There’s an old saying, ‘The whole world’s going crazy!’
Well, when I look around me at how politics has gone lately, I’m inclined to agree and not think it is mere hyperbole.
You just have to look at a few recent examples from around the globe to see what I mean.
Let’s start with the most ridiculous first.
‘Swaziland media had reported Monday that the police had banned women from wearing miniskirts & midriff-revealing tops, saying they were provoking rape.’ With an example given of one woman who was told by her, male, boss to go home from work and get changed after wearing a ‘mini skirt’ to work, which was 1cm above the knee!
What is it about ‘a sense of proportion’, ‘being reasonable’, self-control & keeping it in their pants, that these men do not understand? Why the overweening urge to control women because they can’t control themselves?
It’s just crazy to think that women have to be blamed, again, in the 21st century, for what men might do to them.
Luckily, in this instance, sanity has prevailed in the government of Swaziland, and a spokesman has said that, “Government has not deliberated and taken any position to that effect in recent times or any other time, nor has it ordered the arrest of anyone wearing a mini skirt.” He said, “The National Constitution of the Kingdom of Swaziland(2005) protected the freedom and rights of women in the country such that no custom may be imposed on them in which they were in conscience opposed.”
Still, it was a close-run thing, and it’s not to say that there aren’t many governments now around the world who aren’t reimposing paternalistic and stiflingly authoritarian controls over the women in their society. Saudi Arabia, Iran, and possibly Egypt now too, to name just a few. Plus, if you’re Homosexual in Uganda, forget about being ‘Out Loud and Proud’.
From The Guardian of November 26:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/nov/26/uganda-anti-homosexuality-bill
However, as a gay Ugandan blogger sardonically points out:
‘In fact, if you re-read your anthropology, [Madame Speaker], you will find that homosexuality was tolerated before the White Man came to Africa with his Bible-that foremost foreign import that our detractors love to subjectively, but liberally, quote from.’
http://sebaspace.wordpress.com/2012/11/13/a-letter-to-rebeccakadaga-from-a-supportive-gay-ugandan/
However, what is most interesting here is that this Bill has links back into the vaulting ambitions of the powerful and ambitious men & women of America who make up the Religious Right.
That is, the same Religious Right who are waging a Christian Crusade to take back control of women’s bodies again, on behalf of the males who run the powerful organisations which make up the Religious Right, the Conservative women who facilitate their zealotry, and the political parties, mainly of the Right, through which they seek to express themselves & imprint their agenda upon the national psyche. And which leads to outbreaks of craziness such as this in America recently:
http://crooksandliars.com/karoli/hobby-lobby-will-defy-federal-requirement-p
‘Hobby Lobby Will Defy ACA Requirement for Free Contraception’
Though it’s not really ‘free contraception’ but a requirement under the US’s ‘Affordable Care Act'(‘Obamacare’) that an employee’s Health Insurance payments, taken out of their wages by the employer, must include coverage for contraception in the plan the employer uses.
However, owners of the Hobby Lobby Group do not want to comply with that mandate because THEY are devout Christians. Even though, to refuse to comply, opens them up to fines of up to $1.3 million/day.
Just crazy stuff. However, the Religious Right have deep pockets and they have obviously decided on the fight they want to pick with the President, his ‘Affordable Care Act’ and the mandate to provide contraception coverage in the Health Insurance Plans for employees.
But it’s delusional and offensive for the following reasons:
- why should any employer seek to control the sexual health of their employees?
- Since when did contraception, the Pill, essentially, become ‘an abortion-inducing drug’, as these over-bearing religious zealots are trying to claim?
- And as one of their commenters so cleverly put it-
Stupid Git — 12/29/12 10:06am
I’m sure these same people would have no problem with CEO’s from companies like PIMCO and Ethan Allen telling employees what they can and can’t do based on their Islamic beliefs, right? I’m sure this isn’t just another case of the Christian Persecution Complex because they can’t live in the theocracy of their dreams. In fact, let’s make exceptions for all employer’s religious ideals:
If you work for a Jehovah’s Witness: no blood transfusions will be covered.
If you work for a Christian Scientist: No modern medicine at all.
If you work for a Scientologist: No psychiatric coverage.Did I miss any?
Finally, where will it end? Because these religious control freaks never stop at one success. They always want to keep pushing the envelope further. Pushing back against the hard-fought gains that women, minorities & the LGBTI community have made.
You only have to look around the world, as I have shown, with only a few examples, to see where they may take us if we don’t push back.
Which leads me to the Australian leg of our world tour, because I read the other day that Australia’s own religious extremists, ‘The Catch the Fire Ministries’, have started their own political party.
You wouldn’t read about it, a Sri Lankan immigrant to Australia ‘has launched a new Australian political party opposed to multiculturalism’!
However, he says it’s not a racist party it’s just Anti-Muslim(apparently he thinks Muslims are demons), and has a strongly pro-Christian ideology. Goodness knows what he thinks about godless Atheists! But he thinks it’s OK to want to impose his beliefs on government, and to prevent others from attempting to do the same, via government.
Which, of course, brings me to our Alternative Prime Minister, Tony Abbott. Another deeply religious individual.
It’s why I can’t help wondering, when I reflect upon all these other religious ideologues from around the world & in our own country, just what would Tony Abbott try to impose on Australia & Australians as PM of our country?
He says he won’t impose his religious beliefs on the nation, but he just won’t be able to help himself I believe. Already there are examples, too numerous to list here, from his time as a Minister & Senior member of John Howard’s Government, and since as Opposition Leader, which have demonstrated that Tony Abbott’s belief is that his core religious values are the ‘right’ ones, therefore right for the country.
This is why I thought it important to lay out just a few examples of where this type of thinking is taking the world of politics, and the world in general, at the moment, and thus why I think it is so important to defeat Tony Abbott at the next election in 2013.
I want Australia to be an island of sanity in a sea of political madness which is threatening to swamp us.
President Obama’s re-election has provided a bulwark, and Australia needs to join him in the fight against the sort of people who think it’s factually accurate to build theme parks which have humans riding dinosaurs, Fred Flintstone-style. We just can’t let Post-Enlightenment reality be subsumed by cartoon Christian craziness, with all the evil undertones that come with it.
As a scientist, I cannot.
As American, Pulitzer Prize-winning author & MIT Professor, Junot Diaz, put it so succinctly about the Republican Party(but the same goes for all political parties like them):
“The current GOP is ‘a shelter for a lot of messed-up & toxic paradigms’.”
And, might I add, these parties are a shelter for a lot of toxic & messed-up individuals.
They must be prevented from poisoning the political well here in Australia too.
And Professor Diaz puts it so well, encapsulating what I have been trying to put into words here, when he says:
“And what is happening to communities, is not racist but specifically white supremacist oppression.”
Except, I might add, that the 21st century ‘white supremacists’ have co-opted a lot of people like Danny Nahliah, who definitely aren’t White, but who have evolved a sort of symbiotic power relationship with the ‘Middle Aged Conservative Old White Guys’, based around their religious zealotry and the defined benefits riding on their coat-tails brings to them. They’ve sniffed the wind and they know which way it is blowing.
But again Junot has a neat explanation for this:
“The racial system that has sort of got this planet under a grip, a racial system that begins with the concept of coloniality, the racial system that sort of operates, whether it’s the Dominican Republic or the United States(or Uganda, Swaziland or Australia), isn’t called racism, technically, it’s called white supremacy”, he said. “We don’t like to call it white supremacy, because folks get real, like, iffy. They’re like ‘argh’. But technically, it’s that…So whether it’s the privilege of money, the privilege of gender. I mean try to get boys to talk about misogyny & patriarchy. Boys don’t want to talk about that. Why? Well, because, ‘Darn, if I talk about that, that’s a threat to my privilege’.”
And that’s why Prime Minister Julia Gillard’s ‘Misogyny Speech’ was so powerful and one of the most important speeches given by any politician around the world this year. It spoke directly to these themes, and she said it directly to the man who is the embodiment of White Supremacy, Patriarchy, Privilege and Misogyny in Australia today. Tony Abbott.
THE PUB 
It will be fun watching Adam Bandt living on the dole. I look forward to seeing him do all the stuff very familiar to those of us who have had to manage on some sort of benefit. Things like –
Doing all the cooking – budget meals only, no steaks – from scratch using whatever is on special at the supermarket.
Never having takeaway let alone a nice meal at a good restaurant.
Using only public transport or a pushbike or just his own two feet to get around instead of a Comcar or a taxi. He won’t be able to afford to run a car.
Wearing clothes he’s (a) had in the wardrobe for five years or (b) bought at Vinnies or (c) made himself from bargain remnants.
Doing without air conditioning or if he performs his stunt in winter, heating, because he can’t afford to pay for that.
Doing all his computer stuff at the local library because it’s free there.
Having only a very basic pre-paid mobile phone instead of a whoop-dee-do iPhone with all the bells and whistles.
Giving up his social life unless it can be reduced to having a few mates around to share one bottle of beer and a packet of chips.
Drinking instant coffee because he can’t afford a coffee machine.
And, if the worst happens and he needs urgent medical treatment, waiting for ten hours in emergency because he can’t afford to see a GP.
laocoon:
briefly has been tweeting about the fiscal cliff bill.
https://twitter.com/briefly1
AshbyInquiryNow Dan @Dan_Gulberry
@JacquelineMaley Your byline in the SMH describes you as a sketch writer. Does that mean that your articles are meant to be comedy?
Silly stunt by Bandt. A week proves nothing and he knows it. The Greens are soft and generally useless on this issue too; they’ll ask for the rate to be increased but I haven’t seen them do a lot about the other issues with the system.
Incidentally last time my partner had to call in to report income to them (because she missed an online deadline while snowed under writing thesis) the number to call to report income was persistently engaged – not just on hold, could not get through at all. I managed to get around this by calling the complaint number and complaining on her behalf about the number being engaged and they eventually were able to process the information – but only after I was quite (politely but firmly) persistent.
Some aspects have improved but in other respects I get the impression of a system in bumbling decay, with most of the Howard apparatus still there but without the driving force. It reminds me of a ghost net drifting the oceans catching fish blindly by accident.
Thanks ‘fess – hadn’t seen that 🙂
It’s very easy for A Bandt to brag. What’s a week of hardship when you know that at the end of that week you can go back to all your comfort. Just like TA sitting in the dust with Indegenous people and thinking he knows it all. Fools, that’s what they are. And they’re not fooling anyone.
leone:
It’s going to be embarrassing watching Bandt do his stunt. A week proves nothing, and as KB has already said, it isn’t just the financial aspect, but living the whole experience.
So Bandt survives a week on Newstart. Then what?
And straight away in response:
Jacqueline Maley @JacquelineMaley
@Dan_Gulberry My new year’s resolution is to block people like you – so goodbye!
😆
As always the pie in the sky Greens- raise the dole!!- with no plans to pay for it. Must be so easy to live in ‘we will never have to govern’ world.
As predicted The Age goes front page with it. The government IMO cannot win unless something changes on the OM front; either they give more balanced coverage, or the government convinces the voters that they are biased and not to be taken seriously
The Greens really are becoming rudderless without Bob Brown, like one of those driftnets Kevan Bonham was describing, just floating about in the political sea seeing what they can latch on to to get noticed.
Unfortunately c@tmomma the greens vote is holding up OK without Brown, on the back of a left protest vote. Its hard for Labor to win these voters back as it cant please them on welfare or refugees
So Leone, whoever said that any of those ‘luxury items’ should be affordable on the dole? I imagine Adam Bandt, like many of us, doesn’t need anything other than instant coffee and could dress himself very well at Vinnies, does without air conditioning etc. etc. In fact if anyone had to live on the dole you have shown there’s no better country to do it in than here. Homelessness would be the big bogie, I imagine. Wearing old clothes (who notices?) and not being able to dine out (who cares?) the least of my worries.
I haven’t noticed GPs being more immediately available, or useful, than Emergency staff after hours on the two recent occasions I’ve had accidents. That brought home to me what a great society this is I was treated long before anyone asked how, or even if, I was going to pay for the first rate care I received. Yes, I can afford all the extras and a private room, but no one knew that when they wanted to call an ambulance on the street for this T shirted, sneaker shod, little old lady hanging on to her scruffy little dog for grim death. When someone gently prised Tacker’s lead from my hand Oz took over and looked after me.
And that’s what the dole does. It takes care of those of us who temporarily can’t help themselves. Until they can. Its not meant to provide lattes and new gear. I’ve been so grateful for it being there briefly at one point in my own life and both my kids have benefitted from state support as full time students or while unemployed.
Ms Maley, like Latika and Joe O’Brien, is just another one with a glass jaw: can’t face up to negative criticism. Maybe she should try being in Julia Gillard’s shoes for a week.
Does the practice of journos on twitter blocking people who offer reasonable criticism of their work happen in the UK or US?
briefly @briefly1
Overwhelming vote in HoR in favour of fiscal bill. An enormous win for Obama & the D’s: memorable defeat for the TP.
A good result.
patriciawa
You seem to have missed some of my earlier comments. The ones whwre I expalined that I’ve been on welfare. I’m not saying the dole should be so ample that it allows recipients to afford luxury items. I was trying to point out the stupidity of Bandt spending just one week pretending to live on the dole.
And please don’t lecture me about welfare or what the dole is there for or how grateful you are that you only needed a benefit ‘briefly’.
I spent a few years on a sole parent benefit, ages ago, trying to raise three kids on not much income. My plans to resume a teaching career and my studied to upgrade my qualifications had to be abandoned after I was hit by cancer and left with a few health and disability problems that ruled out working at all. I spent some years on DSP until I qualified for the age pension. Because I ‘m eternally grateful for the support I’ve received I’ve always tried to pay it back in kind by doing volunteer work. This has mostly been with a disability service and a group involved with single mums and elderly widows. I’ve learnt more about coping on benefits that you could ever imagine. i’m still learning.
Dan_Gulberry @ 12.25pm
That is hilarious.
Quite a mild tweet I would have thought. Going to do wonders for the echo chamber that is the Canberra Press Gallery
Peter Brent @mumbletwits
For the next two hours I shall spend no more than if I were on the dole. Look at me!
😆
“Does the practice of journos on twitter blocking people who offer reasonable criticism of their work happen in the UK or US?”
Jacqueline Maley sees herself as an Anointed One, one of the gatekeepers of context, privy to the inside dealings of the political class – politicians, journalists and other hangers-on – who form a club dedicated to preserving privilege and exclusivity.
“Social media helps, although you have to be realistic about its limitations – Twitter is a raging cauldron of opinions, often brilliantly funny and occasionally very nasty, but it is used by about 1 per cent of the population, and is heavily left-leaning. Facebook is great, too, but one tends to be friends with people who share one’s background and views, so it’s not great for balance.
It should also be remembered that it is not the job of the press gallery to laud a speech. It is the job of journalists to place events in context, supply background and nuance, and to make predictions about whether political actions will deliver votes.”
http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/politics/out-of-touch-maybe-but-press-galleries-dont-laud-speeches-20121011-27frs.html#ixzz2Gmc8UIEd
And her sources?
“I have my own Punters Panel I regularly consult – made up of friends and family from all parts of the political spectrum. I pick the brains of taxi drivers. Sometimes I ask friends to vox pop their workplaces for me. Most journalists try very hard to achieve balance.”
That’s right. Jackie’s sources are the same sources as you and I have, except I don’t use taxis very much.
So what qualifies her to write what she writes and have it heard above the voices of others? It’s certainly not because she says “um” a lot.
She’s in the newspaper, that’s her “qualification”.
Fortunately, the newspaper she writes for, so used to dishing out free advice to politicians who inhabit what it considers to be the sandpit of politics, so free and easy with its condemnations of every government policy from fiscal to fisheries, a newspaper that doesn’t seem to be able to run itself and makes its own books balance, yet knows for certain how others should run their lives and institutions, is about to receive it’s own bitter dose of “context”.
Jackie will soon find out that her Twitter banning days, while not over, will be rather pointless. What’s the point of banning people when you’ve had the pulpit for your parliamentary sketches pulled out from underneath you?
I have friends who can’t cope on $100 k a year. Do we raise Newstart to that level on that basis?
I really am getting tired of being told by people on the internet that I lead a crap life because I’m on the equivalent of the dole (disability pension). I can’t be extravagant, no; but I can eat, dress and generally live reasonably well.
I’m also getting sh#t off by people telling me what Centrelink does/does not allow. I know, OK?
If people are going to pontificate on how hard it is to live on the dole, and tell Jenny Macklin that she should give it a go before making comments, then they should take the challenge themselves.
Or at least make sure they know what they’re talking about.
Happy New Year folks
Just wound up a few visits from the grand kids which always simultaneously make me feel young and wear me out completely.
Haven’t thought about politics and stuff which probably explains why I feel so RELAXED.
Leonetwo, my apologies. I jumped into this discussion re the dole on the tail of that last comment of yours, on a new page. Then I went back and read the range of older comments, including your own early one, which, had I read i would have slowed me down to think a bit harder. As you said a propos another subject entirely – It’s a very delicate issue, there’s no one solution and it can’t all be swept away with sweeping generalisations about ‘options.’
Elf – Welcome back.
BB:
A “Punters Panel”? How ridiculous as it is arrogant. These people clearly see themselves as somehow above everyone else.
Did anyone miss me CTar? 🙂
The HOR vote on the fiscal cliff bill is due anytime. Should be interesting.
Elf – We need our own sensible ‘tame’ fib at it!
davidwh:
You sound like you’ve had an enjoyable xmas/new year.
Glad you found this place.
Oh ffs – now I have people sympathising for my dire poverty because I see convenience food as an unnecessary expense……
It was a great holiday period confessions. Did the tragics keep this place rocking throughout?
CTar 😉
davidwh:
It’s actually been fantastic here. I’m going to recommend to William that he take on BB and co as moderators to help him when PB returns.
patriciawa
Thank you. You and I – and zoomster and C@tmomma and many others here understand that it’s hard to live on welfare but it can be done.
I get really cranky with fools like Bandt who have no idea at all and just pull stunts to get attention. He seem to think that eating mince on toast for a week and giving up breakfast at the local trendy cafe while wearing designer clothes, expensive footwear and being followed around by a media circus will somehow prove a point. I’m not sure what his point really is and I don’t think he’s sure either. Is he trying to prove that you can manage on the dole or that you can’t? Either way he needs to do it for six months, not just a few days.
Bandt’s stunt in context:
Nick Grimm @NickGrimm
Coming up on #ArvoLive at 3pm AEDT: Washington’s Groundhog day; Aust’n believed killed in #Syria; & life on the dole @ABCNews24 #ABCNews24
What a fool he is!
confessions, BB would be excellent except he is a biased Laborite. At least William is neutral 🙂 To even things up how about BB and ML as William’s little helpers?
Only kidding of course.
davidwh,
Welcome back! Yes, people were missing you. 🙂
zoomster
Well, I’ve rarely eaten “convenience foods” and it’s not because of poverty. It’s because I value my health and anyway I enjoy cooking. There’s been a bit of publicity about the wastage of food in Oz. I think there’s a connection there between food that hasn’t been cooked at home and the attitude that it doesn’t matter if you threw away the extra bit of pizza, the bag of chips that have gone cold, the leftover pre-cooked chicken, etc.
davidwh:
I think ML would be a terrible moderator.
The goal as far as I’m concerned is to uphold a consistent standard of behaviour. Holding down a job makes it hard for William to do that all the time on his own, and I think he could benefit from some help from a team of others.
He’ll probably say no in any case, but I reckon it’s still worth asking.
bemused should definitely be chief moderator.
And Desert Fox.
And LSL.
I would have no problems with BB. He writes excellent prose even if I don’t always agree with the sentiment.
davidwh,
Hope you are in good elf! 😈
I moderated a very active blog for a few years. It was pretty evenly split, perhaps leaned more to the right. I wouldn’t wish the job on anyone. William’s method of acting and not getting into much discussion and minimal personal participation makes a lot of sense.
elf – They’ve been getting moderation practice with help from my best mate ‘Stonkered’.
😆
spinebill
I don’t mind cooking and generally enjoy my own cooking more than anything I get away from home (and one of the perversities of my life means I get to eat quite regularly in very good restaurants).
We’re parsimonious (even when I was on a very good income we didn’t live very differently; the money saved went into ensuring that we were set up so that if the worst came to pass, we’d be OK — which we are) by nature, but I’m still shocked when I consider how much food goes to waste in this house.
We could easily feed another person on food scraps alone, let alone the food which spoils before it gets used….something I bear in mind when discussing what Australia’s carrying capacity is.
As for housing….I often mentally work out how many families could live here (assuming that, like the majority of the world’s population, privacy isn’t a concern). I reckon we could house about six in our various buildings (with only minor adjustments) in not unbearable situations.
We’re a very rich country. Even the poorest of us live lives others (probably the majority of humanity)wouldn’t dream were possible.
CTar being stonkered sure helps when it comes to moderating a mob like us.
Ducky I am an evil elf of course.
Thanks C@Tmomma.
Score one for Obi: Approval of the bill – 257 votes to 167.
zoomster
I feel so lucky that I live in a rural area. I’ve tried city living and couldn’t sleep. Yes, so privileged to have several private acres.
But my sort of “luck” took a lot of planning and compromises – as I’m sure yours did too. Now I’m trying to work out how to stay here even when I’m old and frail – can’t imagine a “folks home” existence.
The Fiscal Cliff has been avoided … for now.
People on twitter are lucky that vibes can’t kill…I now have idiots doing the ‘well, when have YOU ever been to Centrelink?” number on me.
Honestly, this whole Macklin conversation is simply demonstrating what snobs most of these do gooder types are…apparently people on the dole are obese, because they eat exclusively at Maccas. (I have pointed out that Clive and Gina must be closet dole bludgers….) and generally demonstrating that they have no idea at all about what they’re talking about.
Forget Macklin — a few of those pontificating on the issue should be taking up ‘the challenge’ themselves.
The USA have two months not to exceed their credit limit and to sort out where to cut expenditure.