We all know Australia is changing, but no-one can tell us into what
Australia is in transition. Saying it is easy. The panic kicks in when we are compelled to describe what the future might look like. There is no complacent middle to aim at. We will either catch the next wave of prosperity, or finally succumb to the Great Recession.
The Watson family take on ‘Family Feud’
The set of Channel Ten’s Family Feud has all the subtlety of Las Vegas at night, and as we take our seats within its glow the crowd-warmer fills us in on game-show audience etiquette: in essence, smile no matter what.
Internet access in jails
At 7.57 am, while eating breakfast, I receive a WhatsApp notification. It’s a message, 16 seconds long. “Hello, my friend,” a man says in a sonorous voice. It is hard to pin down the accent, but if I had to guess I would say Egyptian. “First of all, uhhh, I don’t know you,” the man continues. “How do I know you are in prison?
Paul Sheehan’s story about the alleged gang rape of “Louise” led, eventually, to him being suspended by Fairfax. But how has a writer so reckless survived for so long at a reputable media company? A special report for the Monthly and Guardian Australia
The office of the Sydney Morning Herald has been a busy place since Paul Sheehan wrote his infamous piece on “Louise”. The column’s racially charged rape allegations have since unravelled.
February breaks global temperature records by ‘shocking’ amount “February smashed a century of global temperature records by a ‘stunning’ margin, according to data released by NASA. The unprecedented leap led scientists, usually wary of highlighting a single month’s...
Leaked ISIS recruitment files said to show at least two Australians “At least two Australians are reported to appear in a cache of thousands of Islamic State registration forms leaked by a disaffected former member. Two redacted forms with the details of Australians of...
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What eels do when we're not watching
There is a small crowd of people by the ponds in Sydney’s Centennial Parklands, tossing bread to the clamouring waterbirds, when the dark form appears. It glides upwards with a lazy, powerful motion to swallow one of the crumbs before disappearing back into the murk.
A young girl takes a step back. Her mother smiles. “It’s just an eel,” she says. “There are lots of them in here.”
How do emergency services respond to the LGBTI community?
In a classroom at the Victorian Emergency Management Training Centre on the northern outskirts of Melbourne, 17 students stand in an untidy teardrop pattern around a series of cards set out on the floor. The participants – from emergency services, law-enforcement agencies, shire...
Nick Schlieper illuminates a Shakespearean tragedy
The State Opera of South Australia 2004 production of Wagner’s Der Ring des Nibelungen began with almost three minutes of utter darkness. The pesky glow of seat markers and air-conditioner LEDs had all been painstakingly obscured or extinguished.
Making sense of the adult colouring craze
“Do you sell the pencils as well?” I asked the woman in the bookstore. She had already recommended her favourite colouring books for adults. They didn’t sell the art supplies, though; I would have to try the stationery store around the corner.
There is a special sort of loneliness about sitting in a cinema on your own. Over the past year, I have frequently found myself watching an Australian movie as the sole member of an audience and, on three occasions, with only one other person in the cinema. Once the lights go down, it can be an uncomfortable, even spooky, feeling of detachment.
The case for marriage equality
In 2001, when I was first elected to parliament, it wasn’t legal to discriminate on the basis of race or gender in Australia. The Racial Discrimination Act was enacted before my childhood migration from Malaysia, a quarter of a century earlier.
Trouble in the Family Court
When Erin saw the police lights flashing, she knew it was over. She steered the car to the side of the road, and turned to her two children. “OK guys, this is it,” she said. “We’ve done our best.”
Her teenaged daughter started to panic. “Fuck! Oh my god!” she cried. “I can’t do...
Australia blurs the lines with Timor-Leste
My latest journey to Timor-Leste (East Timor) began on 16 October, the 40th anniversary of the murder of five Australian-based journalists in Balibo by Indonesian special forces. My first trip there was in March 1975, six months prior to their deaths. I was reporting for Radio...
Shen Narayanasamy takes on Transfield
It’s 5 am on a pitch-black inner Melbourne street. Two small children are sleeping inside a weatherboard house as their mother, the lawyer and corporate activist Shen Narayanasamy, creeps into a taxi and asks the driver to hurry to the airport.
New
I first heard the scuttlebutt about Tony Abbott and Peta Credlin more than two years ago. As with all rumours, it was handed on to me by what I was assured was an impeccable source.
The relationship had reached crisis point, I was told. The Abbott marriage was finished; the only question was whether Margie would throw Tony out of the marital home or walk out of it herself.
Spotlight won the Oscar for Best Picture at yesterday’s 88th Academy Awards ceremony, on the same day that Cardinal George Pell, giving evidence before the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, said that the Catholic church “had a predis
Spotlight won the Oscar for Best Picture at yesterday’s 88th Academy Awards ceremony, on the same day that Cardinal George Pell, giving evidence before the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, said that the Catholic church “had a predis
Authorities in Europe and the US have both shifted their interest rate policies recently, but in opposite directions. This series of two articles outlines the rationale and what it means for the two largest trading blocs of the global economy.
Why is Australia planning so many new casinos?
Whale migration is set to have a significant impact on the character of Australia’s cities over the next few years. This elusive breed of mammal, the VIP international gambler – or “whale”, as it is called in casino circles – is known to wager millions a night on games of baccarat or blackjack.
John Blaxland’s ‘The Protest Years: The Official History of ASIO 1963–1975’
Following David Horner’s The Spy Catchers, John Blaxland’s The Protest Years (Allen & Unwin; $49.99) is the second volume of The Official History of ASIO.
Chris Bowen’s ‘The Money Men’ and the ideal treasurer
Young politicians write books about ideas; old politicians write histories. In the twilight of their careers, when their passion for politics is no longer absorbed by active service, many former ministers channel their energy into musty biographies or nostalgic memoirs. But...
Stravinsky’s works, collected
Modern composers are no longer famous the way Igor Stravinsky once was. From our century, indeed, it is hard to comprehend the extent of that fame. Just as Picasso was modern art, so Stravinsky was modern music. Like Picasso, Stravinsky lived a long life (they were born a year...
Rupert Murdoch was 27 when he met Kandiah Kamalesvaran, a sensitive young Tamil on the dodge from the immigration authorities. Born in Malaya, Kamalesvaran had arrived in Adelaide in 1953, five years earlier, to complete his matriculation.