There is no U in Team

You know, a lot of people come up to me and ask, "Hey Ben, this Team Australia stuff - what's it all about?"

And to be honest, I find these people intrusive and presumptuous. But still, I attempt to answer their questions as best I can, because if there's one thing you know about Team Australia, it's that we try to help our teammates no matter how inadequate we find them as people.

Team Australia is, essentially, a state of mind, a philosophy that says, look, we're all on the same side here, let's work together to achieve our goals.

After all, we all love to feel like we're part of a team. Look at this happy fellas:

Yes, Team Australia is a lot like the 1982 Parramatta Eels. The government is Peter Sterling and Brett Kenny in the halves, controlling play, organising the team and orchestrating the big moves that produce results. The taxpayers of Australia are the forwards in the engine room, Ray Price and Geoff Bugden and of course good old Johnny Muggleton, doing the hard yards that are necessary if we're ever going to let our outside backs do their job: the outside backs in this case being mainly Cate Blanchett and Silverchair. 

The point is that just like a great football team, Team Australia has all its disparate parts performing their designated function in pursuit of the same aim - a strong, prosperous nation. And that's the genius of Team Australia - it uses the powerful imagery of sport, something all Australians understand, to illustrate a point. No wonder Tony Abbott was a Rhodes scholar - that man sure knows a thing or two about using sports words to say things about things that aren't sport!

It's an effective technique. That's why the accessibility of sport permeates our public affairs nowadays. For example, the government is now moving to implement a "red card" system for hate preachers. Why red card? Why not just a "stop hate preachers" policy? Because red cards are sporting, and Aussies love sports! Admittedly red cards are more of a soccer thing, but let's be honest: it's the ones who like soccer we need to be keeping an eye on.

And this is why I hope people don't feel scared or alienated by Team Australia. After all, would you feel scared or alienated by this?

Of course not! Those guys are having a great time! Because being in a team is just fantastic. And we're all in the best team of all - Team Australia. 

Naturally Team Australia requires vigilance. After all, if you're playing cricket you can't just sit idly by and let the batsman hit you for six. Team Australia is all about taking precautions. As a country of course we need to send fielders to the boundary to keep the run rate down. As a country we do have to, at times, bowl a dry line outside off stump. Sometimes we might even need to pitch it outside leg into the footmarks. That's just the nature of Team Australia - a responsible government must be prepared at times of crisis to come around the wicket. Ben Chifley knew this.

Because the fact is, being Team Australia is just as much about responsibilities as it is about rights. Sure, when you're on a great team like Team Australia you get to take the speccie in the goal square, but you also need to make the smother on centre wing, you need to punch from behind and get men around the stoppages. Some people think it's not important that, as citizens, we rush the odd behind, but those people probably don't understand the fundamentals of foreign policy.

You can't stop terrorism with this:

Sometimes you need this:

And that's what I tell those irritating people from the beginning of this article. I tell them, Team Australia is about security, about safety, about prosperity, about democracy, about freedom, about hard work, about togetherness, about patriotism and about justice.

But most of all, Team Australia is about creating a better future. I know that's hard to see sometimes, but maybe it'll be easier to understand if I put it like this:

When you're down six goals in the final quarter, sometimes it's necessary to roll the dice. You don't get over the advantage line by going sideways before you go forward, you need to make sure your scrum is solid before you start worrying about the corner posts. It's easy to get caught offside when you don't keep your eye on the ball, but the one thing we all know is true is, nobody ever scored a goal sitting on the bench. And it's by sitting on the bench that we miss our opportunity to jump the net. Hurdles are natural in life, but you can take the rebound more easily when you hit the training track hard and keep your shape. It's great to play your shots, but a sound forward defensive is the foundation of a flowing cover drive - getting the ball in the right areas is how you tempt the opposition into mistakes. And it's those mistakes that will keep this country out of the bunker, and in the onion bag, for many years to come.

That's what Team Australia means to me. So please: don't be terrorists OK? Because national security is a trophy we can all win.

HOW NOT TO BURN PEOPLE: AN EXTENSION COURSE FOR MEN AND FOOTBALLERS

Remember this? It was very popular, and had a very positive effect on society: in fact more than one man has approached me in public to thank me for my advice and tell me that it was my blog that was helping him to not rape people in almost all normal social situations.

But look: recent developments have shown me that rape isn't the only problem plaguing today's safety-conscious young gentleman: the sad lack of impulse-control that we boys carry as the curse of our birth causes all kinds of problems, many of them not even tangentially rape-related. And so it is that I think now is a good time to offer an extension to my earlier lesson, and hereby present:

THE HANDY GUIDE TO NOT BURNING PEOPLE IN SEVEN EASY STEPS

1. If you see a person, don't set them on fire.

2. If you have a lighter or a box of matches, or find one on the floor or stuck between your couch cushions, don't use it to set a person on fire.

3. If you have hired a person to provide entertainment for you and/or your friends, don't set them on fire.

4. If you are sitting around at a loose end and you think, "I reckon a good idea would be to set someone on fire", don't.

5. If you are a professional footballer looking to relax after a long hard season, and go out for a few drinks and some fun with your teammates, try to remember the golden rule of fun: setting fire to people is not an example of it. If you need to, make a note of it in the "notes" application on your smartphone, or write it in texta on your arm. Some people like to get tattoos on their hands or stomach reading, "IT IS NOT FUN TO SET FIRE TO PEOPLE", but it doesn't always require such extreme measures - whatever works for you is the method you should go with. The main thing is that, at any given time, if someone asks you, "Do you think you would enjoy setting fire to a person?" you are able to clearly and confidently say, "No I do not. That would be stupid."

6. If a person asks you to please set them on fire, even if they ask very politely, say, "No thank you".

7. If you see a person, still don't set them on fire.

There you go! Easy, isn't it? I'm sure you'll be not setting people on fire in no time, with a bit of determination and study. Happy not-fire-setting everyone!

How To Not Rape People: SPECIAL NRL EDITION

Some of you might remember a handy guide to avoiding being a rapist that I posted a little while ago.

Many people found this extremely helpful in their own lives as they struggled to find a way to not rape people. However, unfortunately it has come to my notice that the original guide was far too narrow in its scope. Recent events have shown that certain segments of the wider community need the Guide to be adapted to their special needs. With that in mind,

I therefore here present:

THE HANDY GUIDE TO NOT RAPING PEOPLE IN SEVEN EASY STEPS (special NRL edition)

1. When you meet a dog who doesn't want to have sex with you, don't have sex with it.

2. When you meet a dog who wants to have sex with one of your friends, remember the golden rule: You Are A Different Person To Your Friends. Maybe this handy mnemonic can help: Yentl Acted As Ducks Probed Three Yucky Frenchmen. This will help you remember that a dog who wants to have sex with one person does not necessarily want to have sex with every person it meets. Confusing, I know; what can I say - political correctness, etc. Also, you should probably tell your friend not have sex with the dog, because it is a dog.

3. If you meet a dog who DOES want to have sex with you, but then a bit later it says it'd rather not, don't have sex with it. Again, pretty confusing, I know, but it's due to a special Scientific Fact: sometimes dogs change their minds. Like, remember the time you wanted a kebab, but then you thought no, I'll have a hamburger instead? It's a bit like that, only with sex. Also, there is another Scientific Fact: dogs can't talk, so if a dog tells you it wants to have sex with you, you're probably hallucinating. It's best not to have sex with anything while hallucinating.

4. When you meet a dog who is unconscious, don't have sex with it. This is true even if it was drinking before. I may be delving into some fairly arcane theory here, but scientists have discovered there is actually technically a difference between "drinking a lot of alcohol" and "saying yes I want to have sex with you". This difference is especially pronounced when dealing with dogs. In fact, even when dogs are conscious, don't have sex with them.

5. When you go home with a dog, try not to have sex with it until after it says it'd like to. Which it won't, because it's a dog. Even if the dog followed you home of its own volition, follow this role.

6. Practise not having sex with dogs. I know it's hard - sometimes you just look down and it's like, whoops, I'm having sex with this dog, how did that happen? But I bet with a bit of concentration and discipline, you can actually manage to avoid having sex with someone, even when they're in the same room as you and they have four legs and a tail and fur. It's true! Anyone can do it! Why, last week I met at least five dogs who I actually didn't have sex with, without causing myself any particularly severe internal injuries.

7. When you meet a dog who doesn't want to have sex with you, don't have sex with it. I realise I already said this one, but that was five steps ago, and I have a feeling some of you guys might have slightly short attention spans.

Phew! All bases covered! I feel we probably avoided a pretty bad crisis here.

How Not To Rape People: A Handy Guide For Modern Men And Footballers

In my perusings of the modern media landscape, a worrying trend has come to my attention: young men who apparently just can't stop having non-consensual sex with others. It's a tricky problem, and one to which there are, clearly, no easy solutions. I mean, it's all very well to say "No means no", but as popular ex-footballer/arachnid Peter "Spida" Everitt says, when a girl goes home with a guy at 3am, it's not for a cup of Milo. So we can see there are two sides to every story: on the one hand, a young lady might feel violated, but on the other hand, why do these women keep going round to strangers' houses in the hopes of having some Milo? Why don't they buy their OWN Milo? Young people today, I ask you.

The point is, as a man myself, I know how hard it can sometimes be to not be a rapist. Masculine identity is so ill-defined these days, what with the sexual revolution, feminism, meggings and so on: it's so difficult to know what women want: do they want us to hold the door open and pay for dinner, or do they want us to wait until they're blind drunk and have sex with them against their will? How can we tell? After all, as ABC The Drum commenter "James" says in response to an article by Lauren Rosewarne, "Why are young women so strange?"

Indeed, why? When young women are free to go around being strange all over the place, how can men be expected to know how to behave? This is why we see so many comments around the internet along the lines of "Why do these women put themselves in this situation what do they expect they are just after bragging rights they can't change their minds after the fact I agree with Kerri-Anne Kennerly"?

When people start agreeing with Kerri-Anne Kennerly, society has gone too far, and this is why I have prepared, for the benefit of my fellow man and also people who play football, a Handy Guide To Not Raping People. Feel free to print it out and keep it in your shirt pocket, men, so next time you find yourself in an awkward situation where it seems you have no choice but to rape someone, you can check the guide and gracefully extricate yourself from the sticky predicament.

THE HANDY GUIDE TO NOT RAPING PEOPLE IN SEVEN EASY STEPS

1. When you meet a girl who doesn't want to have sex with you, don't have sex with her.

2. When you meet a girl who wants to have sex with one of your friends, remember the golden rule: You Are A Different Person To Your Friends. Maybe this handy mnemonic can help: Yentl Acted As Ducks Probed Three Yucky Frenchmen. This will help you remember that a girl who wants to have sex with one person does not necessarily want to have sex with every person she meets. Confusing, I know; what can I say - political correctness, etc.

3. If you meet a girl who DOES want to have sex with you, but then a bit later she says she'd rather not, don't have sex with her. Again, pretty confusing, I know, but it's due to a special Scientific Fact: sometimes girls change their minds. Like, remember the time you wanted a kebab, but then you thought no, I'll have a hamburger instead? It's a bit like that, only with sex.

4. When you meet a girl who is unconscious, don't have sex with her. This is true even if she was drinking before. I may be delving into some fairly arcane theory here, but scientists have discovered there is actually technically a difference between "drinking a lot of alcohol" and "saying yes I want to have sex with you". I realise this difference is probably hard to spot for a lot of you guys; you might have to squint a bit.

5. When you go home with a girl, try not to have sex with her until after she says she'd like to.

6. Practise not having sex with people. I know it's hard - sometimes you just look down and it's like, whoops, I'm having sex with this girl, how did that happen? But I bet with a bit of concentration and discipline, you can actually manage to avoid having sex with someone, even when they're in the same room as you. It's true! Anyone can do it! Why, last week I met at least five women who I actually didn't have sex with, without causing myself any particularly severe internal injuries.

7. When you meet a girl who doesn't want to have sex with you, don't have sex with her. I realise I already said this one, but that was five steps ago, and I have a feeling some of you guys might have slightly short attention spans.

So there you go: seven easy steps to becoming a non-rapist. I bet you didn't think it was that simple, did you? You probably thought you'd need electrodes attached to something. But no, you can do it in your own living room! It's just a matter of staying "on the ball" and learning the difference between a girl who wants to have sex with you, and a girl who doesn't. One way is by listening to what she says: a girl who says "Let's have sex" probably wants to have sex; a girl who says "let's not have sex" probably doesn't. I realise listening to what women say will be a new experience for a lot of you, but I'm confident you can manage it. Practise at home first if you like, with a mirror and a wig.

Anyway, good luck with it all, guys! I know you probably think you could never not rape people, but I believe in you, guys! With a little bit of hard work and determination, anyone can not have sex, any time they want! Amazing but true!

Happy Not-raping!

Gays; Football; Etc.

I do not like disagreeing with the smart and stylish Ms Helen Razer. I intensely dislike it; it gives me a migraine and makes me irritable. So it's fortunate that I am rarely forced to do so. But unfortunately one of those rare occasions has now cropped up.

Even more unfortunately, it's on a matter of homosexual issues, on which I am in no way an expert, and not being gay, not particularly well equipped to comment form a position of empathy. But even so.

I disagree with Helen's article which comments on Jason Akermanis's article in the Herald Sun.

The reason I disagree with it is because I really think Helen has misread it. If, as she says, all Akermanis was saying was "it wasn't a good idea for players to "come out" due to the storm of publicity such an act would brew", there'd be no problem.

If Akermanis had simply written that homophobia is a major problem in the AFL, there'd be no problem.

If Akermanis had said that any player who came out as gay would be subject to enormous pressure and vilification, there'd be no problem.

If Akermanis had said that he would advise a gay footballer to keep it secret purely because of the potential damage it would do that player, there'd be no problem.

But he didn't. He said players should stay in the closet, not just for their own sake, but so they didn't damage the "fabric of a club". So they didn't make their teammates uncomfortable in the locker room. Because once he played with a gay guy and nobody wanted to shower with him. Because, in fact, there is too much homoeroticism in football for homosexuality to be acceptable!

And there's the problem. Because if the fabric of a football club is such that it cannot handle homosexuality, the fabric of that club is not worth keeping intact. And if other players are made uncomfortable by the presence of a gay teammate, that's their problem, and they should go away and work on it as much as they need to to take their place in the 21st century as normal, fully-functioning human beings without idiotic hang-ups about gay people.

Now, I get where Helen's coming from. All those voices who pressure closeted gays to come out are misguided; nobody should "have to" come out if they don't want to. Nobody should have to define their sexuality if they don't want to. And if Gary Burns is launching a human rights complaint against Akermanis, then, well, Gary Burns is kind of a tool. And when she says:

Speaking from a personal experience, as many weighing in on this matter have, it's exhausting being defined in the terms of one's sexuality. And this is how one is explicitly defined after the disclosure, "I'm gay" or, worse, "I'm bisexual". Try it as an experiment in your workplace this afternoon. You will be treated as a hyper-sexual peril who cannot be trusted with anything including the stationery supplies. It's exhausting.

I get it, and that sucks. It's terrible.

BUT...it's really pretty easy for those of us who are perfectly able to live whatever lifestyle we want to, to form relationships with who we want to, to take whoever we want to out for dinner, to kiss whoever we want to in public, without worrying about getting vilified, abused, and ostracised by our friends and colleagues, without worrying about our career being crippled, without worrying about witnesses who might run to the paper to splash our name across the front page - in short, for those of us who have no need for a secret life - to tell others they shouldn't make such a big deal about their sexuality.

Straight people get to do all that. In most spheres of life, gay people do too. Those of us making a living commenting on these issues, like me, or Helen, or Gerard Whateley, or Michael Shmith, certainly do: should we be in a relationship with a partner of our choosing, nobody will tell us we have no right to tell anyone about it because it's all too much for our fragile industry to bear.

In football, they don't (apparently this also applies to politics - see David Campbell).

And that's they key. It's not about making a big hullabaloo about sexuality. It's not about being a "career homosexual". It's not about anyone having any kind of "duty" to come out. It's about saying, if people don't want to hide their sexuality, they shouldn't have to. If you don't want to say "I'm gay", or "I'm bisexual" at work, don't. It's idiotic to suppose you should "have to". But if someone asks you about your partner at work, you shouldn't feel that you have to lie about it either.

A footballer should be able to hold his boyfriend's hand on the Brownlow red carpet. A footballer should be able to kiss his boyfriend in public. A footballer should be able to mention his boyfriend in an interview. Or not, if he doesn't want to. But nobody has the moral right to tell him he shouldn't.

The first one who does is going to cop it, pretty harshly. It will take massive courage to do it, and I don't blame anyone who chooses not to go down that path. Nobody should ever be pressured to come out, in any walk of life. But nobody should be pressured not to, either, and THAT is where Akermanis breaks down, and where his supporters make their mistake too, in my opinion.

Because Akermanis may hope for a day when "coming out isn't a big deal", but the fact is, that day will never come unless people actually do it. Nobody will ever let you sit at the front of the bus as long as you stay in the back with your mouth shut.

I hope no gay footballer feels he "has" to come out. Or that he "has" to stay in the closet. But I hope someday soon some DO come out, because that inestimably brave act will be the first step towards ensuring future footballers don't have to be that brave, just to stop hiding.

Smarter than your average jar

The article which WAS here, on the subject of Gary Ablett's Herald Sun think-piece about evolution, peanut butter, and why it's science's fault he supplies massive amounts of drugs to women young enough to be his daughter, has been taken off the blog due to the piece being promoted to the ABC. Enjoy it there.

But while you're here, why not admire the great man's unique grace and athleticism. And, um, brains and stuff.

OK

So climate change denialists aren't the only stunningly stupid people out there. There are also those who read humour columns. I mean, not all of them, but some.

Check out my latest, here. It's not the worst example of the "I don't get it, and I shall now prove it beyond doubt" genre, but there are a couple of prize pigs in there.

"mocking of women taking non-traditional roles". Sigh. Yes, yes, of course.

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 Burdens Of Office

I think possibly the most amusing thing about the current Collingwood footballers drink-driving saga - and there is plenty there to choose from - is that Eddie McGuire, when berating the playing group, told them that being president of Collingwood had cost him "four or five Gold Logies".

I suppose at this time we should take the opportunity to express our gratitude to the Collingwood Football Club for sparing us this.

He also apparently told Ben Johnson he was fat, which seems to me a little off-topic, like he became incoherent with rage and simply started spouting off random insults.

"You embarrassed me and you embarrassed the club and you're stupid and you've got to grow up and I just...I just...you're fat...you're fat and you're stupid and shut up and and and you smell and I HATE YOU!"

HELP! GAYS!

Former Victorian premier and current Hawthorn Football Club president Jeff Kennett succumbs to his constant fear that his face will seize up if he keeps his mouth shut, and backs a football club that sacked a trainer for being gay.

Jeff is worried that if you let a gay man massage other men it "ran an unnecessary risk".

"It's the same if you have a pedophile there as a masseur, right?" said Mr Kennett, showing that endearing sensitivity that made him such a beloved political figure.

Indeed it is, Jeff - in fact, the previous 22 years the chap spent working for the football club were probably just a clever, slow-burning ruse, waiting for the perfect moment to out himself, upon which he would seize his opportunity and start raping everyone in sight.

So naturally, the football club did the right thing. Somebody has to take a stand before these gays start thinking of themselves as people.

In News Limited papers, Robbo and Ando discussed the issue with equal sophistication and intelligence. Apparently Ando and Robbo "both know where Jeff's coming from". Also, they admire Jeff, because "at least he speaks his mind".

So when you email Robbo and Ando to point out that they are oafish halfwits perpetrating a laughable mockery of the word "journalism", you will get a speedy reply commending you on how well you speak your mind. Since forthrightness is all that matters, after all.