really just a lamb sanga, after all. Can I get you anything while I'm there?</div>
james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1087863006286473810.post-43173232850665116202013-04-19T15:26:00.001+10:002013-04-19T15:26:38.389+10:00Writing quote XVI
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<b>I want to do a piece where I go to the Alps and talk to a mountain. The mountain will talk of </b><b>things which are necessary and always true, and I shall talk of things which are sometimes, </b><b>accidentally true. </b></h3>
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<b>(</b>Bas Jan Ader, Dutch performance and conceptual artist)</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiiWnQjerBc8WvJT6MD8Kr-J3j_dbO3xr-lVlaJDdezlD4xhceeDe7B_B42wDpjdB1AMklLpLs2ZusfFDSI1amng6nWt4wJAZt5aVTTsKP-i63X7kGOECRoIUSjDVAPVw6YJgO-EvC0OTs/s1600/Bas.Jan.Ader-too.sad06.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="241" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiiWnQjerBc8WvJT6MD8Kr-J3j_dbO3xr-lVlaJDdezlD4xhceeDe7B_B42wDpjdB1AMklLpLs2ZusfFDSI1amng6nWt4wJAZt5aVTTsKP-i63X7kGOECRoIUSjDVAPVw6YJgO-EvC0OTs/s320/Bas.Jan.Ader-too.sad06.jpg" width="320" /></a>Ader’s body of work is not large in volume – a few photographs, a handful of short films – but to many in the artistic community his work is considered profound, especially when one looks at his personal story and his deep grief around the death of his father, wh</div>
o was executed by the Nazis for harbouring Jews when Ader was a very young child.<br />
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When Ader was 33 years old, he packed a tiny sailing boat with a few supplies and set out to sail solo from Cape Cod to the other side of the Atlantic. Ten months later his yacht was found drifting, but his body was never recovered, leading to speculation: did he fall victim to his own harebrained scheme, was he literally on a suicide mission, or did he simply expect to probably fail, thus turning his final voyage into his ultimate piece of performance art?</div>
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I thought of Ader when I was watching <i>German Wanderlust</i>, a BBC2 documentary by Julia Bradbury. In it, she visits one of Ludwig II’s hunting lodges near Neuschwanstein in Bavaria. The proprietor of the place, which stands in the shadow of a great mountain, owns a number of old photographs of the lodge taken in the time of Ludwig. Showing her one, he says, with typically Teutonic dryness, ‘This is the house - you’ve seen it [as you were] coming up. It’s quite different now, because the roof is very different.’ Then he points at the mountain in the photograph. ‘[But this] is the same mountain, because mountains don’t change every two hundred years.”</div>
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The natural world isn’t permanent – we know this all too well. But some aspects of it change more slowly than others. Under most circumstances, a snowflake is far more delicate than a tree. Glaciers are slow but measurable, the ocean permanent but far from still. But significant geological formations like mountains are perhaps more permanent – more solid, if you like – than pretty much anything else in the natural physical world.</div>
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To Ader, the Alps offered solid emotional and philosophical grounding that spoke of permanence. He needed to hear that, to be reminded that there are truths beyond what we understand. His contribution to this conversation would be one of subjectivity, humility and accidental enlightenment. </div>
james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1087863006286473810.post-23608845498341246542013-03-28T17:57:00.000+11:002013-03-28T17:58:18.870+11:00Writing Quote XV<br />
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<i><b>It is by sitting down to write every morning that one becomes a writer. Those who do not do this remain amateurs.</b></i></h3>
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Gerald Brenan (British author and historian)</h4>
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Seems obvious, doesn’t it? I can’t tell you how many times people, on learning what I do, have said, ‘Oh, I’d love to write a book!’ To which the obvious, if not slightly antagonistic response would be, ‘Would you like me to lend you a pencil?’</div>
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What we writers do is a seductive proposition. At its core, our lot is to tell stories – lies, even – for a living. We get to make things up, say what we think, research topics that interest us, create worlds, play God for a season, discover wonders we might never have discovered otherwise. And at the end of that, the fortunate amongst us see our work produced and handed over to an audience, at which point the tight shoulders and long nights and innumerable cups of coffee are magically forgotten. Yes indeed, it’s a very seductive proposition.</div>
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But it doesn’t come easily. It very rarely happens by accident. Like anything that’s worth having, it takes serious work to acquire and maintain.</div>
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There’s nothing wrong with being an amateur. After all, an amateur has something no professional has – the option of walking away when it gets too hard.</div>
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So, which are you?</div>
james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1087863006286473810.post-85334027430622349022013-01-17T14:09:00.000+11:002013-01-17T14:09:22.348+11:00Writing quote XIV
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<i><span class="s1">I have a critical nature, in the sense that when I look at something I often look for the flaws.</span><span class="s2"> </span></i></h3>
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<span class="s1"><b>Donald Fagen</b></span><span class="s2"> </span></h4>
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<span class="s1">At first glance, this quote might suggest that Donald Fagen is a negative person, and perhaps he is – I’ve never met him. What I do know is that I love his music, and the music he's made over the years with Walter Becker, under the name Steely Dan.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">In one sense, when he speaks of looking for flaws, Fagen could be speaking about the idea that comes up all the time in any art-form – that without pain, or flaws, or loss, or imperfection, there is no art. A perfect relationship offers very little to sing about, unlike a broken heart. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">However, I think I prefer to look at this quote as a reflection on the way a raw idea is turned into a rough representation then, after close attention to the flaws, it reaches a state approaching perfection. Anyone who has ever listened to a Steely Dan song or any of Donald Fagen’s solo work will immediately recognise the attention to detail. Even if the kind of music Fagen writes and performs isn’t quite your bag, what's indisputable is that he values perfection as much as if not more than any other single element. Whether he’s looking for the perfect production, the perfect chord, or the perfect phrasing, he’s always looking. Steely Dan concerts are renowned for the quality of the mix, and I’m sure it’s because Fagen would settle for nothing less. Famously, on the classic 1977 album <i>Aja</i>, finding just the right drummer for each track was such a priority that six different drummers were employed on seven tracks.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">The editing process isn’t a single step. It’s a long process, where you get to the end, then turn back to the first page and begin again. Over and over, looking at structure this time, consistency of voice the next, a particular character after that, then how that has affected structure. Yes, by all means we should strive for perfection, but as well as admiring the greater shape and form, we shoudn't forget to look for the flaws.</span></div>
james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1087863006286473810.post-20352647982802435482012-12-29T21:10:00.001+11:002012-12-29T21:10:46.643+11:00Writing quote XIII
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<i><span style="font-size: large;">Times are bad. Children no longer obey their parents, and everyone is writing a book.</span></i></div>
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<b>Marcus Tullius Cicero</b> (Roman philosopher, statesman and orator – b. 3 January, 106BCE)<i><span style="font-size: x-small;">*</span></i></div>
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So, it seems that even two thousand years ago parents despaired that their kids’ generation would be the downfall of society, that everything that they’d worked for would be swept aside by the narcissism and self-importance of the ‘modern youth’.</div>
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What does this tell us? Simply, that people are the same now as they’ve ever been. The same things drive them to behave the way they do now as they ever did – lust, greed, power, fear, love.</div>
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But there’s more. Look at the last part of the quote: ‘…everyone is writing a book.’ Really? More than two thousand years ago, people were reading books, laying them down when they’d finished and saying to themselves – and each other – ‘Huh! I could do that!’</div>
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Of course, the publishing mechanisms were very different then. The printing press was still more than 1,500 years away, e-readers more than five hundred beyond that. Even so, it would seem that there were people in Ancient Rome who believed that they had something worth saying. That their words were worthy of preservation. That their views deserved to be heard just as much as those of anyone else. And of course, there would have certainly been those who felt that they were absolutely entitled to any success that came their way.</div>
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It’s probably safe to assume that there were people being ‘published’ back then who were hacks. Perhaps they got their big break because of family connections, or because they just managed to jump on the crest of a zeitgeist. Perhaps they slept with the editor. And by that same token, we can be confident that there were some remarkable writers mooching around Rome who never quite got that break, no matter how undeniable their talent.</div>
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And now we're all writing books. Not everyone should, perhaps, but if we want to, we can. One of the freedoms we hold most dear is the ability – the liberty – to express ourselves. The truth is, no one has the right to tell you that your creative dream is frivolous or worthless or silly or unattainable. But at the same time, no one is <i>entitled</i> to success. </div>
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So go ahead and write that book, but keep in mind that you’re not the only one doing so. Which means all you can do is work hard to make your writing better than everyone else’s, and hope for the best.</div>
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* This quote is somewhat apocryphal. It’s usually attributed to Cicero; however, unlike most of his other quotes, no one seems to be able to name the work from which is taken. The other possible sources include an Egyptian priest, an Assyrian clay tablet, and a stone inscription from Turkey. But since these supposed sources are much older (2,000 to 5,000 years older, in fact) than Cicero’s relatively recent observation, that simply reinforces the point I’m making. For more, go here: <a href="http://quoteinvestigator.com/2012/10/22/world-end/"><span class="s1">http://quoteinvestigator.com/2012/10/22/world-end/</span></a></div>
james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1087863006286473810.post-21632099025716049162012-12-29T12:58:00.002+11:002012-12-29T12:58:53.701+11:00I love this.<br />
“Do you think now and then, now or then, in the whirl<br />
Of the city, while London is new,<br />
Of the hut in the Bush, and the freckled-faced girl<br />
Who is eating her heart out for you?”<br />
― Henry Lawson<br />
james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1087863006286473810.post-18144823103587073152012-12-24T18:25:00.002+11:002012-12-24T18:29:05.771+11:00Breaking the Santa spell... and should we?A couple of months ago I spent a week at a very conservative Christian boys’ school as their Writer in Residence. I’ve done this gig many, many times a year for a decade and a half, so I reckon I’ve seen most of the curveballs that a roomful of school kids can serve up. Some have been troubling, some infuriating and some just… well, weird. I’ve seen kids throw up partway through a talk (probably not my fault), I’ve seen a child have a seizure mid-workshop (almost certainly not my fault), I’ve even witnessed a full-on physical confrontation between two young women that might, indirectly, have been more or less attributable to something I might have said, thereby (in a very loose sense) making it my fault.<br />
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<span class="s1">But this, what I’m about to describe to you, was a complete surprise. Was it troubling, infuriating, or weird? No, it was in fact all of those, all at once.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">So. Imagine a library containing one author, one teacher-librarian, and fifty 5th Grade boys. Imagine that author explaining to those 5th Graders about how writers use misdirection, much as stage magicians do. That is to say, while we’re telling a story about one thing, we might also be addressing some theme that is ‘bigger’ than the simple story within which it is couched. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">‘Because we know that when a magician does a trick, they’re not really being “magic”, don’t we?’ I asked, rhetorically. ‘Because we know that magic isn’t real, don’t we?’</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Let me pause to briefly explain something. In that moment, I thought very hard about what I would say next. I really did. That’s because I have a more or less fully developed frontal lobe – the part of one’s brain that projects forward and assesses potential risk. Which is why I didn’t go where you probably thought I was going next – describing the founder of the Christian faith as ‘Magic Sky-Jesus’. Because that’s not what I do. I’m terribly careful to avoid offending people, since I like being invited back to places. I’m there to talk about stories and writing and books, not to make fun of Jesus, Mohammed or anyone else considered sacred by anyone. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">So while I didn’t plan to offend anyone, I did think – I <i>actually thought – </i>that I’d be safe to remind this room full of ten- and eleven-year-old boys that magic isn’t real. ‘We know that the Easter Bunny isn’t real,’ I said. ‘Neither is the Tooth Fairy. And as for Santa Claus…’</span></div>
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<span class="s1">I know. I know. But come on – these boys were in 5th Grade! <i>5th </i>Grade!<i> </i>My own kids were still putting out carrots and milk on Christmas Eve right up until their eighth birthdays, and I found it endearing and cute and the stuff of a whimsical childhood. But 5th Grade? Really?</span></div>
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<span class="s1">To be fair, none of the boys batted an eyelid. Not that I noticed, anyway. Neither did the teacher-librarian. Until the following morning, that is, when she received five irate parent emails complaining that ‘some guest speaker’ had come to the school and told their boys that ‘Santa doesn’t exist’. It was their prerogative to expose that little bit of dishonesty at a time of their choosing, they claimed, and I guess they’re probably right.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">The teacher-librarian thought the whole thing was pretty funny. So did I, to be honest. What I found slightly less amusing was the fact that one of the class teachers (who hadn’t even been in the room at the time) had sent a group letter to all 5th Grade parents more or less apologising on my behalf. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">But here’s the thing. Imagine your own ten-year-old coming to you in tears, complaining that some mean man had come to school that day and claimed that Santa was a lie. The way I see it, you’ve two possible courses of action. The first is to quietly utter a prayer of thanks that, as unpleasant as it is to see your child weep, you can now have <i>that</i> conversation. You can now say to your child, ‘Honey, the truth is that we’ve been meaning to talk with you about this for some time. And this seems like a good time to do it. Fortuitous, even.’</span></div>
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<span class="s1">The second course of action is to actively promote the lie and, once the tears are largely dried and belief restored, open up the laptop and fire off an angry missive. (To anyone considering Option 2, think on this: how much greater will that feeling of betrayal be when the truth is finally allowed to come out – at, say, twelve or thirteen – and you have to admit to your child that yes, you did lie for a long time, before grasping the opportunity to lie some more.)</span></div>
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<span class="s1">All right, so <i>mea culpa</i>. Lesson learned. I still relate my craft to magic versus misdirection, but Saint Nicholas of Myra no longer scores a mention. It’s not that I’m shying away from the truth; it’s more that I understand that it’s not my job to decide when other people let their kids grow up. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">That said, let me make one final note on what I now call 'The Great Santa Contretemps of 2012'. I briefly considered sending out my own email of apology to the parents of those 5th Graders, saying the following: <i>I wish to apologise for any misunderstanding over my recent comments to your boys. I suffer from dyslexia*, and actually meant to say that Satan doesn’t exist. </i></span></div>
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<span class="s1">How might that have played out, I wonder?</span><br />
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<span class="s1">* NB: I am aware that it is a common misconception that dyslexic people get their letters jumbled up, but to be honest, Anticipatory Coarticulation is simply too much of a mouthful. Happy Christmas, everyone!</span></div>
james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1087863006286473810.post-56831611788379913762012-12-17T13:36:00.000+11:002012-12-17T13:36:30.567+11:00Sorry, Felicity Ward, but I think you got it wrong.
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<span class="s1">So, it seems a few people are getting bent all out of shape over this billboard ad for <a href="http://www.whoexclusive.com/" target="_blank">Who Exclusive</a>, an online shopping site. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">On the face of it, the tagline is hugely offensive to anyone who thinks that women are… you know … equal to men. Without meaning to labour the obvious, it would seem to be suggesting that a woman needs a man to earn the cash required to be kept in the manner to which she is accustomed. Very pre-Cora Downton Abbey, very Betty Draper before she discovers the washing machine's spin cycle. That a woman without her man is nothing.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"></span><br /></div>
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<span class="s1">In response to this ad, comedian Felicity Ward wrote an impassioned and beautifully crafted open letter on her <a href="http://felicityward.com/a-letter-of-complaint/" target="_blank">website</a>, later reproduced on <a href="http://www.mamamia.com.au/social/feminism-spend-his-money-wisely/" target="_blank">Mamamia</a>, titled 'An open letter to the most sexist ad of the year'. I thought the letter's tenor, its craft, its icy fury was first rate. Stand and applaud. It was angry but dignified, much like Julia Gillard hunting Abbotts. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"></span><br /></div>
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<span class="s1">Except I think Ms Ward got it completely wrong. 180 degrees wrong. As wrong as you can get it.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Putting aside the fact that the people at Who Exclusive will, at this very moment, be doing a happy-fun-time dance around the boardroom at all this unexpected publicity, I’d like to look at the actual words in the ad. Or more specifically, the punctuation.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"></span><br /></div>
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<span class="s1">Anyone who grew up before texting was the preferred method of conversation knows that punctuation is important. Very important. “Let’s eat Dad!” becomes much less sinister with a simple comma: “Let’s eat, Dad!” Likewise “I love her period”, which should (one hopes) feature a comma betwen the last two words.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"></span><br /></div>
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<span class="s1">Or this: “A woman without her man is nothing.” With the odd comma here and there it becomes: “A woman, without her man, is nothing.” That’s really no better at all. <i>This</i>, however, will probably draw the Mamamia office to its collective feet: “A woman: without her, man is nothing.” To be honest, neither version flies, since equality means… well, being equal. But you see my point.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Returning to the ad in question, those words certainly carry the potential to be offensive. As some Mamamia commenters have pointed out, it’s meant to be ironic, cheeky, provocative. Sure, but “Spend his money wisely” still comes across as hamfisted.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"></span><br /></div>
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<span class="s1">Except that’s not how the tagline is written. The choice of colour for the text is unfortunate, not just because it’s terribly hard to read, but because the first apostrophe is somewhat lost in the colour of the model’s leg. But the second apostrophe is very clear, and changes the <i>entire tone</i> of the sentence. Spins it that full 180 degrees I mentioned earlier. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"></span><br /></div>
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<span class="s1">“Spend ‘his’ money wisely.” </span></div>
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<span class="s1">In other words, play your cocky partner for the arrogant fool he is and spend the money that he <i>thinks</i> is his. The money that he <i>thinks</i> you need his permission to spend. The money that he’s earning while you, the ever dutiful wife or girlfriend, are at home, watching daytime TV, making pot-roasts, flirting with air-conditioner salesmen, and leaning up against the washing machine. Or worse, playing at having a proper job.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">This ad isn’t an attack on feminism. Quite the opposite – this is a huge middle finger to anyone who thinks that a woman needs permission from a man to do anything. And for that we <i>should</i> stand and applaud.</span></div>
james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1087863006286473810.post-20376121203501206142012-10-15T18:11:00.000+11:002012-10-15T18:14:02.225+11:00Five-minute satay sauce. Srsly.And, gentle reader, since I basically made it up, it is my gift to you.<br />
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<ul>
<li>One cup of crunchy peanut butter</li>
<li>Half a cup of water</li>
<li>A tablespoon (or so) of sweet chilli sauce</li>
<li>A teaspoon of curry powder</li>
</ul>
<div>
Put the peanut butter and water in a small saucepan and bring to the simmer so that the peanut butter dissolves in the water. Chuck in the sweet chilli and the curry powder, stir it in, and you're done. Literally five minutes. </div>
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You could probably put a dash of coconut cream in at the end if you had it handy, but I'm not sure it's necessary. </div>
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Enjoy! We'll be dipping Vietnamese rice paper rolls in ours.<br />
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james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1087863006286473810.post-2007265615321068192012-10-11T15:19:00.000+11:002012-10-11T15:22:49.403+11:00Which Abbott would we prefer?<span style="font-size: 100%;">
</span><br />
<div class="p1">
<a href="http://feminaeaustralis.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/tony-abbott-thinks-too-hard.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="229" src="http://feminaeaustralis.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/tony-abbott-thinks-too-hard.jpg" width="320" /></a><span style="font-size: 100%;"><span class="s1">Tony Abbott must be either breathtakingly stupid, or deeply dishonest. To illustrate this point, I offer two examples.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 100%;"><span class="s1"></span><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1">First, let's look at his claim that when he spoke of the government “dying of shame” barely a week after the Alan Jones imbruglio, he was <i>not</i> referencing Jones’ deeply offensive comments, but rather using a phrase he has used “seventeen times in the past.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Perhaps he has. Even so, should we not realistically expect that someone aspiring to the highest office in the land might internally process the ramifications of using such a highly-charged term? That's what his frontal lobe is for. So, either he was too stupid to make that connection in advance, or he knew what he was doing and is now lying about it being inadvertent, a mere slip-up. (It is tempting to offer a third possibility: that he fully meant it, and he intended it to hurt the Prime Minister – to inflict actual emotional pain upon her. But I can’t bring myself to countenance the hideous possibility that someone so cruel could be our next PM, so I’ll try to assume that it’s one of the first two.)</span></div>
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<span class="s1">My second example is from yesterday (10 October, 2012) when Mr Abbott produced a power bill sent to him by a disgruntled Perth retiree. Her power bill had doubled! Doubled, I say! He related how she’d almost “had a heart attack” when she saw that her bill had increased from $736 to $1,563. “See, I told you so!” he effectively gloated. “It’s the carbon tax! I told you it would have a crippling impact, and look now! Look now!”</span></div>
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<span class="s1">When he tabled the document at Labor's urging, the reason for the woman’s power bill doubling soon became apparent. It was because her power <i>usage</i> had doubled. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">So, once again, which is it? Is Mr Abbott too stupid to notice such a non-trivial error in his reasoning, or has he been caught passing off a deliberately misleading data interpretation?</span></div>
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<span class="s1">I suspect it’s the latter – after all, Mr Abbott was a Rhodes Scholar, and they don’t make a habit of handing those out to half-wits. Which would mean that it’s the other option – that he’s happy to say whatever he thinks is politically expedient, and then play the “woops” card when he’s busted.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">There’s an additional component to this that should be mentioned. If Tony Abbott’s not stupid – meaning we must therefore assume that he’s being dishonest – we need to draw a clear line to a more troubling conclusion: he thinks that more than fifty percent of Australian voters <i>are</i> breathtakingly stupid. And since we’re talking about someone who wants to lead <i>all</i> Australians after the next election, it's a point that needs to be made, and made often.</span></div>
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<br />james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1087863006286473810.post-42031211114059351072011-05-20T13:25:00.002+10:002011-05-20T13:27:14.543+10:00A lovely poem I wish I'd written.<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 12px; "><div id="poem-top" class="tab-content active" style="display: block; "><h1 style="font: normal normal normal 24px/normal Georgia; margin-top: 10px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 3px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; ">No Time</h1></div><span class="author" style="text-transform: uppercase; display: inline-block; letter-spacing: 0.05em; ">BY <a href="http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/billy-collins" style="text-decoration: none; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; outline-color: initial; ">BILLY COLLINS</a></span><div id="poem" class="tab-content active" style="display: block; "><div class="poem" style="font: normal normal normal 16px/normal Georgia; line-height: 24px; margin-top: 25px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><div style="text-indent: -1em; padding-left: 1em; ">In a rush this weekday morning,</div><div style="text-indent: -1em; padding-left: 1em; ">I tap the horn as I speed past the cemetery</div><div style="text-indent: -1em; padding-left: 1em; ">where my parents are buried</div><div style="text-indent: -1em; padding-left: 1em; ">side by side beneath a slab of smooth granite.</div><br /><div style="text-indent: -1em; padding-left: 1em; ">Then, all day, I think of him rising up</div><div style="text-indent: -1em; padding-left: 1em; ">to give me that look</div><div style="text-indent: -1em; padding-left: 1em; ">of knowing disapproval</div><div style="text-indent: -1em; padding-left: 1em; ">while my mother calmly tells him to lie back down.</div></div><div class="credit" style="line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 30px; padding-top: 24px; "><p>Source: <em>Poetry</em> (December 2000).</p></div></div></span>james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1087863006286473810.post-81850069196973291702011-05-20T13:13:00.003+10:002011-05-20T13:23:12.470+10:00Edsel Grizzler Book Gig<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6E4jvytWNPkioOq-lHLz_1F-HNQXc97VJ_BQ7oHwqxsprFurvCR_Moedp1hPSD27reG8y5krPBJFX5rHeY57_PY0DO2Iofi8WMoENvJfeixW8Maix-q16_4ZNjGkgIgziYgQcniwimYs/s1600/wordplay.gif" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 149px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6E4jvytWNPkioOq-lHLz_1F-HNQXc97VJ_BQ7oHwqxsprFurvCR_Moedp1hPSD27reG8y5krPBJFX5rHeY57_PY0DO2Iofi8WMoENvJfeixW8Maix-q16_4ZNjGkgIgziYgQcniwimYs/s200/wordplay.gif" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5608633187054328722" /></a>Great news! As part of this year's Brisbane Writers Festival <i>WordPlay</i> schools program, students from the Queensland University of Technology, under the direction of Carolyn Heim, will be doing two Book Gig performances of <i>Edsel Grizzler</i>. The dates for the performances are Wednesday 7 September (12.30pm), and Friday 9 September (12.30pm). I'll be there to answer questions and enjoy the show, so get along if you can! I'm also doing a whole bunch of other sessions with the festival. It's always a great program up there: all your details can be found <a href="http://www.brisbanewritersfestival.com.au/default.asp?PageID=253">here</a>.james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1087863006286473810.post-8756704421732918052011-05-17T15:01:00.005+10:002011-05-17T15:18:57.352+10:00NSW Premier's Literary Awards 2011The venue was the forecourt of the Sydney Opera House. The date was the 16th May, 2011. And the event was the announcement of the NSW Premier's Literary Awards.<div><br /></div><div>This was the first year that the winners haven't known prior, making it more like the Oscars, except that the presenter read something about the winner in each category before reading the name, thereby giving a ten second heads-up to anyone paying attention.</div><div><br /></div><div>It's good to see this morning that the mainstream media has broken with tradition and published the names of the winners in all categories, rather than just the 'big' ones. And those big ones were Alex Miller for <i>Lovesong</i>, and Malcolm Fraser and Margaret Simons for Fraser's biography. But of most interest to many of us were the winners of the Ethel Turner and Patricia Wrightson prizes, won by Cath Crowley (<i>Graffiti Moon</i>) and Sophie Masson (<i>The Hunt for Ned Kelly</i>) respectively. Both shortlists were stacked with potential winners, but unfortunately there could only be one in each list. I have to say that those who missed out took it in very good grace. I admire their nerve - I don't know if I could have been quite so calm during the tense wait.</div><div><br /></div><div>But the biggest cheer (and a standing ovation) was for Libby Gleeson who, in a huge surprise to her, won the $20,000 Special Award for her past and ongoing contribution not only to young people's literature, but the literary community at large, especially her efforts in establishing the Lending Rights scheme that we all look forward to each year. </div><div><br /></div><div>It was also a great night for the Western Sydney Young People's Literature Project, soon to be renamed Westwords. This project, overseen by Judith Ridge, kept getting mentions all night, including from Libby in her acceptance speech. From memory, Libby (who chairs the project's board) said something like, 'Watch out for us - we're going to be big.' </div>james royhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14044438216337471085noreply@blogger.com0