Seize The Defeat

So, an offensive menu was printed up for a Mal Brough fundraiser. And we are, naturally, in quite a flap about it.

And yes, fair enough. It was gross. It was sexist. It was nasty. It was a shitty joke, and it wasn't even original.

And look, I have no problem with anyone asserting that Mal Brough is a sleazebag. There's the whole James Ashby affair, and oh yeah, that little thing called the NT Intervention. Believe me, I need no convincing that Mal Brough is a first-class dickferret of the very highest purity.

But here's the thing about menugate, or quailgate, or big red boxgate or whatever bullshit it's being called:

Tony Abbott will still win.

It has been blindingly obvious for some time now that the Labor Party is going to go down in flames in September. And yet somehow, the True Believers keep seizing on moments like Brough's menu, claiming that this time,. THIS time, the Coalition's goose is truly cooked. The voters simply won't stand for such appalling misogyny, the True Believers squawk. Women won't be treated like this anymore, they scream. Now that the Liberals have shown their TRUE colours, Julia Gillard's dignity and toughness and determination will win the day and all will be well.

I am sorry, True Believers: all will not be well. And every time you say that THIS will be the straw that breaks the camel's back, a new batch of polls come out and show that the camel is doing a buck-and-wing all over Labor's expiring corpse.

The reason we keep going through this is that the True Believers, justifiably appalled as they are by Tony Abbott's appalling character, cannot conceive of any other explanation for Labor's subterranean popularity than that the electorate simply doesn't UNDERSTAND how bad the Opposition is. Once they do, the story goes, everything will turn around.

Once again, I am sorry to be the one to break it to you: they know. Everyone knows. They've all seen him, they've all heard him, they've all read about him. And they either don't care, or see what you think are character flaws as virtues.

When someone you hate does something you disapprove of, it's seductively easy to assume that this will cause everyone else to hate them too, because you've been hating them all along. It's seductively easy to assume that everyone else thinks the way you do, and the only reason they disagree with you is they don't have all the facts.

Sadly, sometimes people have all the facts and still think you're wrong.

Sadly, sometimes people are bastards, and they like it when other bastards are in charge.

Sadly, Tony Abbott is going to be prime minister, and whatever miracle it might take to prevent that is going to have to be a hell of a lot more volcanic than a shitty sexist joke on a menu of murky antecedents.

And given that fact, why should we keep on making excuses for Julia Gillard's hapless Washington Generals of a government?

The fact is, Gillard ain't all that. Her asylum seeker policy is brutality embraced in the name of expediency. She made a mess of the mining tax in her haste to cave to big business and get the issue off her desk. She is continuing our pal Brough's racist intervention. She gave a nice big smack to single parents the same day she electrified the world by bawling out Abbott in parliament. Her stance on marriage equality enrages pretty much all her staunchest supporters. And her government has done many good and admirable things, she is singularly bad at turning them to her advantage, which, whether it be the media's fault, or Kevin Rudd's, or Abbott's, is nonetheless a fact.

So why should we on the nominally "left" side of politics be as eager as we have been to gloss over all that?

Well obviously it's because, for all her faults, Gillard is better than Abbott. No doubt about that. Though Labor has done some stuff badly, the Coalition will be ten times worse, and we have to fall in behind Gillard to stop Abbott getting in at any cost. Wise words.

But the fact is, Abbott IS going to get in. So what's the point of being "better than Abbott" when you're not going to win anyway?

While Labor had a chance, it made sense to bend our energies to supporting them, to keep the Liberals at bay. But that's failed. The Liberals have stormed the parapet. The shields are down. Labor is dead in the water.

So trying to keep Abbott out is now a lost cause. And any attempt to downplay the failings of Labor in the interests of realpolitik is no longer a brave stab at bringing about the lesser of two evils, but rather an exercise in futility that simply continues the relentless lowering of standards in political discourse.

Consider: if you are backing "crappy" because it's better than "crappier", when "crappy" has no chance of winning, you're not staving off "crappier", you're just ensuring that "crappy" becomes the best we can ever hope for.

So why not stop standing up for "crappy"? Why not starting calling out bad behaviour, bad policy, bad government, no matter which party is engaging in it? The partisan battle is over, let's redirect our energies into demanding better from ALL sides of politics. Let's make it clear that we want to raise standards.

Most of all, let's rediscover our integrity and commit to standing up, in all circumstances, for what we really believe, for what we think is RIGHT, rather than desperately trying to rationalise support for better-than-Abbott.

And hey, we've got preferential voting. We'll be putting better-than-Abbott ahead of Abbott anyway. Don't worry, as long as better-than-Abbott has a lower number next to it on your ballot paper, you've discharged your responsibilities to the temple of low expectations.

But when we're out in the world, fighting and arguing and debating and lobbying and tweeting and blogging and emailing ministers, let's stop shouting our disapproval of "them" while we whisper our disapproval of "us". Let's make clear that right is right, and wrong is wrong, and while political realities obviously have always to be recognised, we're not going to support any politician who flat-out reverses the two.

Right now, my fellow travellers on the Lost Bus Of The Left, we are down. We're outnumbered and outgunned. But even at this moment we can be heard, and we can make clear what we want. Even with our worst enemy in the Lodge, we can articulate how we want this country to be better.

And when the worm turns and we find ourselves up and about again, we can make sure that those who would represent us know that we want them to fight for what's right, not just for what's slightly less wrong.

We're about to get beaten. But if we can stand up, we don't have to be broken as well.

A True Larrykin

If there is one thing I love, it's a larrikin. Know what I mean? A good old-fashioned, mischievous, good-humoured, larrikinish larrikin, the kind of larrikin that made Australia what it is today: i.e. a country full of larrikins.

The trouble, of course, is that although this country is full of larrikins, we are ruled over by a bunch of decided non-larrikins. Our politicians are all so soft and wishy-washy and feminised they wouldn't know larrikinism if it jumped up and shoved a sugar glider down their pants.

Our media is decidedly non-larrikinish too. Michelle Grattan is a poor excuse for a larrikin. And with the best will in the world, I think you'd have to concede that Ross Gittins is very far from being the intellectual heir of famed SCG wag "Yabba" Gascoigne. In fact, the entire press gallery is not the intellectual heir of famed SCG wag "Yabba" Gascoigne, and it seems a bit of a shame that the media watchdog is so obsessed with so-called "cash for comment", and never gives the slightest thought to redressing the lack of "Yabba"-resemblers in our media landscape.

However, we need not immerse ourselves entirely in gloom, because there is one man willing to stand up for tradition and patriotism and not-climate change left in our great nation, and that man is Larry Pickering.

Pickering has been one of our greatest larrikins for decades, of course, his larrikinish cartoons bringing joy to millions and keeping alive the larrikin flame that has been burning bright since Gallipoli, when the Anzacs staved off the horrors of war with cheeky japes and drawings of Billy Hughes's cock.

It is in that tradition that Pickering continues to hold the "stuffed shirts" to account on his website, and in particular in brave, truthful-yet-larrikiny pieces like this one, in which he exposes the monstrous threat to our democracy that is Anne Summers and her radical femo-socialist agenda, finally pricking that balloon of man-hating, excessive body hair and mandatory lesbianism that has been hovering over the great southern land ever since Paul Keating rammed through legislation that allowed women to exit buildings.

In the best larrikin tradition, of course, Pickering is not a vindictive man. He is slow to anger, but sharp as a tack and full of boisterous and wittily logical argumentation when roused, and this was no exception. As he writes:

I had never heard of a person called Ann Summers (not sure Ann is with or without an "e" and I couldn't care less really) until she said somewhere that my scribblings were responsible for Jill Meagher's murder.

See how he first demonstrates how he is the bigger man - he had not even heard of Summers, because he has better things to do, like defending our democracy. He emphasises how far above the pettiness of the world by indicating that he doesn't even care how Summers's name is spelt. This is a good sign of a lofty mind.

But then we get to the nub: the reason why any man of good conscience would speak up at this point: Summers accused Larry Pickering of being responsible for Jill Meagher's death.

What's worse, she did it "somewhere": if there is anything worse than a woman who calls an innocent man a murderer, it is a woman who calls an innocent man a murderer in an indeterminate and ill-defined location. Luckily, I've sleuthed a tad and found out exactly what Summers said in this disgraceful smear. Her words are as follows (be warned it is fairly strong stuff):

I just saw television footage of thousands of people walking in a peace march along Sydney Road past Hope Street to honour the memory of Jill Meagher. It was a beautiful sight and a powerful reminder that for all the Alan Joneses of this world, most Australians are decent honourable people who are disgusted by this culture of vilification and violence.

I'm sorry I had to put that on the blog, but you had to know how depraved "radical womanhood" (god Pickering has a way with words) can get. Look at that paragraph. "It was a beautiful sight" she writes. "Most Australians are decent honourable people". "I just saw television footage".

VOMIT.

We know what you're saying. You can couch in separatist anarchist neo-Greerist psychobabble all you like, Ann(e), but when you write "disgusted", we can read between the lines: you are saying that Larry Pickering murdered Jill Meagher. We're onto you. What a revolting accusation.

But all good larrikins know how to make freedom-lemonade out of feminazi lemons, and Pickering does so by taking the opportunity to expose the misandry and harridanism at the heart of public life. Having gone to notorious communo-hotbed "The Drum", a website run by the ABC Politburo, Pickering found more of Summers's "work". Like any red-blooded larrikin, Pickering "couldn't bring myself to read it closely", and who could blame him? But reading things is unnecessary to identify radical agendas - indeed it can be counterproductive. The important thing is that in his article he draws, with uncanny plausibility, a direct line between Summers, her big fans Christine Milne and Lee "Uncle Joe" Rhiannon, the plummeting value of Whitehaven Coal shares, Tanya Plibersek's husband-fronted drug operation, child sex, drink-driving, fraud, and prunes. It's a vast conspiracy and it takes a journalistic mind of remarkable acuity to pull it all together so neatly, but that's what Pickering has done, and it's a relief to us all I'm sure that he's manning the parapets as Castle Australia is assaulted by this army of green red pink warmenist homosexual vagina-owning orcs.

And it's those aforementioned prunes, the ones clogging up Summers's reproductive tract, that as Pickering notes, are the whole problem, as they have led to this she-beast breathing fire all over our constitutional rights and causing us to not only have to stand an "elected" prime minister with ill-fitting jackets, but also enabled the violent, financial and sexual crimes of the modern Australian Labor Party. Thanks a lot Anne, you armpit-hair-encouraging, child-molester-enabling, economy-destroying, lipstick-flaunting "writer". You have wrecked Australia and now we may as well live in Afghanistan, if it's not already infested by all the feminists which Larry Pickering's blog commenters wish to send there.

So all power to you, Larry Pickering. You are not only a savvy journalist and a masterful artist, you are a patriot, a freedom fighter, and most improtantly, a larrikin of rare note. Don't listen to those who wish to silence you, who wish to repress the truth. Don't listen when they tag you "sexist" or "misogynist" or "racist" or "insane" or "a bankrupt serial conman" or "a sad old derelict sniggering at his own dick-pictures" or "a rambling maniac who can't even concentrate on one thing for the five minutes it would take to compose a coherent blog post".

Don't listen to any of them, Larry. We TRUE Aussies know what you are, and we salute you for it. As your loyal reader "gungit" notes:

"Why is it all the ugly woman are so prejudiced?"

Exactly. EXACTLY.

A low down dirty shame

OK so I need to talk about this comic, which I found through the @EverydaySexism twitter account. Have a look, we'll continue below.





So, this roused great emotions within me, not because the behaviour depicted in the comic is horrible, awful, heinous behaviour. I mean, it IS, but that fact isn't what gets me going.

What gets me going is that apparently this actually happens.

Seriously - it doesn't just happen in comics. I know women, and I hear women tell stories, and situations like the one in the comic happen. In real life.

Isn't that insane? I mean, I know that stuff like this happens, but most of the time I don't think about it, and whenever I do think about it, I feel like I've just found out that Die Hard is based on a true story.

Because that...that is just not the way human beings behave. Is it? Obviously it is. Obviously there are a bunch of actual, human, grown adult male people who go around shouting obscenities at women they don't even know.

And I can't fathom that. My mind's gears loudly grind when it tries to process this thought.

Because here's the thing: I'm not a very good guy. On any objective scale, I am a weak-willed, cowardly, thoughtless, selfish, greedy, lazy, uninteresting, socially inept man. This I know. This, I think, is not a secret.

But there is one thing I can say in my favour: it has never occurred to me to shout "show us your tits" at a woman in public. It has never occurred to me to call a woman I don't know a slut because she doesn't enjoy the experience of being sexually harassed. It has never occurred to me to make sexual advances to a stranger at all, let alone one who is simply passing by exhibiting no signs of wishing to be subjected to loud, braying comments upon her physical appearance. Whatever such signs may look like: I don't really know.

And when I say it has never occurred to me, I don't mean that I look at women in the street and make a considered decision not to yell at them. I mean the thought that this might actually be a course of action open to me has never even entered my head. I've never had to make this decision, because I have never, in my entire life, found myself in a situation where I've thought, hmm, maybe I could shout "Nice boobs!" at that lady.

Never. Not once has this happened. Never have I had to weigh the advisability of acting like the men in that comic, because never has my mind even entertained the possibility that I could. Thinking about whether I should harass women on the street is basically in the same category, for me, as thinking about whether I should travel across the Pacific standing upright on the wing of a 737: it's just not an option. The reason I've never had to make a decision about shouting "Show us your tits" is the same reason I've never had to make a decision about eating a live rhinoceros.

And that's why I don't get it: how can these men actually be behaving this way? How can human minds actually not only contain the outright ludicrous concept of publicly bellowing sexually aggressive inanities at someone you've never met, but go on to decide that acting on the thought would be a good expenditure of time and breath?

How? How can this happen in real life?

And yet it does happen in real life, and it's a disgrace. A disgrace for many reasons, but most of all, for this: these men make me look good.

As mentioned before, I'm not much of a man. I am, essentially, lame. But compared to these guys - who seem to be quite numerous - I appear to be some kind of patron saint of sensitive modern masculinity. They are making me look fantastic in contrast to themselves. It therefore becomes possible for me to give myself big ups, to portray myself as a really sensationally nice guy, simply by behaving at a sort of base level of civilised human decency. I'm not really being nice, I'm just being barely ordinary and maintaining a fairly unexceptional belief that the people around me are human beings irrespective of what kind of fleshy lumps their body might be sporting. But when I see other men behaving in the manner detailed above, I feel like I'm actually a pretty nice guy.

The fact is, these guys are giving me a good name. And that is just plain wrong.

HAS FEMINISM GONE TOO FAR????

"Has feminism gone too far?" asks noted intellectual and pantsman Bob Ellis in his latest think-piece. Perhaps you would care to offer your answer on this. But be warned, before you do, your answer is stupid, because you are not as clever as people like Bob and me and possibly Kim Beazley.

It is important to ask whether feminism has gone too far, because if it HAS, we need to take action to prevent good men being ruined by accusations of things they didn't do, and also things they did do, because isn't being accused of something you did the cruellest injustice of all?

As Ellis points out, feminism is out of control when even a good man like Lord Byron is forced to die in Greece just because he was an incestuous pederast - how much longer must we endure these time-travelling feminists destroying the history of Romantic poetry? What's next? Feminists arresting Alexander Pope for raping quokkas? It is only a matter of time and I hope you are happy Naomi Wolf.

The point is, all the famous people who have ever raped anyone are GOOD MEN. Why do feminists hate GOOD MEN? Why do feminists prefer bad men, just because they bad men are not pederasts or rapists or Bill Clinton? It's like, "Oh yeah, John is a good man, but he raped me, so I'm going to get all thingy about it and destroy his excellent political career. Because I hate good men!"

Is that really feminism? Wouldn't a TRUE feminist, a decent, honest, dedicated feminist, LIKE good men? Wouldn't they want to build a better world and realise the occasional sexual assault is a small price to pay for economic stability? Wouldn't a TRUE feminist spend her time working to make women less nasty and evil, rather than constantly destroying Greece's economy in sympathy with stupid prostitutes making outrageous claims in inverted commas?

Yes that's right, Germaine: you ruined Greece. Thanks a LOT.

Let us not forget the original meaning of "feminism", from the Greek "femi" meaning "women" and "nism" meaning "should shut up and be grateful".

Hasn't feminism gone too far when not only Oscar Wilde, but also Winston Churchill, are accused of being big gay people? Why are feminists so anti-gay? And so anti-left-wing? Winston Churchill, John McCain, Arnold Schwarzenegger - the list of progressive left-wing warriors who have been ruined by feminists' insistence on being total dicks is literally endless. And by literally I mean not literally. It's a literary device, idiot, look it up!

I remember when feminists knew their place. I remember when you could have a decent conversation with a feminist without being accused of raping her ears and being smuggled into the Hague with not even enough time to pop your ears. I remember when feminists knew the value of a good scone. I remember when feminists were happy to stay in the kitchen, incubating their eggs. I remember when feminists took a threat to ruin their careers if they wouldn't get on their knees in the jocular spirit in which it was intended.

What happened, feminists? Did you get bitter because you couldn't find a man? I understand. It's hard being ugly, isn't it? But just because you're ugly doesn't mean you should persecute GOOD MEN just because they are GOOD MEN! It is getting to the point where a man can't even squeeze his secretary's breasts at a Christmas party without being dubbed a "predator". It is getting to the point where a man can't even indulge in a good-natured bit of spiking a girl's drink and then having sex with her while unconscious and filming it and broadcasting it on a public website and then writing "HA HA HA" in black artliner on her boobs and then stealing her handbag and then masturbating into her fridge without being labelled a "pervert". Even if he is a GOOD MAN, he must wear this tag forever. Even if he is a poet. Even if he is Shakespeare. Even if he is a promising junior minister in a Labor government. Why do feminists hate promising junior ministers?

Is it because feminists don't have penises? Do they hate penises?? I think they're jealous. I was in a bunch of feminists the other day, and I showed them all my penis, and I could tell by their looks of disgust that they had an innate hatred of penises. Penises are a natural thing, feminists! Love them! After all I don't hate vaginas - I like them even though they're gross and they scare me.

Feminists, I don't want to fight. I don't want hostility. I think we can reach a mutual understanding between the women of this world, and the actual human beings. All we need is for feminists to imagine a world without poetry. A world without literature. A world without progressive politics. A world without media-friendly Labor politicians. A world without right-wing conservatives who are actually left-wing if you know them like we do. A world without good men.

This is the world we are in for if we continue down this path of accusing every single famous left-wing man ever of raping women and liking little boys. Right now, 90% of good men are in jail for rape, while Bill O'Reilly and Hitler run around free.

Here is the deal, feminists: If you can stop accusing us of sexual misdeeds, stop trying to ruin our careers just because we have strong passions and enormous physical magnetism, stop attempting to have us thrown into jail for no better reason than the fact we have committed a crime, stop suing us for every petty little grope and trivial assault we might commit in the course of good old-fashioned horseplay - if you can do all these things...

Then we will continue advancing society, ensuring economic and political stability, producing wonderful art, and being nice to women most of the time unless we're drunk or feeling a bit frisky.

Is it a deal feminists? Can't we go back to how things used to be, when men were men, and women were women, and it was only you who had to be ashamed of that fact?

Hasn't feminism gone too far? Can't we roll it back a bit? Isn't it time to admit that basically, men are pretty good, no matter what they do?

Look into your hearts, feminists - assuming you have any - and try to find it within yourselves to stop bitching.

Because seriously, it is REALLY killing the mood.

One for the Ladies

On International Women's Day, I think it's important that we share some really great news about women, and how it's now become easier than ever to judge them purely on their physical appearance in a nice, polite way.

The Daily Telegraph brings us the feelgood story of the year, the news that women will no longer be compared to fruit, but instead to dead painters.

I mean, if you're a woman - and if you are, I just want to say, WELL DONE, you're a real trooper - you know what it's like to be called a pear, or an apple, or a banana, or a nectarine. It's humiliating. But what's the alternative? Just call women fat ugly hogs? Well, yes, that would solve everyone's problems, but you know, feminism, am I right?

So it's good that underwear brand Triumph (underwear companies: nature's philanthropists) has stepped up to provide an elegant solution that will fix everything: name body shapes after painters!

You see, throughout history women have been facing the same problem: how to get others to use nicer words when assigning them categories based on how fat they are. Finally their prayers have been answered!

Here is a quick guide to the new categories, as designated by the International Society For The Designation Of Nicknames For Body Shapes, which as you know is the body which legislates for body shape labels and metes out punishments to those who use the wrong ones:

"Pear-shaped" is now to be known as "Botticelli"

"Hourglass" is now to be known as "Rembrandt"

"Well-proportioned and carrying weight around the middle" (i.e. "Apple", or "gooseberry") is now "Rubens" - Rubens painted chubby chicks, so this will be good for their self-esteem.

The "Raphael" body shape is the one men like, with the little waist and big boobs - what used to be known as the "Jessica Rabbit" or the "cherry tomato".

The "da Vinci" is the one that's all flat and skinny.

The "Matisse" is the one where you're slightly uncomfortable being photographed in your underwear.

The "Pollock" is the body shape of women who have recently had a tin of paint poured over their heads.

The "Picasso" is the body shape of women who have been cursed by gypsies.

The "Whiteley" is for women who are addicted to heroin.

The "Van Gogh" is for women shaped like mental patients.

The "Dali" is for melted women.

The "Kahlo" is for women shaped like Mexicans.

The "Michaelangelo" is the shape of men who are dressed as women.

And of course the "Ken Done" is for women shaped like prostitutes.

You'll get an idea of how it works from the picture below, which is of a "Pro Hart":



Isn't it great? With these labels, women now have the CONVENIENCE of knowing exactly what box they are in, with the RELIEF of people only implying their physical flaws rather than spelling them out explicitly!

This is known as the "Feminist Ideal", and it's appropriate on this IWD 2011 that we celebrate, finally, the end of sexism.

Hooray!

What IS the Fuss About?

I don't see why everyone's getting so worked-up and PC and huffy and lame and sissy over Alannah Hill's comments about David Jones ex-CEO/sex machine Mark McInnes. All she said was that she wished he had touched HER up, and who can blame her? The man is a FOX. ANY woman would be grateful to be harassed by him. Am I right ladies?

Oh, you KNOW I'm right! And Hill (pictured here in one of her own creations)
was just saying what we're all thinking: i.e. "Whoa girl, way to blow your big chance!"


Hell, I'm a GUY, and I want to be harassed by Mark McInnes. For one thing, how good would it be for your self-esteem? Imagine knowing that you were harassment-worthy! Self-worth: through the roof, baby! In fact, I've always wanted to be harassed, by anyone, really. So many times at social functions I've tried to lead the conversation around to the subject of harassment, hoping the object of my affection will try it on.

In fact, ladies, don't you think it's time to stop calling it "harassment"? Isn't it time we used the correct term: "flattery"? Jesus Christ, Kristy Fraser-Kirk, learn to take a goddamn compliment. Take a lesson from Alannah Hill, and maybe then you'll learn to conduct yourself with a little class, a little grace, a little of what the French call "laissez-faire".

Because trust me, Kristy, all this "ooh I'm so sensitive don't touch me there no I'd rather not have sex with you right this minute thanks" nonsense is no way to land yourself a husband. And today, a nation is shaking its head at YOU, the girl who had the chance to engage in intercourse with a man who was both good-looking AND rich, and who turned it down like some kind of lesbian or something. Who turned down what pretty much every men's magazine informs me is every normal girl's dream.

You tell her, Alannah, Girl don't know what she's missing.

Chicks, man. Am I right?

For Our Daughters' Sakes, She Must Be Stopped

The modern media has many purposes – entertainment, education, a substitute for the judicial system – but probably its most important function, for me at least, is as an emergency warning system for everyone who is worried about menaces to society. Whether it’s A Current Affair exposing the threat of single mothers lurking in our supermarket carparks, or the Herald Sun reporting that one in every three Australians is now a paedophile living next door to a primary school, the media is invaluable in letting us know just who’s coming to get us.

Which is why Bettina Arndt is, hands down, my favourite journalist in the whole wide world. If it weren’t for her, I never would have known just how badly my life was being destroyed by women’s low sex drive, and this week she’s done it again, warning us all that the new prime minister, Julia “Medusa” Gillard, is setting a bad example for Australian women everywhere.

It probably has not escaped anyone’s notice that the PM is living with a man, without having first consecrated the relationship via the sacred bonds of marriage. Or that, furthermore, she has chosen to live for 48 years without at any time making use of her reproductive system in pursuit of the survival of the human race and Western civilisation.

Of course, this is fine, in and of itself. If a woman decides that she wants to violate all standards of morality and decency in order to satisfy her own unnatural lusts even as she denies her inherent feminine purpose by selfishly putting the hedonistic enjoyment of a materialistic lifestyle ahead of the creation and nurturing of new life that gives all humanity a reason for being and without which a person is but a hollow soulless shell destined to die alone, unloved and without meaningful contribution to the world, who am I to judge?

But there’s a broader significance to the issue of Gillard’s sexual proclivities and rogue womb that goes well beyond the individual. As Bettina warns, it’s all about the example being set. Women are, as we know, easily led and slaves to trends – just look at Twilight – and there is a very real danger that if set a bad example by the most powerful woman in the land, other women, women without Gillard’s political career to fall back on, and without Gillard’s total absence of normal human emotion to comfort them, might find themselves making bad decisions..

And prime ministers are, of course, exceedingly influential in social matters, as we’ve seen time and again, with the likes of the Italian suit craze of the Keating years, or the enormous popularity in the late 1960s of disappearing mysteriously at sea. Why, Frank Forde was only in power for eight days, and yet that week sales of nipple rings rose 400 percent. And that was based on nothing more than an unfortunate misquote from a Press Club dinner. So we see how much sway prime ministers have over the common people.

Prime Minister, or First Whore?

And so what are the women of Australia – bless their little hearts – to think when they see Ms Gillard stand up before them and say, “Yes, I am proud to be a living outrage against social cohesion”? Why, quite naturally they will think, “Hey, if it’s good enough for Julia, it’s good enough for me!” And so we will see the country beset by an epidemic of women shacking up with men they aren’t married to, diving headfirst into the murky waters of shared en suites without the sturdy anchor of a marriage certificate to keep them from drifting onto the rocks of dissatisfaction. “I’m unmarried,” they will think to themselves, “I can leave anytime I want to.” And so, at the first sign of trouble or stress or long-term psychological abuse, off they’ll flit, away to the next “committed relationship”, footloose and fancy-free, totally unaware of the terrible price they will pay later in life, when they will live out their lives pushing shopping trolleys full of catfood around the streets, muttering to themselves and asking passing strangers if they’re looking for a de facto.

And what of any children that might come from these reckless relationships? How horribly scarred will these poor mites be, knowing they are the product of idle whims and experimental co-habitation? How horrible will it be for them to be forced to sit in the Bastard Corner at school, shunned by the legitimate students and mocked by the teachers?

Arndt has many examples to back her argument. Pat Rafter, for example. He had a child out of wedlock a few years back, and the results have been catastrophic. Thank God Bettina Arndt has finally taken the opportunity to expose the trail of shattered lives that Pat Rafter has left in his procreating wake. How many more, Pat? How many more people must you rob of dignity and crush beneath your heel before you’re sated?

Of course, there are worse things than children out of wedlock, such as not having children at all. Imagine at 20 telling yourself you would try to follow Gillard’s lead because she is an inspiration to all women, and all of a sudden, BANG! It’s 25 years later and you’re breaking into hospitals to steal babies to make up for all those who were never born because you thought you’d got a “role model” and that it was therefore OK to go to Bali or buy yourself an iPad instead of putting your ovaries to practical use.

So we can see how lucky we are that Arndt sounded the alarm. But still there is something nagging at me. The new prime minister is obviously an intelligent woman – some commentators have described her as “as smart as any man”, which is as high a compliment anyone could wish to be paid assuming she was a character in a Famous Five novel – and she obviously understands the consequences of her actions. So why? Why has she decided to nudge Australian womanhood in the direction of wanton sin and pleasure-seeking infertility?

It just didn’t make sense to me until…until I heard Gillard this week reveal on radio a rather disconcerting fact: she doesn’t believe in God.

Suddenly everything clicked into place. The non-marital sex. The wasted uterus. The pantsuit. She’s been operating without a moral compass. Flying blind.

I don’t see this from a Christian perspective; I don’t believe in God either. But I know I can handle non-belief. I know I have the ethical grounding and moral viscera to prevent me from running off half-cocked due to my lack of a higher power. I’m not sure this is the case for the PM.

Because sadly, even though you and I know we don’t need religion, most people do. Most people are far too stupid to be allowed to formulate their own moral frameworks and make their own decisions about good behaviour. Most people need to be protected from their own blithering idiocy, something the Labor Party knows all too well – that’s why they’re setting up an internet filter. And God is the internet filter of our everyday lives: keeping a watch on us and blocking us from all the naughty things that we really want to do. Like an internet filter, God also doesn’t necessarily work all the time, and slows us all down quite a bit, but at least he keeps us headed in the right direction.

And I’m afraid this is exactly where Julia Gillard’s problem lies. She answers to no higher power. She used to; and Rudd perhaps managed to keep her debauchery in check. But now he’s gone, she’s accountable to nobody but herself, and so will continue to engage in her perverse, unsanctioned, recreational monogamy, sending the message to all that such behaviour is perfectly acceptable in today’s society and thereby causing the nation to sink under the weight of the fractured relationships and blighted lives that await all who attempt relationships without the proper paperwork.

And so I beg you, Ms Gillard: find God. For your own sake, and for the sake of all the silly, impressionable, scatterbrained young lasses who fail to heed Bettina’s warning, and who look up to you so devotedly as a leader, a feminist icon, and a reasonable substitute for an independent mind.

Don’t let a generation of women slip away from their womanly destinies. Don’t let your own selfishness ruin everything for the rest of us. Pick up a bible. Pick up a nice white dress. Do the honourable thing. Because if our first female prime minister refuses to conform to tried-and-tested gender norms, what’s the point of having a woman there in the first place? We might as well have kept Kevin. At least he could cry like a girl.

I Am Very Racist

So anyway, my latest article at newmatilda is right here.

It is about population policy, and includes phrases such as:

"obstetric dystopia"

"plentiful feral camels"

"take to it like a duck to breadcrumbs"

"the little buggers can swim"

How do I tie it all together? You'll only know if you click on the link!

But more important is the massive controversy that my article has inflamed among at least two people, due to the use of the phrase "Why are you being such a girl" in the introduction. Because according to "swivel35":

Substitute the “n” word for “girl” up there. See? You’d never get away with that nor could you even begin to call that satirical.

I have, indeed, become guilty of racism by word substitution. For example, elsewhere in the article, imagine if you substituted the "n word" for "seafood" in the following sentence:

if we boost our population growth we too can have a thriving electronics industry and a predominantly seafood diet.

That's even WORSE! I mean, "why are you being such a nigger?" is mainly offensive due to its incomprehensibility, but it is distressing to me to discover that I inadvertently advised my readers to eat black people.

Sorry readers!

Just so you can safely avoid this kind of accidental racism, here are some other phrases which you could not get away with if you substituted the word "nigger" for the word "girl":

"I prefer the intimate company of men to that of girls"

"I have four children - two boys and two girls"

"I have to take the girls to netball practice"

"See that girl in the straw hat? She looks pretty stupid"

"Fell In Love With A Girl is one of my favourite songs"

"I think there are distinct educational advantages to be gained by separating boys and girls into separate schools"

"I contracted AIDS from a girl I knew once"

"Girls should all go back to Africa where they came from"

"Stop these goddamned girls getting ideas above their station, strutting about the town, drinking our liquor and raping our womenfolk, damn dirty girls"

REMEMBER THIS!

Misogyny like Mother used to make

Lincoln Lewis's mother speaks out about her darling boy's charming behaviour.

"I don't want that as a daughter-in -law," she said.

And who would want "that" in their family?

It's good to see that even in these days of extreme feminism and fuzzy-headed political correctness, there are still some mothers willing to parent the old-fashioned way - by excusing their children's actions and teaching them women are things.

Bravo, Mrs Lewis. We could all learn a lot

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.

The Monarchy: moving with the times

So Robyn Riley - fearless campaigner for truth, justice and the duty of the mainstream media to publish unsubstantiated nude photos of prominent public figures performing legal and consensual acts in a private place thirty years ago in order that the public know the sort of person that the person they are voting for looks a bit like - this week tackles the monarchy.

Apparently there is a bill under consideration in Britain that would remove the gender bias from royal succession rights.

And as Robyn says, "about time too. It is ridiculous that gender is still relevant".

Yes, indeed, what a ludicrous way of organising one's monarchy. Maybe now, finally, we can bring our undemocratic medieval system of hereditary privilege into the 21st century. It seems absurd that in this day of age, the selection of our head of state should be dependent on their sex. It's about time we took that giant leap forward and selected them based purely and simply on who gets born first to the descendant of whatever family managed to wrest power from another several centuries ago.

After all, it would be terrible if the monarchy were to seem in any way outdated. It must move with the times, lest it be seen as obsolete and pointless and wasteful and generally stupid.

Hate for that to happen.

Bad Ben! Bad!

My latest at newmatilda, in which I am very offensive as I make a number of outrageous statements that are in no way ironic jokes but are in fact meant to be taken seriously on face value, and express very sincere sexist and criminal views.
Enjoy!

Just for the record:

I don't drink beer.

And I did not actually drag the subject up. It was on the front page of Australia's most widely-read newspaper.

Some, of course, might think that Hamza is just a silly little man with a silly beard talking crap to a small group of inadequate losers who have substituted Islam for an ability to talk to women.

Fortunately, there are those in our society willing to disabuse of this notion by informing us that he is in fact A MENACE TO ALL WE HOLD DEAR. So thanks to News Ltd for keeping up the vigilance.

I'm sorry to those who didn't find it funny; I hope you laugh more at next week's.

Now I am off to revel in my unapologetic blokey ockeristic fundamentalist Islamicism.