There’s a lot I hate more than do-gooders believing they’re doing you a favour by asking, demanding and nagging you to stop smoking, but this takes the Boston Bun: yesterday in London a group of out-of-work actors (or rather, too proud to put their talent to good use – really: any idiot can act like a zombie, as evidenced by how many flashmobs have been staged over the years where fools with nothing better to do ape the dance moves to Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” and take up space on footpaths) paraded round in zombie masks to drive the point home to innocent smokers that, hey, you might just end up like them. Well guess what well-meaning zombies? We’re all going to die! (Sooner the better for some)
As part of a campaign by a mob called HealthExpress (no doubt a glorified WebMD with staff) who are offering free consulations to assist people who want to bow out from the baccy because, panic of panics, of some lark in Blighty called “Stoptober” – only three things should be celebrated in October: 1. Oktoberfest 2. Choctoberfest and 3. Labour Day if you’re unfortunate enough to live in Queensland.
Stoptober is a campaign by the NHS that boasts that it already has over 200,000 who have “pledged” to give up the Gold Flake. Whenever people “pledge” to do something makes me squirm – most likely those sad American teenagers who pledge to remain “pure” – i.e. no fumblings for them behind the bikesheds unless Daddy or “the Lord” (much the same really) “allow” them to. Interestingly people are signing up to raise money for charity while stopping for Stoptober. Why not just write a cheque? There’s always the money angle when people stop smoking, isn’t there? We’re constantly being told that if we were to pack in the Pall Malls, “Think of how much money you’ll save [by not smoking]!” Hello? How many people have nixed the nicotine only to spend the money on something else? I’ve been told quite a few times that I could afford a holiday to Bali. That’s right, holiday in a fundamentalist stronghold with (of course) disgusting records on human rights and safety and facing the indignity of being bombed while in the same room as a bunch of bogans on a package holiday – the type of drunks who give drunks a bad name – or stay at home in a peaceful democracy with a carton of Rothmans? Sadly, there’ll be people who have to think about that.
A quick look at HealthExpress’s website shows how boring they are, specialising in middle-class gripes such as weight loss, impotence, hair loss, etc – in other words: drugs for mugs and alleviation for the vain.
Just looking at the zombie masks chosen by HealthExpress doesn’t scare me a bit – they’re like something out of Bo’ Selecta! I’ve seen scarier people at the milk bar – or rather, I was affronted by the sight of a sixty-something tranny who was wearing a primary school girl-sized school uniform and he decided to bend over repeatedly to display his saggy old arse bulging out of a pair of My Little Pony pants. Now that’s a real horror!
Look here you holier-than-a-colander hypocrites, because that’s what you are. HYPOCRITES. How dare you have the unmitigated gall and tut-tut-tut temerity to tell me to stop smoking for my own good when you’re usually already morbidly overweight, voting Liberal and then complaining about them after and volunteering when you’ve got so much to sort out in your own lives before you start with somebody else’s. I smoke because I can. I enjoy it and am very skilled at it. I can even smoke White Ox without wanting to throw up. What are you good at besides scrapbooking, or rather, ruining perfectly good photos by afixing cardboard and stickers to them?
And Doctors accusing smokers of “murdering” themselves or committing a really slow and drawn out “suicide” – aren’t you doing the same by advocating that people unfortunate enough to be in a vegetative state and doubly unfortunate to not have an Advanced Health Directive should be kept alive anyway?
Of course I know the “risks” – but everything’s got a risk. Who’s to say that you won’t be hit by a car simply by walking on the side of the road? Or won’t be electrocuted while making toast? I made a conscious decision to smoke fully aware that I’m in line to receive cancer, strokes, heart disease, etc. Gotta die of something. In fact, in moments of all-out snark and hatred of the world, I entertain the idea of having an iota of fame and then getting cancer, just so I could mindfuck a lazy sub-editor who wants to print that I’m “fighting” a “battle”, because nothing would give me more pleasure to say to a hack, “Actually, no. I’m not fighting. I’m not in a battle. To carcinogenics I’m a conchy. Have fun printing that.” But of course they won’t. With any luck they’ll ask if I “have a death wish?”
“Yes, you!”
Finally, the NHS spent £5.7 million on last year’s Stoptober – how about letting people who choose to smoke face the consequences themselves and spend that money on actually improving, oh I dunno, hospitals and the quality of care?
Next thing you know there’ll be Aspartame-pril, Auglutenust and MaySG, created for only a few but paid for by all.
Well, it’s been a month since I last posted anything here because I’ve been a) too busy moving back to the “big smoke” of Brisbane, which last time I left because it was like a large country town but now it’s like a proper city – the pubs are open late on weeknights now! b) trying to find gainful employment here (and I shall “reveal” that I’m actually an aged care nurse – bet you’d never guess that’s my day job) and c) there’s been so much to write that I can’t decide what to punch out first: I’ve been meaning to write for nearly two months now a letter of commiseration to Julia Gillard (and on the whole Rudd vs. Gillard frippery, I’m still proudly pro-Gillard – much like with British Labour having had Blairites and Brownites, I’m proud to call myself a Gillardite); the election campaign currently underway between Kevin Rudd, who’s campaign slogan is “A New Way” (again, does this not sound like Tony Blair’s “Third Way”? If Kev wins – which I hope beyond all power of wishful thinking that he will to spare us the arch-conservative rule of Tony Abbott, more anon – I really hope he doesn’t start calling his style of governance “New Labor”); the laughable fringe parties (Katter’s Australia Party and Palmer’s United Party – yes, PUP, the most unfortunate acronym for something since the National bank changed to NAB) who think they’re actually going to win seats; and the (newly discovered on my part) awesomeness of Elizabeth Taylor. Quite the mix, huh?
Anyway, let’s start with the election so far. We’ve less than a month until polling day and so far the whole thing’s been totally uninspiring – the only enjoyment I get from it is whenever Opposition Leader Tony Abbott (a hair-sniffing, paedophile-defending, woman-hating, Anglo-loving, North Shore-living, blue-blooded tongue lizard. And a fundamentalist Mick too, who only quit the seminary because he couldn’t keep his dick in his pants – imagine that! A priest who took a pro-active stance with his (ugh!) libido) or one his co-conspirators from the Liberal Party make a gaffe, faux-pas or grand-mal fuck-up.
The first fuck-up came courtesy of the Liberal candidate for the seat of Greenway (currently held by Labor and the most marginal in the country), Jaymes Diaz – and yes, that hurts to type and spell James that way; it’ll never have the same impact as Liza with a Z – who when quizzed on the Libs’ “Six Point Plan” for asylum seekers could not name a single point. True to form, like all Libs when they can’t answer a question, Mr Diaz blinked, stuttered, shrugged his shoulders and mentioned something about families before being led away by a minder (so clearly on day release, Mr Diaz). Since then it’s gone global and most notably featured on Jon Stewart’s The Daily Show in the US of A, complete with all the other aspiring politicians in this country who’ve ballsed up their one shot in the past week (see, Peter Dowling, a Lib who sexted his mistress a pic of his dick in a glass of red – I hope it stung; and Stephanie Bannister, standing for the right-wing and non-admitting xenophobic One Nation party, confusing Islam as a country and the word “haram” for Quran, as well as saying she has no problem with Jews because “they follow Jesus Christ”). Apparently, it’s since been alleged that Jaymes “Liza with a Z” Diaz has slagged off his neighbouring constituency of Chifley (held by the country’s first Muslim MP, Ed Husic, for Labor) as being “full of Muslims” and tweeting his detractors juvenile missives to “fuck off”.
Next came a meet-and-greet with Abbott and one of his many lacklustre candidates, complete with the obligatory non-consensual baby-kissing, and what appeared to be a photo of Mr Abbott sniffing the hair of the baby’s mother. Now, we could say this was just an unfortunate camera-angle that snapped an unfortunate moment. But no. If fellow Liberal Troy Buswell can be caught out seat-sniffing, then does it not surprise us that all Libs have sniffing tendencies?
Yesterday, Mr Abbott described his party’s candidate for Lindsay as having “sex appeal” and today writing it off as a “daggy dad moment” – look Tony, my own father has plenty of daggy moments (and sometimes I seriously believe he must be on the autism spectrum) complete with sexist and hateful views, but he at least knows not to say them in public!
And today, when again quizzed on whether the members of his party will be allowed a conscience vote on any motions to legalise same-sex marriage, Mr Abbott again dismissed this with an even more offensive quote than he has uttered on the subject before, describing marriage equality as, “the fashion of the moment”. And yet people are seriously considering voting for this hateful, backwards and arch-conservative bully. This is not my Australia. How could we go from the glory days and revolutionary and awe-inspiring governments of Gough Whitlam, Bob Hawke, Paul Keating and even Julia Gillard until the media (read: Rupert Murdoch) and the sub-conscious bigotry and vileness of otherwise “normal” folk came to the fore and villified and hindered any hope of a fair-go of governance for Ms Gillard? And from within her own party, too – yes, you Kevin. I’m only 22 (23 next Thursday, join me for booze, spills and thrills if you like) and proudly identify as a “staunch” and “rusted-on” Labor voter, despite my dislike of Mr Rudd – yet if he’s our only chance to ensure that this country is not sent back to the 1950s in policy, society and our standard of living, then fight the good fight Kev – don’t give that Blue(blood)-Tongue Lizard the satisfaction.
And so, as luck would have it, this morning I found out that Mr Abbott was doing a presser down the street at the Hilton, so I raced round there and sat on the other side of the street to the front (and only) exit of the joint in the hope of seeing Phoney “Kony” Tony. And after an hour’s wait and watching his minders and staffers mill about in the obligatory white Holden Statesmans’ (oh ok, Statesmen) with Commonwealth plates, he emerged. And you know what, he’s actually pretty short! Macho man of politics my arse! Seriously, it’s no surprise he is the way he is, he’s got near dwarfy-Tom Cruise levels of Small Man Syndrome. Anyway, as he happened to turn his head in my direction, I took a chance and shouted the most polite word I could use to describe him.
“KNAVE!”
So there we go, I called Tony Abbott a knave, and whether he heard it or not I don’t know (I’m guessing he manages to block out anything that isn’t spoken by a blue-tie wearing fool), at least I did it, in my own special little small-a anarchist way. By the way, his security detail is pretty poor, just a bunch of old farts who look more like White-Shoe Brigaders up from the Gold Coast to follow their “leader” around. So if you should see Mr Abbott around, kneecap for me! I’ll lend you the crowbar.
—
I’ve just discovered the writings of journalist Liz Jones, former fashion-editor and now columnist for the Daily fail,hell, Mail, who writes of her life in a column called “Liz Jones’ Diary”. I believe the selling-point is that Ms Jones is unafraid and unashamed to write of her miserable upbringing, depression and successive failures to make friends and get blokes and keep them. So far, I’ve been reading the book based on her writings and providing the backstory to her forlorn failures and eating disorders, neuroses and media-placed malaise and am finding it interesting, hillarious, heartbreaking and (yes, I’m admitting this) just occasionally familiar to moi. No, I haven’t tried to steal somebody’s sperm or had plastic surgery, but there’s a few stray similarities between myself and Ms Jones that I keep picking up on in her writing (ok now I’ve gotta sing this, “Have you met Miss Jones?”) which makes me want to either keep on reading in the hope it gets better and all is well (although by the tone of this op-ed from the Independent I doubt it) and I want to give her a hug a la Milhouse, “So this is what it feels like … when doves cry.” And how could you not either laugh hysterically or cry soul-crushingly over titles such as: “In which I face a lonely birthday” (veteran of that), “In which the years aren’t kind to me” and “In which more friends desert me”. Best I’ve read so far is “In which I’m rejected yet again”:
To promote my autobiography, I came up with the brilliant idea of asking all the men who wouldn’t go out with me, all my ex-boyfriends (all – that’s a joke!) and ex-husband, and all the friends who have dropped me to write about why I am such a pariah.
What did I do that rendered me so unfanciable? Why am I not worth a reply to a text?
and after a list of absent, wayward and disappeared friends and lovers …
They were all contacted and asked, ‘Why did you reject Lizzie?’
Each and every one refused to answer …
Well, welcome to my world, Lizzie! Where on this earth have my muckers L, A, J, G, R, K and E buggered off to? Though this being the “modern world”, any semblance of normal etiquette doesn’t apply, as I’ve found out with Facebook. It’s seems to be perfectly acceptable to just “unfriend” and block someone on the site with nary a word why. And as for all the etiquette I bang on about, you’ll be happy to know that I’ve never read Debretts – instead I’ve picked it all up by watching Ladette to Lady and Bad Lad’s Army.
If I could make a quid from it, then I’d happily publish all the anxious and near self-fulfilling prophecy (oh shut up, Josh) thoughts that keep me awake at night, but they’re not even embarrassing. They don’t get sympathy, even from me. Really, the only word I can use to describe my tendencies to be an over-emotional fool is “pathetic”. Who gives a shit if I have a semi-recurring dream that when I wake up from it has knocked seven shades of shit out of me? Or that I can’t accept most compliments because I’m deserving and that it’s presumptuous of me to expect people to give a damn anyway. But the money from such a venture … Yes, Liz Jones and her writing is the proverbial car-crash that you can’t look away from, a truck laden with combustible chemicals about to destroy a school bus, a parish of nuns and the cure for cancer. Oh well, it’s better than Fifty Shades of Grey!
Finally, one evening recently I decided to have a few drinks and traipsed round on my lonesome, having a little solo pub-crawl to see what was new since I’d last lived in Brisbane. After discovering the Embassy (where all the booze is either crafted, artisan or made by hand without being the slightest bit annoying pretentious), and being introduced to White Rabbit Dark Ale (do try it, it’s like White Ox tobacco in liquid form, but smoother than blue-eyed soul, so unlike the tobacco favoured as prison currency, it doesn’t one-inch-punch you in the soul as you imbibe it) I had a few pints of the yeasty restorative. At the next and final bar I went to I tried the White Rabbit Pale Ale and it’s a lovely drop too, and, I’m still embarrassed by this so here goes, I FELL ASLEEP! I know, right? I was only a bit tired but didn’t even notice myself nodding off with a pint in my hand whilst perched precariously on a wobbly barstool, and was woken up by the nice Irish barman, leaving to quickly slam down the rest of it and scurry away with my metaphorical tale between my legs. See, hardly up to Ms Jones’ level of unfortunate events is it?
So there we go, a post of rambling, self-agrandizing waffle but hey, at least I’m back! So look forward to some more regular updates around here and hopefully you can give me some of that sweet feedback too, even if it is hate mail. In fact, I do prefer hate mail, because nothing thrills me more than replying carefully-worded missives to my detractors (just like when I got bete-noires from my onetime fundamentalist Christian neighbours – what else could I do but reply with serial-killer handwriting and signing it “THE DEVIL”?), although I guess encouragement is just as good.
I came across this article by Vex News, correctly titled OUTRAGE: MIA about the hypocrisy of the left to try and boycott “oppressive” (in their words) Israel when they could be doing much more by taking aim at the oppressive world of fundamentalist Islam in the Middle East. What really grabbed my attention (and guffaw) was the description of BDS supporters and protestors of Max Brenner stores as:
be-scarved local private-school brats, Hamas-niks and anti-Semites raging against the chocolate machine.
Bravo, VEX! It’s always struck me as hypocritical that those who denounce Israel with anti-Semitism and stand up proudly for the torturous and actually oppressive Islam “be-scarf” themselves with the keffiyeh. Do they not notice the irony of wearing a keffiyeh when it’s the fashion accessory of choice for oppressors?
I’m sick of these bloody hipsters running around and wearing and doing stuff without a thought for it’s origins or the deeper meaning. And hipsters are now everywhere. Remember when cool kids used to be, actually, cool? A quick Google of “keffiyeh and hipsters” took me to this blog called (and the jury’s still out on this) Taking Life Seriously, and a post titled: The Keffiyeh: Modern Symbol of Hipster Ignorance. Oh, how my heart swelled when I read that title alone – a kindred spirit?
From the post, describing hipsters:
Their THC-drunk smiles relaying a kind of superficiality and ignorance usually reserved for the offspring of Hollywood celebrities.
and:
The keffiyeh began its ascent into Western fashion culture in the early 1980s when it caught on as a symbol of support for Palestinian freedom amongst politically-active non-Arab American students. Wearing the keffiyeh was a potent political statement to make too: The Independent called the keffiyeh “a symbol of Islamic militancy” while Spanish Prime Minister Zapatero was criticized by opposition parties after posing with a keffiyeh and was accused of “anti-Semitism, anti-Zionism and Israelophobia”.
Most beautifully, the author sums up with this gem:
Dumbass hipsters wearing keffiyehs is equivalent to gorilla-brained gangster rappers spouting ineloquent and violent lyrics while wearing giant crucifixes and, better yet, encrusting them with diamonds and rubies.
Although one anonymous commenter wrote:
Even if it is “clueless hipsters’ wearing the keffiyeh’s then at least the discussion of this should lead to conversation on the plight of the Palestinians. If complimented lots of ‘hipsters’ keffiyehs and questioned them on knowledge of palestine. The majority are aware of the symbolism of wearing a Keffiyah and wear it in solidarity. The few that don’t know will generally be interested and then research the situation and the history of palestine themselves. Surely that is a positive thing.
Oh come on! They’re hipsters! They’re never going to willingly learn anything other than what’s new and decrying it by saying they liked it before it was popular. Duh! Though that wasn’t nearly as bad as this other comment:
I’m jewish but I hate Israel because it kills people in the name of jews.
Which is basically saying I love Palestine because it kills people in the name of Islam.
There’s always been cool kids, and some of them have actually been pretty cool, but these hipsters are only cool to themselves. What’s cool about dressing in the latest high-priced threads that make you look like a kid playing dress-ups? Imitation Wayfarers that look like kids’ sunglasses, trousers that are glorified “babygros” and t-shirts with cartoon characters on them? I was confronted with this cartoon couture in 2009, when I went shopping for clothes in Myer (a half-arsed Marks & Spencer down under) one day and all that was on offer were t-shirts with Sesame Street, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and the most juvenile manga. I hated it as a kid, so why wear it now?
I first saw hipsters en masse in 2010, going to a gig on a friend’s free ticket at the Brisbane Hipster’s venue of choice, the Hi Fi Bar – home to overpriced poor-quality beer (Carlton Draught, anyone?) and on the bill was the hipsters’ favourite bands: the Hungry Kids of Hungary (rivals to Chilly Kids of Chile or Island Kids of Ireland?) All these hipsters were there, dressed in their best op-shop sourced and Enid Blyton-inspired finest, having forked out $40 per ticket they simply sat around on the floor talking to each other – why not save your (parents’) money and stay home instead? I was trying to take notes on the night in an attempt at a review and all I scribbled was: Sarah Blasko called, she wants her wardrobe back.
Other bizarre things hipsters call “clothes” (much like Vivienne Westwood‘s haute couture) include the trend of guys walking round with “salmon” coloured pants, and it’s not just me who’s noticed this – there’s even a site on Tumblr (the hipster’s own social media) White Boys in Salmon Shorts. Why pay money to look like a walking, talking salmon terrine? If hipsters were actually dedicated followers of fashion, wouldn’t they realise that the general concensus (even the uninspiring Vogue) is pastels went out in the 80’s?
Hipster males are also known for growing beards yet shaving their pubes, as if they’re constantly living Opposite Day. They also wear “plaid” (read: flannelette) shirts not seen since the early 90’s. When I was a litt’lun, anything called “vintage” was usually a vintage car, i.e. made before 1940. Now, these 90s leftovers or anything more than five minutes old are called “vintage”, and we’re poorer for it. Thanks, losers.
And hipster television sucks too – I don’t hate Girls because it is written by an intelligent, educated and switched-on woman, I hate it for pampering to the hipster ideal of having more clothes and money than sense. Why was there all the hype about it being so “white” and not casting anyone of a darker than hipster-pasty hue, but nothing about how they all seem to be still living off their parents? This is best shown in the pilot episode when Hannah (played by creator, writer and producer Lena Dunham) whines over her parents refusal to fund her badly-dressed and going-nowhere life. Think she’s got problems because Mama and Papa won’t give her a few grand whenever she wants? I can’t get $20 out of mine!
The only hipster-related thing I like is the song ‘Pumped Up Kicks’ by Foster the People – in a perfect world, I’d listen to this as I walked down the streets of Fortitude Valley, Fitzroy, Surry Hills, Hoxton and Williamsburg, taking pot-shots at the hip and stupid with a well-loaded rifle. Although next thing you know it will be a “hate crime” to discriminate against young, salmon-wearing fools.
It’s time for a rant and I hope you’ll agree that we all need to speak up on this.
I’ve just read Bill Cosby’sop-ed in the New York Post – a pale imitation of the New York Times – and what he thinks is a “plague of apathy”. It’s the usual Cosby schtick: go to school, get a job, respect your elders and pull your own weight. All admirable qualities to strive for but Cosby’s now gone and thrown a clanger in the mix, saying that the only people who live up to these ideals are Black Muslims. Yes, that to have a cosy little family-centred up-bringing, we must all take note of a religion whose fundamentalist side is rooted in the patriarchy: women are nothing more than bits of meat, stonings and torture take place over a fair trial and, sorry Bill, but I’ve never known a Christian or Jew to behead others for daring to have different beliefs.
Never mind that the piece is hyperbole anyway (of course), but I’ve read it three times now and it still doesn’t make any sense. It rambles from stories of people growing up and being strung about by controlling parents to mentioning the deaths of Michael Jackson and Whitney Houston and then to how we all should emulate Muslims, and that cigarettes and alcohol are more harmful than extremism.
Cosby likes to get in a snit over the smoking of cigarettes (and yes, I’m an out-and-proud chain-smoker, so have a puff on that, Bill) but didn’t cigarettes as we know them today come about after the British soldiers serving in the Crimean War were inspired by the tobacco-smoking Turkish soldiers, and how many of the Ottoman Empire’s armed forces were Muslim? Please correct me if I’m wrong, but could this not be a streak of hypocrisy on Cosby’s part?
The Nation of Islam believes that Jewish people are ‘responisble’ for ” … the filth of Hollywood that is seeding the American people …” which smacks of Joseph McCarthy’s mad reign of witchhunts and “reds under the beds”. They even believe that Hitler was “a great man” and leader Louis Farrakhan is noted as saying
“[I’m] not proud of Hitler’s evil toward Jewish people, but that’s a matter of record. Well, in a sense you could say there is a similarity in that we are rising our people up from nothing.”
Charming! The Nation of Islam even has a “Health Minister”, not just a spokesman, accusing Jewish doctors of injecting African-Americans with AIDS. Do you believe that, Mr Cosby?
The United Nation of Islam’s founder is Royall Jenkins, a guy who believes he spent time on a spaceship with angels. And yet Scientology too is based on other unbelievable sci-fi schlock and is espoused by Cosby’s fellow A-listers. And the Five-Percenters are mostly profligated by the dullest hip-hop “artists”, Wu Tang Clan, Nas and Queen Latifah.
Surprisingly the best criticism of Cosby’s half-arsed rant I’ve seen is from a Republican Congressman, Allen West of Florida, who is African-American and tweeted:
Despite being before my time, The Cosby Show always looked like it was for saps anyway. Rubbish for touchy-feely wimps who need to be slapped into the real world. Come on, how could that show have beat Cheers and Roseanne in the ratings? I wonder if the Huxtable kids were schooled not just in respect and common courtesy but Sharia law, too? I’d hate to see an argument between the kids in that house. I’d also check out your own life, Bill. You’ve had quite a few lawsuits and are an adulterer yourself despite your crazed preaching like Pauline Fowler or Peggy Mitchell that family is everything.
I’m not religious, so it wasn’t a big surprise that after doing an online quiz (no, not the “What type of porn star am I?” or “Which sexual position is best for me?” type) on which religion is “best” for me. I got 100% compatibility with Unitarian Universalism, which makes sense I guess – I’ve never believed in a god, much less the usual Christian one or any other type, and especially not Jesus (he’s always seemed a bit of a pansy) and the poster-child for hypocrites and the small-minded. Why have so many of my peers joined MySpace or Facebook and ticked the box that they’re a Christian when they’re anything but? My “religion” on social media has gone from Atheist to Buddhist/Judaism and is currently Humanist Judaism, which I’ve cheekily subtitled as “From Goy to Oy”, Philosemite that I am. And with all these people saying they’re a Christian despite living like a “heretic” if not the hedonist they are, it’s due to them being christened isn’t it? I was, in the Uniting Church (clearly the best form of Christianity around, with their progressiveness and acceptance of women and gay people) and it’s the only time I’ve been in a church. Same goes for them I reckon.
I used to call myself an atheist but it seemed too militant (i.e. stubborn – just look at Richard Dawkins) and so dabbled with calling myself a Humanist, but Humanism doesn’t believe in an “afterlife” – I believe in ghosts because I’ve seen one twice – if they don’t exist, then why so much of them in popular culture? Same for aliens, too – but I don’t extend the same courtesy to the current cultural undead phenomena of vampires and werewolves. That’s ridic. I dabble in astrology too, due to my mum being a teacher of it so I’ve picked up bits and pieces over the years and found most parts to be true – I’m a Leo with a Virgo moon and an Aries ascendant, and if you’re up with the zodiac then you would’ve known by now.
I’ve always felt a bit iffy towards most believers of Christianity since in my Year 5 R.E. class, when the class clown asked the voluntary scripture teacher if he was a paedophile and the guy became more flustered and “Ummed” and “Ahhed” than Hugh Grant in a rom-com, declaring “I don’t know what one of them is.” Yeah, a likely story. My other big beefs with “God-botherers”, however serious they may be, have been the remarks that when somebody dies it was “God wanted them” (hardly an invite to an A-list party) and “God sends these things to test us” – well then, get the guy a stress ball! If you’ve got stress, then take some time out, have a drink, pop a pill or change your own circumstances – don’t shift the blame to a supposedly omnipresent, phony “eye-in-the-sky” – there we go, God: the original voyeur!
And as for Catholicism, it was bad enough my ancestors were Huguenots (kicked out of France for refusing to tow the line and kow-tow to the Catholic God – what champs!) only for my great-grandparents to return to the fold and subject my family to never-ending requiem masses when they snuffed it. This point is best shown by my Mum’s favourite funereal memory, when my great-grandfather from the other side of the family had the big Catholic burial and as his coffin was lowered into the grave, one of the handlers nearly fell in with it. Imagine! Having to be bored out of your mind by Latin and other rituals, and then trying not to laugh for an hour or more. Funnily enough, my Mum – the new ager with hippie ideals that she is – rebelled as a teenager by going to a bible study group. Just goes to show the limited appeal of Christianity. And it’s always a source of mirth and dismay of the hypocrisy that her best friend from that time is still believing she’s Jesus’ own sunbeam and won’t let her kids read Harry Potter but will let them watch Star Trek.
In the census before last, I put my religion down as ‘Buddhist’, mainly to boost the numbers and I do agree with some parts of it (and as the quiz shows, I do have some “compatibility” with the Theravada and Mahayana strains of Buddhism): the eight-fold path – better than a garden path – and that the Buddha himself was pretty much a top bloke, however I don’t look good in orange and nor would I look good in Orange.
Since my philosemitism blossomed at the age of 16, I’ve always been trying to learn more about Judaism as a whole, and I often think of converting, mainly for the purely selfish reason that I could then call myself Jewish, selfish because of how holistically attractive I think any Jewish person is. But if I was Jewish, would all my out and proud pro-Jew and pro-Israel sentiments then make a “God-botherer” out of me? Perhaps it’s best to leave it alone and go on being the astrology and ghost-believing atheist-lite philosemite that I am. I already bandy about words and would love to do rituals that come from Judaism and to convert to even the Reform branch of Judaism requires a few years study, and even with something I like (and parts I believe) so strongly I would inevitably indulge my indolent streak and let it slide – much like my half-arsed attempt at getting a degree, three years and counting of on-again, off-again time-wasting.
And would Jews have me anyway? For all my chest-thumping and obsessing over Judaism, I’m saddened to say that I’ve never knowingly met a Jew and worry that I appear patronising in my love, respect and defence for Jewish people. Come on, it’s all very presumptuous on my part isn’t it? There’s no Jewish congregation or even a place to go and learn about it here in Gympie where I currently live – it would be like going to learn about veganism at a butcher’s. For all the good that books do, they’re not a patch on learning in person sometimes.
As much as I believe in the separation of church and state, and that having a religion is not a be-all and end-all, the number of times I’m asked what my religion is, from Facebook to the census and general questionnaires, perhaps it’s best to just leave well alone and go on as the no-name philosophy I’ve chosen – equal parts new age larks and bits and pieces of this and that, from Buddhism to Judaism and certainly no Catholicism.
Today the media’s been whipping itself into another frenzy about the “Royal Hoax” and one of the hoaxers involved, Michael Christian, who’s been crowned the winner of a competition to find Australia’s “Next Top Jock” (got my hopes up after the excitement of thinking Alan Jones had died). Why all the attention? In wanting to find a “shock jock”, to my understanding any idiot with a microphone who can court controversy – then hasn’t the award been warranted? A radio presenter who has made controversy by getting even more controversy for the merit award of getting the original controversy. This whole “hoax” business is just a moraliser’s football, bouncing around and kicking own-goals for the self-righteous and people who do and think as they’re told.
I’ve never understood all the outrage over the prank, which Christian and his fellow announcer Mel Greig did by calling up the hospital where the Duchess of Cambridge was being treated for morning sickness. Greig’s impression of the Queen was pissweak (yes, I could have done better – in fact, go to any pub and you’ll find a dozen people who could imitate royalty better), not to mention Christian trying to dither like Prince Charles too – I’m sure not even the work experience kid would’ve gone near that one.
Nor can I fathom how Christian and Greig are referred to as DJs – do they jockey discs? With the title “DJ” I think of people like Paul Oakenfold, Judge Jules, Fatboy Slim and David Bowie’s “DJ” – not people who sit on a swivel-chair (and the chairs always make me think of Lily Savage‘s insult of flipping the bird with “Sit on that and swivel”) and click a mouse for an MP3 to play.
In all the news outlets I read when the hoax happened – from the print editions of the Courier-Mail, The Age, The Australian to The Guardian, The Independent and other blogs and sites online (nerd that I am) – the finger of blame has all been placed on the “DJs” themselves. I disagree. The only instance I’ve found where somebody shares my view has been Germaine Greer in The Age, writing Saldanha had been
“ballyhooed into a heroine done to death by the dastardly Aussies”
and
“The only person to be blamed for a suicide is the suicide.”
My belief is that suicide isn’t the final answer but sadly the first of many questions that the family and friends of the victim have to ask – but it wasn’t the “DJs” fault. Yes, somebody died as a result of their attempt at a practical joke and a worse impression than those found in How Green Was My Cactus (when I listen to it I keep hearing Blinky Bill despite which politician they’re supposed to be lampooning), but that’s just a collateral incidental really, not knowing that Jacintha Saldanha was obviously in need of help. I can’t buy that Saldanha was a “victim” of the hoax – she only transferred the call to another nurse who happily gave out the details on the Duchess’s condition. Saldanha wasn’t “fooled”, “tricked” or any other word for answering the call, but was taken with the idea of riding the fame to get her mortgage paid. Not really a “victim mentality”, huh?
So how can Greig and Christian be blamed? I don’t believe like others have said that the pair have “blood on their hands” or should be charged with manslaughter. I see the whole incident as if I went to a shop, bought something and as the cashier was giving me my change slammed a finger in the till – how is that my fault? Because the cashier was giving change to me or tried to close their cash drawer too fast while I was there? It’s not right.
Now let’s get over it and listen to some real DJs:
I’ve spent this evening listening to Ofra Haza’s “Chai” on repeat, at least two-dozen times now, and I wish to declare her my second “Eurovision crush”. Here she is performing “Chai” at the 1983 contest, where she represented Israel to come second:
“Chai, chai, chai – Ken, ani od chai!”
(Alive, alive, alive – Yes, I’m still alive!)
I learnt of Haza a few years ago through indulging my inner sociopath – playing Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories – her anthemic “Im Nin’alu” is part of the game’s soundtrack. At the time, despite my burgeoning Philosemitism and eventual love of all things Israeli, I didn’t know that Haza was born in Israel, Jewish and a Eurovision contestant to boot. Could there be three greater things? I’ve since discovered that the lyrics to “Im Nin’alu” are based on a Hebrew poem written in the 17th century:
Im nin’alu daltei n’divim daltei marom lo nin’alu
Even if the gates of the rich are closed, the gates of heaven will never be closed.
– Rabbi Shalom Shabazi
How much better would the Occupy movement have been if that was the mantra?
The song, originally released in 1984, was eventually remixed and tweaked and ended up in the Top 10 of various European countries, peaking at no. 1 in West Germany in 1988. The original version was released on the albumYemenite Songs, also known as Fifty Gates of Wisdom – without listening it puts Fifty Shades of Grey in the shade, doesn’t it?
A brief look-up of Ofra Haza reveals heaps of good things – including this interesting snippet from Haza’s official website: in 1986, Margaret Thatcher was a guest of the Israeli parliament and met Haza, who gave Thatcher a brief lesson in Yemenite dancing. Apparently Thatcher was given two of Haza’s albums and wrote to her afterwards, “I listen to your albums with great pleasure.” How awesome is that? For all the bashing you hear of Thatcher and her policies, to think the PM could have been singing and dancing (like me as I write this) around Downing Street to an Ofra Haza song is a wonderful thought. Don’t ruin it for me by saying it was just a PA or the tea-lady forging Mrs T’s signature.
And as for the “Eurovision crush” title – well, I’ve been watching the Eurovision Song Contest since I was about 13 or 14, when here in Australia we get a delayed telecast of the proceedings with commentary from our own Des Mangan; if you think Terry Wogan was an ace commentator, then you’ve never heard Des do it. Unfortunately, I can’t find any footage of Des and Eurovision through the usual channels (read: YouTube), but to give you an idea, here’s one of Des’s intros from one of SBS’s Saturday night “cult films”. See what I mean?
My favourite Eurovision year has been 2010, when Lena Meyer-Landrut won for Germany with “Satellite” – one of the best pop songs made since 1998, in fact, it could have sat easily on the charts back then, with its flirty lyrics and easy to learn chorus – and I was able to pick first, second and third of the contest, which has made me want to bet on the competition every year since.
I like Eurovision for the blatant theatrics and camp so obvious it’s more a farce. I’ve also wanted to do the drinking game for it too – a shot of whatever you fancy whenever a “reveal” occurs, or a song changes key, languages or has some form of “special effects”; an easy and fun way to get hammered, basically drink whenever anything happens – but have always missed out due to having no funds when the contest is on. I shan’t do a Withnail and slug down vanilla essence, the closest I’ve got to proper booze.
And here’s another of my favourite Eurovision entries: in 2007, Israel was represented by a mob called Teapacks with the song “Push the Button” (the complete opposite from the Sugababes same-titled tune), a rock meets hip-hop/dub-step of English, French and Hebrew (they even rap in it). Apparently “controversial” because it featured references to Iran and nuclear war (the eponymous pushing of the button to launch missiles) – controversial to whom? Don’t tell me that even the Eurovision Song Contest isn’t safe from anti-Semitism? If a British entry – atrocious as they are – made references to bombs and mass-destruction (Why not get Faithless next year?), would it be considered “controversial”? Would it be seen as a dig against a fascist regime, the likes of which haven’t made such a presence in Eurovision since Spain’s General Franco ordered the namby-pamby “La La La” to trump Cliff Richard’s equally naff “Congratulations” in 1968; or would it simply be listened to as another song in the same treacle-laden vein as John Lennon’s “Happy Xmas (War is Over)”?
Why no irreverent study of popular culture in the mainstream Australian media? The best we ever had was the ABC’s Mondo Thingo, presented by the awesome Amanda Keller – from Clive James chatting away about celebrities without his usual loquacious loftiness to the emergence of flashmobs (apparently around since 2004 – I know, right?). It was easy to understand, entertaining and most of all fun. Who else knew little of the thrill of Eurovision or the stereotype-come-to-life of Ebonics until Mondo Thingo?
So what do we have now? Only intentionally serious and unintentionally boring reports on the evening news where the “latest” fads and crazes have already hit the limelight; features in weekend supplements that cater to a female audience that largely doesn’t exist either – yes I’m a male, but the “Yummy Mummy” tag is ridiculous because it implies that mothers have to be soft and stupid – my mum (known as “The Glacial One” – which I love as nickname despite at first deriding it with Paul Keating‘s “All tip and no iceberg” quip) isn’t, and neither are any other mothers I know. At least there’s Fairfax’s The Tribal Mind blog which gets a nice little strap at the end of the opinion pages every Sunday, but it sometimes tends to be more academic than needed.
The only real yet fun, irrelevant but also learned study of popular culture now is of course from blogs and social media. When’s the day going to come when bloggers are readily paid – properly – for what their writing is worth, without having to let an MSM site steal their words for a bit exposure or take advertising? Take the Courier-Mail as an example – they’ll happily publish a glib tweet from a nobody to fill space, but is that nobody getting a quid for it? And not to mention around the edges of the letters page there’s handpicked tweets from “celebrities” – either politicians, athletes nobody knows or cares of or talent-show plebs who rate even less. They’ve even quoted “models”, FFS!
There’s been many blogs and social media users from Australia and around the world that have gained prominence for their take on aspects of modern culture – some have been able to use this success to get books published, like Stuff White People Like and others have inspired television series, like Shit My Dad Says (much like the old schoolyard threat of “My dad could bash your dad”, my Dad could give his a run for his money).
DAD: … and she had all this thick gold rubbish and trinkets hanging off her, like Sammy Davis, Jr. What’s that called?
So why doesn’t the press directly source (and pay) from blogs, instead of the usual “blogs” hosted on their websites that are nothing more than opinion columns for less pay – Sam de Brito‘s All Men Are Liars, John Birmingham‘s Blunt Instrument – even Katharine Feeney’s Citykat (and what a ripper euphemism that could be with the right dirty mind).
Yes, I’ve only been blogging here for a fortnight as a way to hone my own writing and hopefully use it to get published, a portfolio of sorts, but I’m writing this piece not just for me, but for all the bloggers out there who entertain, provoke and inspire thought: I’ll admit Bob Ellis has pretty much burnt his bridges with nearly every paper in the country before his blog Table Talk, but what about Heathen Scripture? If blogs are now as “free” as media gets (no Rupert Murdoch, or as he’s known in my family, Elliot Carver types looking over shoulders) – then why doesn’t the media start publishing the works of bloggers more often instead of the usual coterie of repetitious middle-class opinion writers – how many columns have you read in the last week that riff on themes of either the same shrill opposition to any government policy without a second thought or about how “happy” (read: boring) family life is?
Hey Courier-Mail, if I have to read yet another column in tomorrow’s edition from a middle-aged fart writing about domesticity, I shall set myself on fire in your office – consider it a scoop. And on the C-M, nothing they’ve done has outraged me more than when the PM gave her awesome fifteen minute defense to the misogynistic attacks of the Opposition in Question Time last year, which set social media on fire and was viewed by millions around the world, a mere three paragraph report buried behind the front pages and even the “celebrity” pages. I think I was actually “unfriended” (the end of any friendship in modern etiquette is via Facebook) by someone who works for them – I’d love to know if it was because they thought I just posted crap (I couldn’t care less) or because I slagged off their editor; another instance of the mainstream media unable to handle the real world?
People can talk of “skeletons in the closet”, whether they are personal or familial indiscretions. My shameful act was to join the Socialist Alliance a few years ago. Wanting to join a political party (lefty that I am) I naturally plumped for the ALP, but being skint (unemployed) I chose to join the S.A. because membership was cheaper for the jobless. I wasn’t sure I’d last long anyway, being a pro-Israel and Philosemite. It’s obligatory to barrack for Palestine in all matters as a lefty, no matter the circumstances.
Proof of my shame.
Invited to the first meeting of the Melbourne branch for 2011, I went into town one Saturday afternoon, pushed out of home by a friend who encouraged me to go out and meet people instead of sitting on my arse watching box-sets of Weeds. The most memorable part of the day wasn’t meeting all my new upper-case-s Socialist friends, but the train into town – as I sat in my seat with sunglasses on and headphones pumping out a playlist of Deborah Conway’s “Consider This” and the Huxton Creepers’ “My Cherie Amour” (my “Melbourne music”), watching the suburbs along the Frankston line fly by, a girl a few seats away kept staring at me and as soon as I noticed would instantly look away, as if caught doing something untoward; which by all accounts it is untoward and unusual if someone casts an eye in my direction – I’ve no delusions. Before I disembarked the girl made a call and asked, “Have you ever had that weird thing happen when someone keeps staring at you on a train?” WELL, YOU STARTED IT! (“I have no issues. Really, I’m fine … I’m fine … don’t touch me!”)
Anyway, I made my way to the so-called “Resistance Centre” at the top end of Swanston Street opposite RMIT. A few floors up the branch meeting had just finished and, wallflower that I am, pretended to browse over books about Unionism in Eastern Europe in the 18th Century, Communist tomes and of course, the essential Marx and Engels, etc. Finally introducing myself, we all walked up to Carlton to a pub – this brightened my mood no end, friends and beer! Well, I was hoping I would make some friends after already committing a political faux-pas when asked what my thoughts were on socialism, “I’m a bit green at all this.” Cue lefties recoiling in horror at the name of another (and a damn-sight more organised and popular) political party. Thankfully the beer flowed and I did end up enjoying myself despite a few O.P. (other people’s) smokers – I aimed to please with my mercy dash to the nearest corner shop on a Saturday evening.
A week later I was asked to participate in a march to support Wikileaks, this being the summer of diplomatic discontent, and rocked up outside the State Library to find hundreds of people there of all different lefty backgrounds. There was a guy in a grey wig – to symbolise Julian Assange although he looked like Mrs Doubtfire – making speeches and was probably the organiser. Whilst milling at the edge of the crowd, lo and behold – another attractive girl came right up to me in her lovely purple ‘I SUPPORT GAY MARRIAGE’ t-shirt and tried to sign me up to another group, the Socialist Alternative. (I bet you all just said “alternative to what?”) So we got talking and as the march set off down tourist-filled Swanston Street on a warm Sunday afternoon, I quickly got into the screaming of
“FREE BRADLEY MANNING!” and endless rhymes starting with “2-4-6-8!” Equality Girl and I talked of my reasons for coming, my support of lefty things (“I just do it because I hate Tony Abbott”) and becoming political through reading the works of Frank Hardy – strangely, she hadn’t heard of him – how can you call yourself “political”, much less a “socialist” and live in Melbourne without knowing of Frank Hardy? Odd, I thought as we marched on complete with police escorts and blocking tram access to Flinders Street. I even ended up in the very front row too, but of course sod’s law came into play and I didn’t get my mug in any papers at all. So embarrassing.
We suddenly turned off Swanston into Collins Street and came to a stop outside the British Consulate. Why? I don’t know – surely it would have made much more sense to picket the Yanks instead? And that’s when the lefties tried to cram every single one of their causes into the afternoon by having an Aboriginal smoke-ceremony, the (only way to say it) “token Indigenous” person, everyone’s favourite lefty fool, Stephen Jolly from Yarra City Council and other larks that had nothing to do with Wikileaks at all. One of the marchers had grabbed a megaphone and started singing “Burn, baby burn!” Yes, hell is a socialist disco.
I bunked off with Equality Girl after an invitation to attend Trades Hall, where the Alternative’s set-up. I managed to stay for an hour despite not getting a single lefty joke – something about Condoleezza Rice or Donald Rumsfeld or some Bushite that was neither topical nor funny – and praise heaped on the beginning of the Arab Spring – I think Tunisia had just come through it and Egypt was about to kick off. When I got to Trades Hall I was met someone and said I’d just been on my first march, only to be asked, “Do you feel like a radical now?” Um no, I lived in Parkdale. Come on, like one bullshit march makes you a revolutionary leader. If true then a cake walk would be called a show of solidarity and consciousness-raising exercise. And why are the words “consciousness” and “collective” bandied about by hardcore lefties so much? They’re a worse cult than the Brethren! At least that time my mention of Frank Hardy was understood, before the motion was passed that to celebrate the Arab Spring they’d spit-roast a goat. Yeah, to celebrate the oppressed getting rid of their oppressors, they were going to cook a goat in a backyard in Fawkner. It’s like when they want to show solidarity with refugees locked up in detention centres – I don’t see the protesters sewing their lips and self-harming in protest.
A week later I returned to the Trades Hall mob for a free six-week course on learning all about socialism. Needing (and still) to know a lot more, I enthusiastically went along, only to be given a lecture on communism (which I can differentiate) and more “consciousness” and “collectives” being said. Me being me I started to take the piss but my barbs went unnoticed. So what more was there to do then just stop going? I’m glad I did – I’d have happily broken rank to condemn the BDS groupies and shame them for the anti-Semitic thugs they are. And so many middle-class members too – take this any way you want, but why try to change things on the other side of the world when there’s tonnes to do here – but of course, they’d be NIMBYs wouldn’t they? NOT IN MY BACKYARD! And I “love” NIMBYs. They’re the people who hate to see a block of housing-commission flats in their own street (“don’t want any riff-raff to come in”) but will happily snap up “investment” properties left, right and centre, charge exorbitant rents and thus create homelessness in the first place.
Like the Occupy movement, especially in Melbourne – what did the participants do for a living? They wouldn’t get the dole because they’d refuse to leave their pile of tents and squalor to attend appointments at Centrelink. I believe any hardcore and brainwashed member of a two-bit political group will always have a trust-fund or ready cash from Mummy and Daddy, especially if Pater works in the mines. How great to protest about minerals and natural resources being sent overseas when you’re living off the money your father gets for raping and pillaging the land and exporting said resources. It’s got to be true – when was the last time you saw a member of a political group other than the big four (Labor, Liberal, National and Greens) work from nine-to-five?
As much as I identify as a “lefty” (I believe in equality, free healthcare, education and public transport and less privatisation), I’m not a real one because I support Israel – and if I choose to support people who are holistically attractive instead of the other side with their tea-towels, hankies and policies of torture and abuse – then all the more fun for me!
Since the age of sixteen, I’ve had a deep love, interest and respect for Jewish people, whether they be practicing or just of the blood pure. It all started from reading the columns of Julie Burchill, the British journalist who is known as one of the fiercest defenders of Israel in the British media. Where are the defenders of Israel in Australia?
Why do I have such a thing for Jews? I can’t explain but I hope the following list will. How many of the people listed are either clever, talented, intelligent, funny, switched-on, interesting or even downright sexy, and all because they’re Jewish, regardless of whether by birth, religious observance or descent:
And that’s just a selection from Australia alone. I could go on with a list of people from overseas but we’d never hear the end of it, such is my passion.
I consider myself a philosemite (a Judeophile if you will, but small-minded people hear the suffix of “phile” and their minds go instantly to child abuse – I can’t fathom it either) and am very slowly learning all about Judaism, Israel and Zionism. Thanks to Burchill’s and others’ writings and the dozens of books I’ve read, I’m gradually becoming more passionate and learned.
I overcame the slight dislike of my name once I learnt it was of Hebrew origin, (Yeshua, translated to God is Salvation) and that even the alias I tooled about with, Levi, was again by coincidence Hebrew, meaning “joined in harmony”.
But the real turning point for me was when I decided to join a political party. Being of a lefty persuasion (despite favouring Israel over Palestine, a slap in the face to any left-leaning cause) I decided to join the Socialist Alliance, cheap at only $15 a pop for yearly membership. I only attended meetings and such for a fortnight before realising what a crock it was, of people brainwashed by words like “solidarity” and “cause” and “consciousness” bandied about like stones, the same stones that Israelis are pelted with by Palestinians. Also I got out before the question over the Middle East arose and would surely have been kicked out anyway. I can just picture myself being chased out of Trades Hall for refusing to kow-tow to the demands of a group of people whose chosen fashion accessory is one of Mum’s tea towels, straight out of the third drawer down.
I’m glad I cut all ties with the lefty loonies by then, because at that time they all decided to do the only thing a BDS campaign can do, to picket a chocolate shop because it was started by two guys who happened (by fortune) to have been born in Israel. I was livid and had a near panic-attack when I read in the papers that 19 protestors (some of whom were from the S.A., just one letter away from S.S.) were arrested for protesting outside a Max Brenner store in Melbourne’s CBD, on charges including riotous behaviour, trespass and besetting premises. In my upset state I seriously thought that the next thing the S.A. would do was goose-step down Glen Huntly Road to Caulfield, Elsternwick and Balaclava (the home of most of Melbourne’s Jewish population) and attack any newsagent that dared to sell the Australian Jewish News. Thankfully, this has not happened, but if anything so resembles that sickening thought I’ll be on the first plane down there to abuse them in turn whilst proudly wearing my Israeli flag-patterned bandana (sorry, it was cheaper than buying an actual flag-sized flag, of which I hope to buy a few to put up in my front windows).
Picketing Max Brenner stores and other businesses with links, however tenuous, to Israel is not just confined to Melbourne, or even Australia, but has happened throughout the world too – from London to Los Angeles. It also happened at around the same time to another Max Brenner store in Brisbane, and delightfully the BDS mob were met by a counter-protest, with bigger numbers and louder voices. Happily there was as a pro-Israel protest and show of support for the beleaguered chocolate shop in Melbourne, although sadly (to me personally) was sponsored and organised by the Liberal Party (don’t let the name fool you, international readers – the Liberal Party of Australia are conservative and currently there’s a right-wing Catholic at the helm), but at last Josh Frydenberg, Liberal MP for Kooyong, finally endeared himself to me, by asking BDS protestors to their smug faces: “Where is your Boycott, Divestment, Sanction about the butchers in Syria, about Ahmadinejad in Iran and the perils of Hezbollah?” If I should ever move to Anglican, leafy, upper middle class Kooyong – he’s got my vote.
So why do we hear nothing from a pro-Israel point-of-view in the Australian media? Granted we hear precious little about the Middle East anyway, usually only a few seconds on the evening news of rockets being launched over borders. And even that’s only onWorld News Australiaon SBS! Australia needs a shake-up to scrape off the anti-Semitic crust that somehow most people I’ve met have inherently got. Even last week a 17 year-old (now former) friend of mine heard me mention that I was reading about Israel. His response to this was “bomb the shit out of them.” Considering that the political history of the Middle East isn’t taught in high school history (for shame), how could he say this without knowing a thing? How come in February 2012 on a block of toilets in near-redneck Wantirna of all places, some yobs chose as graffiti “The best Jew is a dead Jew” and a picture of a stick-figure in a noose, in a place with no Jewish people at all?
As Peter Finch cried in Network, “I’m mad as hell and I’m not gonna’ take it anymore!” Why is there no history of out-and-proud philosemitism in Australia, particularly in the most Jewish-populated cities of Sydney and Melbourne? Why do studies say that anti-Semitism in Australia is on the rise since 9/11? Correct me if I’m wrong but was Israel in anyway involved in an attack that was orchestrated by the suicidal shareholders of Al Qaeda PLC? I know Muslims, whether fundamental or not, have taken stick (if not a branch), since then but blaming Jews for a cowardly offence committed by people? Have you not heard of Nick Griffin? Isn’t this just fringe-dwelling conspiracy nuts blaming Jewish people for everything wrong in their lives becoming mainstream?
It’s not on.
NOTE: Next I’ll be writing about what it’s really like attending a Socialist Alliance meeting and joining them on a protest – in other words, “My Brush with the Loony Left”.
The Josh Holley 