Parental guilt trip neglects the real offenders

 

We’ve become such a judgemental society that now the smallest thing blows up to become the biggest issue of the day. Party boy Corey is a case in point, where the reaction and subsequent publicity about a kid whos party got out of hand was way out of proprtion with the actual event.

This week’s fodder for the tabloid press, talback hacks and the swarmy bitch Anna Coren is a mother who dared put her toddler’s mishap at the hands of her pet dog as a boys-will-be-boys thing.

Alicia Cottier has become the most hated mum in Australia since, well since Corey’s mum pissed off to the Gold Coast leaving him to, if you believe the hype, destroy the entire City of Casey.

Why? Because when her two-year-old son Noah tugged at the mastiff-stafforshire cross’s ears and it lashed out and bit him on the face, she refused to have the dog destroyed saying that it as the boy’s fault and refused to have the dog taken away or put down.

Warning fatigue

We are all going to die. The question is how.

I’m not talking about our individual mortality, but as a species. If global warming (has that earned proper noun status yet?) doesn’t kill us, genetically modified food, terrorism, over-population, exotic influenza, US foreign policy and all manner of pending catastrophies will vye for the title of biggest fuck-off threat to mankind.

Which is why I am finding difficult to grasp the concerns about Melbourne’s Port Phillip Bay channel deepening project. What started as a temporary threat to the bay’s ecology is now the total destruction of the bay and all life within it; according to some of the protestors who welcomed the dredging ship Queen of the Netherlands into port.

It takes two, surely

When a big story breaks you read all kinds of things as the news services attempt to satisfy your hunger for more and more information. This happened today on Australia’s news web sites, which went from having a one-sentence AP story about reports of Heath Ledger’s shock death to black-top web news specials with stories, tributes and biographies within an hour or so.

Within all that you read some weird stuff, like this story in The Age about the sleeping pill that Ledger was said to have been prescribed.

Follow that dream, before it’s too late

The shock death of Heath Ledger attracted predictably large numbers of tributes and comments on the newspaper web sites. Among the polite, non-judgemental messages of condolence was the usual scattering of “he took drugs so he deserved to die” bullshit pieces of divine wisdom, that are sadly to be expected when this sort of tragedy occurs.

Then there were the “why would a famous person who has it all want to kill themselves?” comments, which demonstrate there really needs to be a lot more education about the hideous scourge that is depression.

Hidden amongst the comments on the Herald Sun web site was this one by Dustyn of Richmond, who I’m sure is a nice fellow if not foolishly naïve enough to think that we actually give a shit about his fantasies.

Beware the Rudd haters

All those people who accused anyone who dared criticise the Howard Government as “left-wing, latte-sipping Howard haters” have taken it upon themselves to spread their own hatred to the incumbent, for no other reason than that he is a popularly elected Labor prime minister.

The trouble with the whole Howard-hater tag is that it deflected the reasons why people disliked the former prime minister and his government.

Despite what the pig-headed conservatives who coined the term would have you believe, John Howard wasn’t hated simply because he was a Liberal prime minister. When he first came into power and toughened the country’s gun laws after the Port Arthur massacre, Labor voters (except those who hunt and vote) agreed with him, as they did his decision to send Australian troops into East Timor.

The so-called Left didn’t oppose Howard for the sake of opposing him. He had to actually show what a bastard he really was before people started sharing more than a passing dislike based on political or idealogical differences.

Come on! Pull your head in Hewitt

I don’t how he can, but Australia’s most unpopular sportsperson is registering his arrogant hand gesture that has become the symbol of what a little shit he is.

I’m not sure how trademarking the movement of a bodypart will pay off for Lleyton Hewitt. Even if we had to pay him royalties, the money won’t exactly come rolling in as it’s not exactly a gesture that one makes normally unless they:

• Are doing a hand puppet show which involves having a discussion with an emu
• Are an ancient Egyptian
• Are an unloved tennis player who often talks to the same hand they’ve long had sexual relations with.

Anyway the “vicht” salute isn’t even Lleyton’s. The rights were actually held by former Swedish players Matts Wilander (someone whose compusure and sportsmanship Hewitt can learn from) and Niclas Kroon who let the trademark lapse. It is also used by other sportsmen like Grant Hackett (an Aussie sportsman in the true sense of the word) and Adelaide Crows defender Andrew McLeod as well as millions of other people who happen to have an arm, hand and wrist.

 

The Usual Suspects

Another Australian Open Tennis tournament, another display of foolish thuggery concerning Greek, Croatian and Serbian fans.

If Sudanese or other Muslim kids so much as fart in Melbourne there are calls for their deportation and claims they simply aren’t assimilating. Yet we allow these buffoons, many of whom have never been to the country they so love to champion through their thuggery, bring old hostilities to a sporting event under the guise of supporting players from their countries who, unlike them, have moved on from all the hatred they love to spew out - interestingly, while many happily like to “fight for their country’s honour” on Melbourne’s streets, they won’t be caught dead in their country for fear of having to do National Service. What patriots!