Make sure you go to New Matilda right now to read what is almost certainly the most interesting thing anyone has ever written about Australian politics.
Then come over for some drunk Twister.
Thursday, May 28, 2009
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Cave of Wonders
Tonight, at BMW Edge, Federation Square, 7:30pm:
WORDSTOCK - Reinterpreting the songs of Nick Cave. Tickets $20/$15
Besides me, it will feature such talents as Sean M. Whelan, Emilie Zoey Baker, Clem Bastow, Daid Quirk, Damien Lawlor et al.
If you're in Melbourne, you may well regret it forever if you miss it.
WORDSTOCK - Reinterpreting the songs of Nick Cave. Tickets $20/$15
Besides me, it will feature such talents as Sean M. Whelan, Emilie Zoey Baker, Clem Bastow, Daid Quirk, Damien Lawlor et al.
If you're in Melbourne, you may well regret it forever if you miss it.
Sunday, May 17, 2009
Lead Me Not Into Temptation
Thank God that someone finally understands. It’s so hard being a young man in today’s society, beset on all sides with pressures and temptations, that it comes as a relief when someone shows their comprehension of the modern man’s struggles the way Miranda Devine did in last week’s Herald.
Miranda, with unerring perspicacity, has pointed out the real root of the issues surrounding footballers and their sexual misadventures. It’s all about society’s failure to teach women how to behave properly. And isn’t that the truth? Oh, it may not be fashionable to say so in today’s anything-goes, teenage-sexting, pass-the-crackpipe dole-bludging tree-humping society, but the fact is it is just plain unreasonable to expect men to know how to treat women when women insist on waving their sexuality in our faces like a red rag to a five-eighth.
As Miranda explains, far better than I ever could, without any “expectation of women to modify their behaviour”, it is “putting unsustainable pressure” on these poor befuddled footballers to expect them to know how to act. After all, they may be “drunk, insensitive or carried away by group dynamics”. Hey, we’ve all been there, right? If I had a dollar for every time group dynamics had forced me against my better judgment to jump on top of a reluctant teenager in a hotel room, I would have enough money to put a whole battalion of young girls in cabs after thanking them politely.
The point is, why don’t women modify their behaviour? Why is it always incumbent on we men to restrain ourselves from groping or assaulting or watching a dozen of our friends copulate with, yet nobody ever calls out women for their deliberate and persistent sexual attractiveness? It seems that our moral compass has spun out of control to the extent where we suddenly laud the sexually active woman, but condemn the innocent drunk insensitive footballer. Has the world gone topsy-turvy? When did the balance of power between the sexes shift to such an extent? When did we decide that avoiding sexual assault was the sole responsibility of the assaulter, with no corresponding responsibility on the assaultee? Aren’t relationships these days supposed to be an equal partnership? Not in the case of the relationships between young girls and entire football teams, apparently. No, in those situations, suddenly everything changes and the footballers have to do all the work. They’re expected to read all the subtle signals, pay attention to all the complex issues of consent, say all the thank-yous, make all the police statements. How about a bit of give-and-take, girls?
After all, as Miranda says, with typical warm, knowing wisdom, today “it is men, alone…who must restraint themselves”, despite the very pertinent fact that “young women are told they can act and dress any way they please”; and if that ain’t nail on the head, finger on the pulse, rolled-gold truth. What mad Marxist social engineer hit upon the idea of women acting and dressing any way they please? Have you seen the way they dress these days? It’s like, ladies, I know you have breasts. You don’t have to draw such obvious attention to them. You don’t have to strut around displaying your bodies, as if they were something to be proud of. But there they go, running about in next to nothing, frequenting nightclubs, drinking and dancing and rubbing our noses in their shameless femininity, and here we are, expected to restrain ourselves. We’re expected to just ignore this wanton behaviour, act as if they’re not shattering all our long-cherished moral codes.
We once had a social contract in this country: women covered up and stayed home; and men agreed not to force them into sex except under extreme provocation. As far as I’m concerned, they broke the contract first. Now we have the absurd situation where women get away scot-free with doing whatever they feel like, while somehow a bunch of fit young men are pilloried for no greater crime than giving expression to the perfectly natural, healthy urge that every man has, the urge to climb through a window and stand around naked with some other fit young men, observing each other’s sexual technique. The fact that these men are highly paid elite athletes, for whom any kind of distraction or media brouhaha could seriously affect their match-day performance, just makes the injustice all the more tragic.
Not that men are the only victims here. As Miranda observes, “our era’s turning point in sexual politics confuses women as much as men”. In all likelihood, that lass from New Zealand was quite confused when she went on Four Corners. So you see, women are suffering too. The sheer confusion must be so overwhelming; that’s probably why they act out by seducing all those footballers, or by reading Twilight, or exposing their midriffs, or any of the other bizarre ways in which modern women demonstrate their irretrievable descent into an inescapable moral vortex.
But there’s a way out, ladies. You can turn things around. You can return to your “natural modesty”. You can stop ruining men’s lives with your thoughtless expressions of sexual identity. You can stop blaming the victim – footballers – and start taking responsibility for your own feminist-warped minds.
Just thank God that Miranda came along to save us all, before it was too late.
Miranda, with unerring perspicacity, has pointed out the real root of the issues surrounding footballers and their sexual misadventures. It’s all about society’s failure to teach women how to behave properly. And isn’t that the truth? Oh, it may not be fashionable to say so in today’s anything-goes, teenage-sexting, pass-the-crackpipe dole-bludging tree-humping society, but the fact is it is just plain unreasonable to expect men to know how to treat women when women insist on waving their sexuality in our faces like a red rag to a five-eighth.
As Miranda explains, far better than I ever could, without any “expectation of women to modify their behaviour”, it is “putting unsustainable pressure” on these poor befuddled footballers to expect them to know how to act. After all, they may be “drunk, insensitive or carried away by group dynamics”. Hey, we’ve all been there, right? If I had a dollar for every time group dynamics had forced me against my better judgment to jump on top of a reluctant teenager in a hotel room, I would have enough money to put a whole battalion of young girls in cabs after thanking them politely.
The point is, why don’t women modify their behaviour? Why is it always incumbent on we men to restrain ourselves from groping or assaulting or watching a dozen of our friends copulate with, yet nobody ever calls out women for their deliberate and persistent sexual attractiveness? It seems that our moral compass has spun out of control to the extent where we suddenly laud the sexually active woman, but condemn the innocent drunk insensitive footballer. Has the world gone topsy-turvy? When did the balance of power between the sexes shift to such an extent? When did we decide that avoiding sexual assault was the sole responsibility of the assaulter, with no corresponding responsibility on the assaultee? Aren’t relationships these days supposed to be an equal partnership? Not in the case of the relationships between young girls and entire football teams, apparently. No, in those situations, suddenly everything changes and the footballers have to do all the work. They’re expected to read all the subtle signals, pay attention to all the complex issues of consent, say all the thank-yous, make all the police statements. How about a bit of give-and-take, girls?
After all, as Miranda says, with typical warm, knowing wisdom, today “it is men, alone…who must restraint themselves”, despite the very pertinent fact that “young women are told they can act and dress any way they please”; and if that ain’t nail on the head, finger on the pulse, rolled-gold truth. What mad Marxist social engineer hit upon the idea of women acting and dressing any way they please? Have you seen the way they dress these days? It’s like, ladies, I know you have breasts. You don’t have to draw such obvious attention to them. You don’t have to strut around displaying your bodies, as if they were something to be proud of. But there they go, running about in next to nothing, frequenting nightclubs, drinking and dancing and rubbing our noses in their shameless femininity, and here we are, expected to restrain ourselves. We’re expected to just ignore this wanton behaviour, act as if they’re not shattering all our long-cherished moral codes.
We once had a social contract in this country: women covered up and stayed home; and men agreed not to force them into sex except under extreme provocation. As far as I’m concerned, they broke the contract first. Now we have the absurd situation where women get away scot-free with doing whatever they feel like, while somehow a bunch of fit young men are pilloried for no greater crime than giving expression to the perfectly natural, healthy urge that every man has, the urge to climb through a window and stand around naked with some other fit young men, observing each other’s sexual technique. The fact that these men are highly paid elite athletes, for whom any kind of distraction or media brouhaha could seriously affect their match-day performance, just makes the injustice all the more tragic.
Not that men are the only victims here. As Miranda observes, “our era’s turning point in sexual politics confuses women as much as men”. In all likelihood, that lass from New Zealand was quite confused when she went on Four Corners. So you see, women are suffering too. The sheer confusion must be so overwhelming; that’s probably why they act out by seducing all those footballers, or by reading Twilight, or exposing their midriffs, or any of the other bizarre ways in which modern women demonstrate their irretrievable descent into an inescapable moral vortex.
But there’s a way out, ladies. You can turn things around. You can return to your “natural modesty”. You can stop ruining men’s lives with your thoughtless expressions of sexual identity. You can stop blaming the victim – footballers – and start taking responsibility for your own feminist-warped minds.
Just thank God that Miranda came along to save us all, before it was too late.
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
The Earth Shall Tremble At Our Approach
Last Call: I shall be performing at quite a momentous Wordplay tonight at the Dan O'Connell - details in the sidebar. Momentous because it's the last Wordplay before its great convenor Geoff Lemon heads overseas, and also because sharing the bill with me will be hip-hop luminaries Solo of Horrorshow and 1/6 from Illzilla (I don't know either, but people who do say they're very good) and spoken wordy star Briohny Doyle.
I'll be on first, so get in early.
I'll be on first, so get in early.
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Head Scratcher
I'm not sure I quite understand the complaints about stay-at-home mothers not getting maternity leave. To take "leave", I believe you actually have to have a job to take leave from. I think maternity leave is meant to be a payment to tide a new mother over while she's not working. I THINK so. I'm pretty sure that if you don't go to work before you have a baby, continuing not to go to work is not actually "taking leave". But some are complaining that stay-at-home mums are not going to get any maternity leave from the jobs they don't have.
It seems a bit like complaining that you're being discriminated against by being denied workers' compensation payments from a company you don't work for as a result of an injury suffered on a snorkelling holiday.
It seems a bit like complaining that you're being discriminated against by being denied workers' compensation payments from a company you don't work for as a result of an injury suffered on a snorkelling holiday.
Monday, May 11, 2009
Are You Interested In Climate Change?
If so, why? It's boring as hell. In fact, until NOW, nobody had ever said anything interesting about climate change ever! So go read for a thrilling experience.
I do acknowledge a debt of gratitude to Kevin Rudd and his emissions trading scheme for allowing my dreams to take wing.
I do acknowledge a debt of gratitude to Kevin Rudd and his emissions trading scheme for allowing my dreams to take wing.
Sunday, May 10, 2009
To Conservative Columnists Everywhere
I mean you, Robyn Riley, Paul Sheehan and Andrew Bolt, among others:
Please stop whining like little bitches about how mean Perez Hilton was to Miss California. He was not in any way denying her right to free speech. This is what free speech is:
Free speech is when you have the right to say any bubbleheaded, fundamentalist Christian idiocy that pops into your spacious little skull, and when you do, anyone else has the right to call you the homophobic retard you are.
That's free speech. Giving your opinion of someone else's opinion isn't anti-free speech, it's the very definition of free speech. Get over it.
Oh, and also, the bimbo posed topless. It was against the rules. Nobody made that up to bring her down; the pictures are on the internet. Get over that too.
Oh, and also: I KNOW Perez Hilton is an insufferable dick. That doesn't mean he's not right about this little twit.
Please stop whining like little bitches about how mean Perez Hilton was to Miss California. He was not in any way denying her right to free speech. This is what free speech is:
Free speech is when you have the right to say any bubbleheaded, fundamentalist Christian idiocy that pops into your spacious little skull, and when you do, anyone else has the right to call you the homophobic retard you are.
That's free speech. Giving your opinion of someone else's opinion isn't anti-free speech, it's the very definition of free speech. Get over it.
Oh, and also, the bimbo posed topless. It was against the rules. Nobody made that up to bring her down; the pictures are on the internet. Get over that too.
Oh, and also: I KNOW Perez Hilton is an insufferable dick. That doesn't mean he's not right about this little twit.
Thursday, May 7, 2009
Musing...
The thing about the issue raised in the last post is...
Andrew Bolt rails against the tragedy of allowing this poor girl to change her sex, on the basis that she was not born a "boy in a girl's body", but was somehow "twisted" into this state of mind by the abusive behaviour of parents.
And this line seems to assume that if someone is not born into a certain state, that state is not actually genuine.
Let us suppose that Bolt is right (God forbid), and that yes, "Alex" was not born with gender dysphoria, but instead developed the condition later in life. Does that mean her condition is not genuine? If she was not born this way, does that make it any easier for her to keep living as a girl? Does it make her need to be a boy any less urgent? Does a desire lose its legitimacy because it arose in the world and not in the womb?
The whole nature versus nurture debate is inherently flawed. Take the issue of homosexuality. Sure, if you can convince a fundamentalist that gays are born, not made, you might get them to stop trying to convert them back, but in reality it doesn't matter. If a gay person isn't born gay, but becomes gay as a child, as a teenager, as an adult, it doesn't make it wrong to be gay. If scientific evidence came to light tomorrow, proving beyond doubt that homosexuality is definitely a matter of upbringing or environment, it wouldn't change one bit the acceptability of homosexuality, or the importance of gay rights. It wouldn't make homophobes right.
So sure Andy, maybe "Alex" was made into who she is, not born that way. But that doesn't make her any less miserable now, and it doesn't make her any less entitled to try to be happy.
Andrew Bolt rails against the tragedy of allowing this poor girl to change her sex, on the basis that she was not born a "boy in a girl's body", but was somehow "twisted" into this state of mind by the abusive behaviour of parents.
And this line seems to assume that if someone is not born into a certain state, that state is not actually genuine.
Let us suppose that Bolt is right (God forbid), and that yes, "Alex" was not born with gender dysphoria, but instead developed the condition later in life. Does that mean her condition is not genuine? If she was not born this way, does that make it any easier for her to keep living as a girl? Does it make her need to be a boy any less urgent? Does a desire lose its legitimacy because it arose in the world and not in the womb?
The whole nature versus nurture debate is inherently flawed. Take the issue of homosexuality. Sure, if you can convince a fundamentalist that gays are born, not made, you might get them to stop trying to convert them back, but in reality it doesn't matter. If a gay person isn't born gay, but becomes gay as a child, as a teenager, as an adult, it doesn't make it wrong to be gay. If scientific evidence came to light tomorrow, proving beyond doubt that homosexuality is definitely a matter of upbringing or environment, it wouldn't change one bit the acceptability of homosexuality, or the importance of gay rights. It wouldn't make homophobes right.
So sure Andy, maybe "Alex" was made into who she is, not born that way. But that doesn't make her any less miserable now, and it doesn't make her any less entitled to try to be happy.
Wednesday, May 6, 2009
Is there anything the man can't do?
Andrew Bolt this week writes about the case of "Alex", a 17-year-old girl who wants to be a boy, and who was given permission by Chief Justice Diana Bryant to undergo a double mastectomy to allow her to do so.
Bolt says:
"I have not spoken to Alex. Bryant has. I am not a psychiatrist. Bryant, I presume, has consulted those who are."
And yet, it is a measure of the man's perspicacity, wordly knowledge and polymathic expertise that despite this, he knows the decision is wrong, why it's wrong, and what everyone should have done instead.
Bravo, Andrew, your mighty brain leaves us stuttering in awe
Bolt says:
"I have not spoken to Alex. Bryant has. I am not a psychiatrist. Bryant, I presume, has consulted those who are."
And yet, it is a measure of the man's perspicacity, wordly knowledge and polymathic expertise that despite this, he knows the decision is wrong, why it's wrong, and what everyone should have done instead.
Bravo, Andrew, your mighty brain leaves us stuttering in awe
Sunday, May 3, 2009
Live!
Short notice, but you can catch me on "Lime Champions" on Triple R tonight, around 7:40pm. That's 102.7 FM, or http://www.rrr.org.au/ to listen.
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