Still on the subject of everyone's favourite aboreal hash hunter: Hardly surprising that pro-legalization lefties would seek to take advantage of the Stoner Sloth campaign's massive social media debacle. They'll use anything they can find to push their cause. And they always seem to do it in an intellectually dishonest way. (Though maybe they're not that smart. Perhaps what appears to be deceitfulness is actually stupidity caused by years of bonging on? Not totally sure.)
Anyhoo, take this dopey gargle on The Drum. It's as dodgy as all get out! The summary reads:
The Stoner Sloth campaign is a symptom of our poor drug conversation. If we legalised marijuana then we could discuss how it's used without euphemisms, hypocrisy and bizarre furry animals, writes Jeff Sparrow.
Typical leftist sophistry. It's like saying: "If you quit resisting and simply go along with my side of the debate, then we can have a real debate. The fact that you disagree with me is what is stopping us rationally discussing different points of view."
Sparrow then goes on to imply that because Barrack Obama was once a "big time herbsman" cannabis is clearly benign. If anything, that fun fact says more about Obama himself -- along with the culture of the Democrats, as well as the mainstream media for generally sweeping it under the carpet -- than it does about whether pot should be legalized in Australia.
He then drops this little nugget of comedy gold:
The teens targeted by Stoner Sloth are not stupid.
That's almost as funny as the campaign itself, and in the same unwitting way!
Of course they are stupid. And not just because they're off their faces on weed. As well as being emotionally and intellectually immature due to their young age, they mistakenly believe that smoking is entirely benign, and that they can keep indulging in it without a worry in the world. (And this stupidity has resulted in part due to the rosy picture of pot smoking painted by people like Sparrow himself.)
It's this ignorant nonchalance that the Stoner Sloth campaign seeks to disabuse teens of. Numerous studies have proven that marijuana can be addictive and that heavy long term use causes significant psychological damage. So you shouldn't let yourself sleepwalk into a habit, particularly at such a young age. That's what the campaign is trying to convey, albeit in a hilariously clumsy way.
This undeniable fact is inconvenient to Sparrow, which is why he pretty much avoids it throughout the article. Instead he focuses on demonizing the law and comes up with this hilariously revealing line:
As every stoner knows, most of the dangers about toking weed are a direct consequence of the legal prohibitions on its use and sale.
This knowledge he speaks of, is it possessed by said smokers while they're high as kites, or straight? Because there's a big difference in those two states of consciousness. And it's actually the main reason dope smokers do what they do ... with their doobies.
See, they don't like reality. So if they're stoned all the time they end up being completely detached from it. As a result, what they "know" doesn't really count for much now does it?
Tuesday, December 22, 2015
Monday, December 21, 2015
Stoner Sloth satires spell doom for star and similar campaigns
The "Stoner Sloth" campaign has been a rolled gold (or should that be joint?) disaster for the NSW Government. It's spawned several online parodies and since everyone's yucking it up over the surreal ads their anti-drugs message seems to have been well and truly lost.
Secret sources from deep inside Macquarie Street tell me that the Stoner Sloth social media yuckfest has resulted in the scotching of a whole series of planned spinoffs.
These included:
A "Keep Australia Beautiful" style promo starring a rubbish throwing feline called Litter Kitty.
A series of positive body image messages aimed at young men featuring Longer Langur the Penis Extension Monkey.
The self-destructive misadventures of a marsupial adrenaline junky called Thrillby Bilby.
Hard hitting anti-binge drinking ads showing a herbivore overdoing it at his local watering hole. His name: Will Da Beast (otherwise known as Spu Gnu).
An STD awareness campaign based on the brazen bed-hopping of a randy rodent called Root Rat.
Sadly, none of these social awareness epics will see the light of day. But the advertising firms behind them will of course still be paid. Typical! More tax dollars down the drain ...
But back to the Stoner Sloth campaign: While the reputation of the creative team behind it has taken a battering, they're unlikely to suffer any long term consequences.
The same cannot be said of the poor sloth who starred in the series. Countless tales of celebrity meltdown are testament to the deleterious effects of instant, fleeting fame on the human psyche. But what if the subject is an animal (or "non-human person" as the more PC like to say)?
By jetting to the big smoke and taking on the challenging role the hirsute thespian was already out on a limb. And if he wasn't off his tree during filming (as any true method actor would have been) he almost certainly is now due to all the stress!
As we all know, dope is a gateway drug. He'll be Smacked Out Sloth eventually. Death by overdose is sure to be the final, tragic outcome. But it won't be over quickly like what happened to Knut. Given his species' characteristic slowness, his journey toward the final curtain is sure to be an excruciatingly drawn out one.
How terribly, awfully, horribly ... gradually ...eventually ... finally ... sad. Yet all the while we humans will be laughing at him online!
Man's inhumanity to man is appalling enough. But his inhumanity to sloth is far, far worse.
Secret sources from deep inside Macquarie Street tell me that the Stoner Sloth social media yuckfest has resulted in the scotching of a whole series of planned spinoffs.
These included:
A "Keep Australia Beautiful" style promo starring a rubbish throwing feline called Litter Kitty.
A series of positive body image messages aimed at young men featuring Longer Langur the Penis Extension Monkey.
The self-destructive misadventures of a marsupial adrenaline junky called Thrillby Bilby.
Hard hitting anti-binge drinking ads showing a herbivore overdoing it at his local watering hole. His name: Will Da Beast (otherwise known as Spu Gnu).
An STD awareness campaign based on the brazen bed-hopping of a randy rodent called Root Rat.
Sadly, none of these social awareness epics will see the light of day. But the advertising firms behind them will of course still be paid. Typical! More tax dollars down the drain ...
But back to the Stoner Sloth campaign: While the reputation of the creative team behind it has taken a battering, they're unlikely to suffer any long term consequences.
The same cannot be said of the poor sloth who starred in the series. Countless tales of celebrity meltdown are testament to the deleterious effects of instant, fleeting fame on the human psyche. But what if the subject is an animal (or "non-human person" as the more PC like to say)?
By jetting to the big smoke and taking on the challenging role the hirsute thespian was already out on a limb. And if he wasn't off his tree during filming (as any true method actor would have been) he almost certainly is now due to all the stress!
As we all know, dope is a gateway drug. He'll be Smacked Out Sloth eventually. Death by overdose is sure to be the final, tragic outcome. But it won't be over quickly like what happened to Knut. Given his species' characteristic slowness, his journey toward the final curtain is sure to be an excruciatingly drawn out one.
How terribly, awfully, horribly ... gradually ...eventually ... finally ... sad. Yet all the while we humans will be laughing at him online!
Man's inhumanity to man is appalling enough. But his inhumanity to sloth is far, far worse.
Sunday, November 22, 2015
Reclaim Australia rally in Martin Place
Just shuffled up from Wynyard to the State Library of NSW, where I am now. Got some snaps of the Reclaim Australia rally being held in Martin Place.
Have just learned that there was some violence at the rally. That surprised me because when I was there only about 40 minutes ago it was all pretty sedate ... There was a very strong police presence, however.
Still, the crowd seemed very well behaved. There is definitely an aggro -- and it must be said, racist -- element at some Reclaim Australia rallies. But that seemed to be absent here.
Not sure who was addressing the rally when I walked through but he seemed to be of Middle Eastern descent. Maybe he'd suffered under Sharia Law himself? He was basically saying that Islam doesn't tolerate other religions, and is using our willingness to bend over backwards to accommodate it as a kind of Trojan Horse to attain the commanding heights of political power here.
He stood above a panoply of flags that was certainly at odds with the MSM line that this group is dominated by white supremacist neo-Nazis!
That said, I'm sure some die hard lefties would find it sinister that a huge Christmas tree loomed over him! But I suspect most people would think it benign at worst.
There were plenty of Aussie flags, which lefties deem to be racist in and of themselves, of course -- as well as the odd sign that nervous Nellies might find offensive. But there was nothing overtly racist about any that I could see.
Interestingly there seemed to be a couple of guys from Anonymous supporting the rally. Now that's an intriguing development! Well, they have launched a cyber war against ISIS, so maybe that was the reason? Or maybe they were just a coupla smartarses? Who knows ...
Anyhoo, it'll be interesting to learn more about that biffo. I'll have a gander as I go to catch the train to Bondi Junction.
I suspect it was provoked by the lefties who lobbed. They always do that, don't they? Pick a fight so they get thwocked and then starting crying that they've been bullied.
Have just learned that there was some violence at the rally. That surprised me because when I was there only about 40 minutes ago it was all pretty sedate ... There was a very strong police presence, however.
Still, the crowd seemed very well behaved. There is definitely an aggro -- and it must be said, racist -- element at some Reclaim Australia rallies. But that seemed to be absent here.
Not sure who was addressing the rally when I walked through but he seemed to be of Middle Eastern descent. Maybe he'd suffered under Sharia Law himself? He was basically saying that Islam doesn't tolerate other religions, and is using our willingness to bend over backwards to accommodate it as a kind of Trojan Horse to attain the commanding heights of political power here.
He stood above a panoply of flags that was certainly at odds with the MSM line that this group is dominated by white supremacist neo-Nazis!
That said, I'm sure some die hard lefties would find it sinister that a huge Christmas tree loomed over him! But I suspect most people would think it benign at worst.
There were plenty of Aussie flags, which lefties deem to be racist in and of themselves, of course -- as well as the odd sign that nervous Nellies might find offensive. But there was nothing overtly racist about any that I could see.
Interestingly there seemed to be a couple of guys from Anonymous supporting the rally. Now that's an intriguing development! Well, they have launched a cyber war against ISIS, so maybe that was the reason? Or maybe they were just a coupla smartarses? Who knows ...
Anyhoo, it'll be interesting to learn more about that biffo. I'll have a gander as I go to catch the train to Bondi Junction.
I suspect it was provoked by the lefties who lobbed. They always do that, don't they? Pick a fight so they get thwocked and then starting crying that they've been bullied.
Saturday, September 12, 2015
David Leyonhjelm and Michael Moore debate nanny statism on Lateline
I've long been interested in the idea of freedom of speech. Without it, we don't really have true democracy, after all. But the whole concept is open to interpretation -- as well as being highly emotive -- so double standards often apply.
In past decades it was the conservative side of politics that was most censorious. Significant battles like the Oz obscenity trial come to mind. But these days it's clearly the Left who really want to control what we can say. Deceitful and sinister, political correctness is a truly poisonous form of censorship.
This idea that the government knows what's good for you better than you do yourself comes through in other ways such as bike helmet laws and plain packaging of cigarettes.
There was an interesting debate about the idea of this creeping "nanny state" last night on Lateline. In it, Senator David Leyonhjelm debated Michael Moore, CEO of The Public Health Association of Australia.
Leyonhjelm is clearly an intelligent and rational person. I can see why his prescriptions would infuriate many on the Left. They are primarily motivated by emotions, in particular an inflated sense of their own virtue. One of the ways they feed this is by "caring" for others. But that "caring" often morphs into control. Look at any communist state and you'll see just how far that can go!
Leyonhjelm's more detached view can be seen throughout the interchange, but particularly in this segment about health damage caused by smoking:
EMMA ALBERICI: Let's talk about a nanny state issue then, smoking, is that a nanny state issue?
DAVID LEYONHJELM: Absolutely.
EMMA ALBERICI: But doesn't smoking have the ability to cause ill health to other people around you?
DAVID LEYONHJELM: Yes. Secondary smoking, and I'm not denying that and nor does anybody on my side of the argument deny that. What we do argue is that it's a personal choice when you're not affecting somebody else and yet we have nanny state measures such as plain packaging, such as very, very high taxes that are intended to stop people from smoking, irrespective of whether they are harming somebody else.
EMMA ALBERICI: But won't they harm the economy overall if they end up becoming sick and in fact, very sick because we know that smoking causes a lot of harm and kills?
DAVID LEYONHJELM: It does. It makes people die earlier. And that actually saves the economy money.
Lefties watching that bit would have thought he was the devil incarnate! But he was just being rational. If you're going to talk about cost then you must look at things dispassionately, like an accountant. Can't have it both ways.
Speaking of detachment, and lack thereof: Michael Moore was brusque and borderline rude to his opponent. He was also dismissive of the whole idea of the nanny state, as if it was some sort of wacky conspiracy theory.
This is a favourite tactic of the Left. Keep saying that grounds for criticism just don't exist, that the arguments are so ridiculous as to be laughable. It's a way of implying that opposition is mad, bad or both and can be extremely effective if done in a concerted way.
He ended on a patronising note:
EMMA ALBERICI: Michael? A final view from you.
MICHAEL MOORE: Absolute nonsense of course. I think David is quite confused. One minute he says yes we should have it on this, we shouldn't have it on that. The reality is and I suppose this is almost where we agree, is that there is a balance between personal responsibility and good government stewardship as outlined by the Ethics Committee. So it's that good stewardship that we want inform ensure that we have an appropriate level of freedom as individuals as we should have and an appropriate level of government stewardship.
"Appropriate." Sounds reasonable. But just as one man's meat is another man's murder, appropriate for some is suffocating for another. Something tells me he'd support a much greater level of "government stewardship" than I'd be comfortable with, which is why I'm glad there are people like Leyonhjelm in positions of power to question it.
In past decades it was the conservative side of politics that was most censorious. Significant battles like the Oz obscenity trial come to mind. But these days it's clearly the Left who really want to control what we can say. Deceitful and sinister, political correctness is a truly poisonous form of censorship.
This idea that the government knows what's good for you better than you do yourself comes through in other ways such as bike helmet laws and plain packaging of cigarettes.
There was an interesting debate about the idea of this creeping "nanny state" last night on Lateline. In it, Senator David Leyonhjelm debated Michael Moore, CEO of The Public Health Association of Australia.
Leyonhjelm is clearly an intelligent and rational person. I can see why his prescriptions would infuriate many on the Left. They are primarily motivated by emotions, in particular an inflated sense of their own virtue. One of the ways they feed this is by "caring" for others. But that "caring" often morphs into control. Look at any communist state and you'll see just how far that can go!
Leyonhjelm's more detached view can be seen throughout the interchange, but particularly in this segment about health damage caused by smoking:
EMMA ALBERICI: Let's talk about a nanny state issue then, smoking, is that a nanny state issue?
DAVID LEYONHJELM: Absolutely.
EMMA ALBERICI: But doesn't smoking have the ability to cause ill health to other people around you?
DAVID LEYONHJELM: Yes. Secondary smoking, and I'm not denying that and nor does anybody on my side of the argument deny that. What we do argue is that it's a personal choice when you're not affecting somebody else and yet we have nanny state measures such as plain packaging, such as very, very high taxes that are intended to stop people from smoking, irrespective of whether they are harming somebody else.
EMMA ALBERICI: But won't they harm the economy overall if they end up becoming sick and in fact, very sick because we know that smoking causes a lot of harm and kills?
DAVID LEYONHJELM: It does. It makes people die earlier. And that actually saves the economy money.
Lefties watching that bit would have thought he was the devil incarnate! But he was just being rational. If you're going to talk about cost then you must look at things dispassionately, like an accountant. Can't have it both ways.
Speaking of detachment, and lack thereof: Michael Moore was brusque and borderline rude to his opponent. He was also dismissive of the whole idea of the nanny state, as if it was some sort of wacky conspiracy theory.
This is a favourite tactic of the Left. Keep saying that grounds for criticism just don't exist, that the arguments are so ridiculous as to be laughable. It's a way of implying that opposition is mad, bad or both and can be extremely effective if done in a concerted way.
He ended on a patronising note:
EMMA ALBERICI: Michael? A final view from you.
MICHAEL MOORE: Absolute nonsense of course. I think David is quite confused. One minute he says yes we should have it on this, we shouldn't have it on that. The reality is and I suppose this is almost where we agree, is that there is a balance between personal responsibility and good government stewardship as outlined by the Ethics Committee. So it's that good stewardship that we want inform ensure that we have an appropriate level of freedom as individuals as we should have and an appropriate level of government stewardship.
"Appropriate." Sounds reasonable. But just as one man's meat is another man's murder, appropriate for some is suffocating for another. Something tells me he'd support a much greater level of "government stewardship" than I'd be comfortable with, which is why I'm glad there are people like Leyonhjelm in positions of power to question it.
Tuesday, September 1, 2015
Laurie Penny and Tariq Ali on Q and A
For last night's Q and A I suspect that the team of sneering hipsters who monitor the tweets had been told to lay off the bongs so they didn't let any obscene handles through. And yes, there were no disasters there. So, well done kids!
Basically, they got it back to business as usual: A constant flow of PC cant and infantile abuse from quarter-witted pinkos without the spine to use their own names.
The guests, and their views, repeated the show's notoriously dreary right-on bias. The panel included three of the Left's most well known slebs. Renowned on the festival circuit as big thinkers, all they offered on the night was a barrage of bolshie bollocks. Most of it was funny. But some was kinda sinister. Can't cover it all but here's a bit of a roundup:
The show began with a discussion of the Ashley Madison hack and its social ramifications. Feisty feminist pixie-person Laurie Penny was the first to offer her wisdom:
BRIDGET DOMINIC: Hi. In a recent case in the US involving Tinder, a judge handed down what many considered to be an extreme punishment calling the use of the app totally inappropriate behaviour for which there is “no excuse whatsoever. Vanity Fair also published a scolding article criticising the hook up culture of the app. The moral outrage seems to mirror that which surrounds the Ashley Madison hack. Do you think technology breeds cheating and casual sex or merely facilitates inevitable human behaviours?
TONY JONES: Laurie Penny, this question was made for you, I think.
LAURIE PENNY: Well, when people ask about hook up culture and is it good or bad, I think what people mean by hook up culture is casual sex and generally I'm for that. It’s not a political position per se but the idea being promulgated is that sex itself is bad for women and I think, as a feminist writer, this is kind of what I'm expected to say but actually it’s not sex that's bad for women. Sexism is bad for women. What is disturbing about the Ashley Madison hack is that we are using very new technology to, sort of, promulgate Victorian moral values which are around shame, around punishing people for private behaviour which is not abusive. I mean, cheating on your partner, lying to your partner, makes you a dick. It doesn't make you an abuser and let's be very clear on the distinction here. What I'm learning from this is that, really, monogamy isn't working for a great many people and people are using technology to get around that and I don't have a problem with that really.
She clearly has a very cynical attitude to relationships if she thinks that cheating does nothing more than make you "a dick". But while it couldn't be called abuse in a legal sense it's still very destructive. Infidelity breaks hearts, ruins relationships and makes it very difficult for those who've been so betrayed to trust again. If she thinks that such major deception of someone you're in a deep and intimate relationship with is no biggie, what does she think of using falsehoods in other contexts?
Penny's swipe at Victorian morality was echoed by Tariq Ali and Naomi Klein to some degree. They seemed to think that monogamy was too big an ask.
But this is one of the key tenets of marriage, as we all know. Given that, it seems odd they'd they be supportive of "marriage equality" (which I'm sure they all are). Do they think it's liberating for homosexuals to endure the same sexual, emotional and spiritual incarceration the straight Ashley Madison members found so unbearable?
Snowcone Tony Jones was clearly impressed by Penny's erudite elfin insights because he asked her: "Did you think the hack was some sort of backlash from moral conservatives?"
You can understand why he'd think that. But it did seem a bit of an odd link to make even for him, given that the Left love to see themselves as sleek geeks and conservatives as mouldy ol' Luddites. Maybe Snowcone thought the hacker was from Tony Abbott's PR office?
Never know. Coulda been. Anything's possible, I s'pose ... Well, one thing's for sure. It wasn't Dyson Heydon.
In her answer, the sassy social media sprite was closer to the mark:
LAURIE PENNY: I think the hack was chancers trying get hold of people’s private information and that is the thing we should be worried about when it comes to services like this and instead of being outraged that people's private data is being stolen by criminals and that all of our data is increasingly insecure and could be used for all kinds of nefarious purposes, including by States, we are jumping on this band wagon, shaming people saying gleefully rubbing our hands trying to figure out who has been cheating on who. You know, three people have committed suicide after being exposed by the Ashley Madison hack and I'm sure, sadly, that there may be more and this is a serious matter and instead of, you know, asking ourselves, you know, are we sliding into some kind of moral decline because of technology, I think the real moral decline is that we are still prepared to shame each other in this way.
Hmmm. If suicides have resulted from a dating site being hacked, then you can only wonder at the collateral damage caused by Wikileaks. Wonder what her views on this issue are?
Penny supplied more clangers as the night went on, including a completely irrelevant, utterly cringeworthy nod to land rights. Her insincerity was obvious from the self-conscious manner in which she acknowledged the area's "traditional owners" and struggled to pronounce their tribal name correctly.
But she did make the effort. So Jones approved, natch.
When the discussion turned to Border Force, Veteran Tariq Ali beclowned himself with his predictable regurgitation of the local loony Left take on the exercize.
Interestingly he was much more ambivalent about bona fide tyranny. He even waxed lyrical about Iraq under Saddam Hussein:
TONY JONES: Tariq, would Iraq be better off with an authoritarian regime is the question the questioner asked?
TARIQ ALI: Compared to now, without any doubt. I have no doubt about that at all, and ...
TONY JONES: So what about Syria under Assad?
TARIQ ALI: Saddam was at his worst when he was an ally of the West. That's when the Kurds were attacked with poison gas, during the Iran Iraq War when the West was backing him. But of late, despite the sanctions and all that, he kept that country together and people have no idea now, because we live in a world where amnesia is more or less encouraged, but that effectively the social gains made in Iraq during Saddam's period, and others before him: education, health, women's rights, that in the 1980s, Baghdad University had more women teaching at every level than there are women teaching at Princeton today. These are the figures. So, there were lots of social gains made and these gains have all been lost by this crazy war. There is no rational logic for that war, except the maintenance of American power and probably Israeli pressure put on the United States to destroy larger countries who have independent armies. There was no other real reason for that war and we are now paying the price.
Gawd, he sounded like that Sean Penn puppet from Team America. (He'd been to Iraq, you know!)
The unshockable Ali went on to say ISIS should be left alone, too. Maybe he thinks that like Saddam they'll eventually be able to hold Iraq together? Given their propensity for separating individuals' heads from their bodies, I find it hard to get enthusiastic about their plans for uniting the nation.
There was another telling little interchange that showed where Ali's sympathies were. That was right at the end, when talk turned to the Virginia shooting after a questioner asked if extremely violent images should be shown on mainstream media:
TONY JONES: So there’s a case for actually suppressing press freedom in this instance, is there?
MIROSLAV VOLF: I don't think suppressing press freedom, I don't think that’s going to happen, but there is a moral case for appealing to people not to show.
TARIQ ALI: I agree with that actually and I found it very repulsive, for instance, when Saddam Hussein was being hanged, all that footage was shown on the screens, when Gaddafi was being butchered, without any trial or any attempt even to have a serious trial.
He said more but I found that first bit most intriguing. The question related specifically to the horrific slaying of two completely innocent people. Yet the first thing that came to Ali's mind was the rough justice meted out to those two mass-murdering arseholes. Revealing, eh?
Basically, they got it back to business as usual: A constant flow of PC cant and infantile abuse from quarter-witted pinkos without the spine to use their own names.
The guests, and their views, repeated the show's notoriously dreary right-on bias. The panel included three of the Left's most well known slebs. Renowned on the festival circuit as big thinkers, all they offered on the night was a barrage of bolshie bollocks. Most of it was funny. But some was kinda sinister. Can't cover it all but here's a bit of a roundup:
The show began with a discussion of the Ashley Madison hack and its social ramifications. Feisty feminist pixie-person Laurie Penny was the first to offer her wisdom:
BRIDGET DOMINIC: Hi. In a recent case in the US involving Tinder, a judge handed down what many considered to be an extreme punishment calling the use of the app totally inappropriate behaviour for which there is “no excuse whatsoever. Vanity Fair also published a scolding article criticising the hook up culture of the app. The moral outrage seems to mirror that which surrounds the Ashley Madison hack. Do you think technology breeds cheating and casual sex or merely facilitates inevitable human behaviours?
TONY JONES: Laurie Penny, this question was made for you, I think.
LAURIE PENNY: Well, when people ask about hook up culture and is it good or bad, I think what people mean by hook up culture is casual sex and generally I'm for that. It’s not a political position per se but the idea being promulgated is that sex itself is bad for women and I think, as a feminist writer, this is kind of what I'm expected to say but actually it’s not sex that's bad for women. Sexism is bad for women. What is disturbing about the Ashley Madison hack is that we are using very new technology to, sort of, promulgate Victorian moral values which are around shame, around punishing people for private behaviour which is not abusive. I mean, cheating on your partner, lying to your partner, makes you a dick. It doesn't make you an abuser and let's be very clear on the distinction here. What I'm learning from this is that, really, monogamy isn't working for a great many people and people are using technology to get around that and I don't have a problem with that really.
She clearly has a very cynical attitude to relationships if she thinks that cheating does nothing more than make you "a dick". But while it couldn't be called abuse in a legal sense it's still very destructive. Infidelity breaks hearts, ruins relationships and makes it very difficult for those who've been so betrayed to trust again. If she thinks that such major deception of someone you're in a deep and intimate relationship with is no biggie, what does she think of using falsehoods in other contexts?
Penny's swipe at Victorian morality was echoed by Tariq Ali and Naomi Klein to some degree. They seemed to think that monogamy was too big an ask.
But this is one of the key tenets of marriage, as we all know. Given that, it seems odd they'd they be supportive of "marriage equality" (which I'm sure they all are). Do they think it's liberating for homosexuals to endure the same sexual, emotional and spiritual incarceration the straight Ashley Madison members found so unbearable?
Snowcone Tony Jones was clearly impressed by Penny's erudite elfin insights because he asked her: "Did you think the hack was some sort of backlash from moral conservatives?"
You can understand why he'd think that. But it did seem a bit of an odd link to make even for him, given that the Left love to see themselves as sleek geeks and conservatives as mouldy ol' Luddites. Maybe Snowcone thought the hacker was from Tony Abbott's PR office?
Never know. Coulda been. Anything's possible, I s'pose ... Well, one thing's for sure. It wasn't Dyson Heydon.
In her answer, the sassy social media sprite was closer to the mark:
LAURIE PENNY: I think the hack was chancers trying get hold of people’s private information and that is the thing we should be worried about when it comes to services like this and instead of being outraged that people's private data is being stolen by criminals and that all of our data is increasingly insecure and could be used for all kinds of nefarious purposes, including by States, we are jumping on this band wagon, shaming people saying gleefully rubbing our hands trying to figure out who has been cheating on who. You know, three people have committed suicide after being exposed by the Ashley Madison hack and I'm sure, sadly, that there may be more and this is a serious matter and instead of, you know, asking ourselves, you know, are we sliding into some kind of moral decline because of technology, I think the real moral decline is that we are still prepared to shame each other in this way.
Hmmm. If suicides have resulted from a dating site being hacked, then you can only wonder at the collateral damage caused by Wikileaks. Wonder what her views on this issue are?
Penny supplied more clangers as the night went on, including a completely irrelevant, utterly cringeworthy nod to land rights. Her insincerity was obvious from the self-conscious manner in which she acknowledged the area's "traditional owners" and struggled to pronounce their tribal name correctly.
But she did make the effort. So Jones approved, natch.
When the discussion turned to Border Force, Veteran Tariq Ali beclowned himself with his predictable regurgitation of the local loony Left take on the exercize.
Interestingly he was much more ambivalent about bona fide tyranny. He even waxed lyrical about Iraq under Saddam Hussein:
TONY JONES: Tariq, would Iraq be better off with an authoritarian regime is the question the questioner asked?
TARIQ ALI: Compared to now, without any doubt. I have no doubt about that at all, and ...
TONY JONES: So what about Syria under Assad?
TARIQ ALI: Saddam was at his worst when he was an ally of the West. That's when the Kurds were attacked with poison gas, during the Iran Iraq War when the West was backing him. But of late, despite the sanctions and all that, he kept that country together and people have no idea now, because we live in a world where amnesia is more or less encouraged, but that effectively the social gains made in Iraq during Saddam's period, and others before him: education, health, women's rights, that in the 1980s, Baghdad University had more women teaching at every level than there are women teaching at Princeton today. These are the figures. So, there were lots of social gains made and these gains have all been lost by this crazy war. There is no rational logic for that war, except the maintenance of American power and probably Israeli pressure put on the United States to destroy larger countries who have independent armies. There was no other real reason for that war and we are now paying the price.
Gawd, he sounded like that Sean Penn puppet from Team America. (He'd been to Iraq, you know!)
The unshockable Ali went on to say ISIS should be left alone, too. Maybe he thinks that like Saddam they'll eventually be able to hold Iraq together? Given their propensity for separating individuals' heads from their bodies, I find it hard to get enthusiastic about their plans for uniting the nation.
There was another telling little interchange that showed where Ali's sympathies were. That was right at the end, when talk turned to the Virginia shooting after a questioner asked if extremely violent images should be shown on mainstream media:
TONY JONES: So there’s a case for actually suppressing press freedom in this instance, is there?
MIROSLAV VOLF: I don't think suppressing press freedom, I don't think that’s going to happen, but there is a moral case for appealing to people not to show.
TARIQ ALI: I agree with that actually and I found it very repulsive, for instance, when Saddam Hussein was being hanged, all that footage was shown on the screens, when Gaddafi was being butchered, without any trial or any attempt even to have a serious trial.
He said more but I found that first bit most intriguing. The question related specifically to the horrific slaying of two completely innocent people. Yet the first thing that came to Ali's mind was the rough justice meted out to those two mass-murdering arseholes. Revealing, eh?
Tuesday, August 18, 2015
Emotive, anti-democratic "marriage equality" barracking on Q and A
Last night's Q and A was a bit more balanced than usual. They had three sane adults on and a couple of mental infants. If you include Tony Jones and his obvious leftie bias it was sorta evenly balanced.
They covered several topics as usual. But of most interest to me was same sex marriage. The speed with which this issue has become a global revolution for the cutural Left is alarming. I don't think that many of its proponents believe in it to even half the extent that they claim. Seems to me that they've gotten behind it in major part because it's a good way to bash conservatives and Christians. And their emotive tactic of saying marriage is "all about love" (and what a crock that is!) has been very successful. So they'll keep banging that drum.
And the usual suspects on Q and A did just that. Greens Leader Richard Di Natale used the tired ol' tactic of saying "society has moved on. It's all down and dusted. Why are we even talking about this?"
RICHARD DI NATALE: The simple answer is that Parliament should deal with it. Tony Abbott had a chance to drag the country into the 21st century and end discrimination, to end prejudice and he used every tactic in the book to block it, to continue to support prejudice and discrimination in marriage, to not recognise that the love between two people is love, regardless of their gender or their sexuality. He stacked his party room with National MPs. He has now come up with this tortured position it might be a plebiscite. It might be a referendum. No, we just should have the Parliament deal with this. We could have this done so quickly. We could have this done this week. We could have a bill before the Parliament supported by a majority of parliamentarians. If Tony Abbott did what he espouses and that is to respect the freedom and liberty of his own backbenchers and allow them a free vote and he won't do it. He won't do it and it’s part of the reason that he is languishing in terms of public support because he is a man stuck in the past. He belongs to another century and the sooner the Liberal Party change the Prime Minister, I think the country will be better for it.
TONY JONES: Richard, aren't you, from your point of view, at all nervous in advocating that? At all nervous about the fact, given the numbers of the Coalition party room, just on the conscience vote issue, aren't you nervous that it wouldn't have gotten up in the Parliament anyway?
RICHARD DI NATALE: No, I think it would - it will get up and I think there are a lot of MPs who do what they do in that place and that is sniff the breeze. There will be a lot of nervous backbenchers who will be worried about winning their seats back at this election under Tony Abbott and they'll go where the political breeze takes them and on this issue, the public are overwhelming in support of ending discrimination. Just move on and do it. I don't understand how we can be here in the 21st century arguing for a position that is based on prejudice but that’s what this is.
He has a very simplistic view of marriage. He also clearly doesn't like debate. The thought of the people getting to decide on this issue directly annoys him, obviously.
The same could be said for Sam Dastyari. He was extremely rude to the anti-gay marriage panellist Katy Faust. Again he used no actual argument, just emotive judgements that implied she was a bad, hateful person:
SAM DASTYARI: There is so much with what you have said just then that is so offensive, it’s hard to know where to start. The politician in me tells me that I should be saying that while I disagree with your views, I wholeheartedly respect them but I find that very hard. I find it very hard to respect a lot of your views on what you have said because I don't think it comes from a place of love. I think it comes from a place of hate and I think that there is so much I can't accept the fact that you believe that Gini's parents, who I have no doubt love each other, you know, that they’re hurting their child simply because of the love they have for one another. I can't accept that. I think so much - I worry that so much of your views stem, not really with an issue with just marriage. I think some of it stems from an issue with homosexuality and you’ve described homosexuality as a lifestyle. You have said that homosexuality drives us further away from God. These are your comments. You run a blog called Ask the Bigot. And I think that there are people in this country who have different views on same sex marriage. They’re entitled to have different views on same sex marriage. People are going to have the debate but I think we have to have that debate at a higher level and, I’m sorry, but I think this American evangelical claptrap is the last thing we need in the debate.
The sheer gall of this guy is stunning. He pretty much says she's a hateful person, and accuses her of homophobia simply because she doesn't toe the PC line.
Hell, she's the one with the lesbian parents! If anyone has the right to speak her mind about same sex relationships it's her. And she's not abusive. She makes criticisms that are not nearly as mean-spirited as those he makes of her.
And dropping the line in about the name of her blog was a nasty bit of dog whistling. It was as if he was saying: "You said it lady. You are a bigot!"
Careful not to seem anti-democratic, Dastyari talked about a "debate at a higher level". In other words: No debate at all, thanks. We'll just tell people what's good for them.
So funny that his union head kicker says Faust is the mean-spirited one! Were the machinations that he engaged in during Labor's disastrous reign, and that he was so chuffed to be divulging in The Killing Season, coming from a place of lerve? Hardly.
Thankfully, Brendan O'Neill cut through to the heart of the issue:
BRENDAN O’NEILL: Here is what freaks me out about gay marriage. It presents itself as this kind of liberal civil rightsy issue but it has this really ugly intolerant streak to it. Anyone who opposes gay marriage is demonised, harassed, we have seen people thrown out of their jobs because they criticised gay marriage. We have seen people ejected from polite society. You know, 200 years ago, if you didn't believe in God, you wouldn’t have a hope in hell of getting ahead in public life. Today, if you don’t believe in gay marriage, you don’t have a hope in hell of getting ahead in public life. There’s a real, ugly element to this and I think, you know, you really see it with the whole cake shop phenomenon. This whole thing around the western world where people are going to Christian traditional cake shops and saying to them, "Hey, you stupid Christians, make this cake for me", and if they don't they call the police. There are equality cases. Shops have closed down. It’s like a 21st century form of religious persecution. It’s horrendous and I think, you know, of course some people support gay marriage, as we’ve heard. That's absolutely fine. But what's extraordinary and unacceptable is that they cannot tolerate the existence of people who do not support gay marriage and I think we sometimes fail to understand how extraordinary that is and I think the reason Tony Abbott is very defensive on this issue and is erming and ahing and shifting from the free vote to the not free vote and all this stuff, he clearly has a problem with gay marriage but he can't articulate it because we live in a climate in which it’s not acceptable, as we have just seen in Sam's attack on Katy, calling her hateful and saying she’s talking claptrap, it’s not acceptable to express this sentiment in public life.
SAM DASTYARI: Well, hang on, no, Brendan...
BRENDAN O'NEILL: And I think so Tony Abbott - Tony Abbott is now being described as someone from the dark ages for believing what humanity has believed for thousands of years. Within the space of a decade, something that humanity believed for thousands of years has suddenly become a form of bigotry, a form of hate, something you’re not allowed to express in public life. That extraordinary shift in intolerance is something I think all Liberals like me should be worried about. Gay marriage is not a Liberal issue. It has a deeply illiberal streak.
Spot on.
They covered several topics as usual. But of most interest to me was same sex marriage. The speed with which this issue has become a global revolution for the cutural Left is alarming. I don't think that many of its proponents believe in it to even half the extent that they claim. Seems to me that they've gotten behind it in major part because it's a good way to bash conservatives and Christians. And their emotive tactic of saying marriage is "all about love" (and what a crock that is!) has been very successful. So they'll keep banging that drum.
And the usual suspects on Q and A did just that. Greens Leader Richard Di Natale used the tired ol' tactic of saying "society has moved on. It's all down and dusted. Why are we even talking about this?"
RICHARD DI NATALE: The simple answer is that Parliament should deal with it. Tony Abbott had a chance to drag the country into the 21st century and end discrimination, to end prejudice and he used every tactic in the book to block it, to continue to support prejudice and discrimination in marriage, to not recognise that the love between two people is love, regardless of their gender or their sexuality. He stacked his party room with National MPs. He has now come up with this tortured position it might be a plebiscite. It might be a referendum. No, we just should have the Parliament deal with this. We could have this done so quickly. We could have this done this week. We could have a bill before the Parliament supported by a majority of parliamentarians. If Tony Abbott did what he espouses and that is to respect the freedom and liberty of his own backbenchers and allow them a free vote and he won't do it. He won't do it and it’s part of the reason that he is languishing in terms of public support because he is a man stuck in the past. He belongs to another century and the sooner the Liberal Party change the Prime Minister, I think the country will be better for it.
TONY JONES: Richard, aren't you, from your point of view, at all nervous in advocating that? At all nervous about the fact, given the numbers of the Coalition party room, just on the conscience vote issue, aren't you nervous that it wouldn't have gotten up in the Parliament anyway?
RICHARD DI NATALE: No, I think it would - it will get up and I think there are a lot of MPs who do what they do in that place and that is sniff the breeze. There will be a lot of nervous backbenchers who will be worried about winning their seats back at this election under Tony Abbott and they'll go where the political breeze takes them and on this issue, the public are overwhelming in support of ending discrimination. Just move on and do it. I don't understand how we can be here in the 21st century arguing for a position that is based on prejudice but that’s what this is.
He has a very simplistic view of marriage. He also clearly doesn't like debate. The thought of the people getting to decide on this issue directly annoys him, obviously.
The same could be said for Sam Dastyari. He was extremely rude to the anti-gay marriage panellist Katy Faust. Again he used no actual argument, just emotive judgements that implied she was a bad, hateful person:
SAM DASTYARI: There is so much with what you have said just then that is so offensive, it’s hard to know where to start. The politician in me tells me that I should be saying that while I disagree with your views, I wholeheartedly respect them but I find that very hard. I find it very hard to respect a lot of your views on what you have said because I don't think it comes from a place of love. I think it comes from a place of hate and I think that there is so much I can't accept the fact that you believe that Gini's parents, who I have no doubt love each other, you know, that they’re hurting their child simply because of the love they have for one another. I can't accept that. I think so much - I worry that so much of your views stem, not really with an issue with just marriage. I think some of it stems from an issue with homosexuality and you’ve described homosexuality as a lifestyle. You have said that homosexuality drives us further away from God. These are your comments. You run a blog called Ask the Bigot. And I think that there are people in this country who have different views on same sex marriage. They’re entitled to have different views on same sex marriage. People are going to have the debate but I think we have to have that debate at a higher level and, I’m sorry, but I think this American evangelical claptrap is the last thing we need in the debate.
The sheer gall of this guy is stunning. He pretty much says she's a hateful person, and accuses her of homophobia simply because she doesn't toe the PC line.
Hell, she's the one with the lesbian parents! If anyone has the right to speak her mind about same sex relationships it's her. And she's not abusive. She makes criticisms that are not nearly as mean-spirited as those he makes of her.
And dropping the line in about the name of her blog was a nasty bit of dog whistling. It was as if he was saying: "You said it lady. You are a bigot!"
Careful not to seem anti-democratic, Dastyari talked about a "debate at a higher level". In other words: No debate at all, thanks. We'll just tell people what's good for them.
So funny that his union head kicker says Faust is the mean-spirited one! Were the machinations that he engaged in during Labor's disastrous reign, and that he was so chuffed to be divulging in The Killing Season, coming from a place of lerve? Hardly.
Thankfully, Brendan O'Neill cut through to the heart of the issue:
BRENDAN O’NEILL: Here is what freaks me out about gay marriage. It presents itself as this kind of liberal civil rightsy issue but it has this really ugly intolerant streak to it. Anyone who opposes gay marriage is demonised, harassed, we have seen people thrown out of their jobs because they criticised gay marriage. We have seen people ejected from polite society. You know, 200 years ago, if you didn't believe in God, you wouldn’t have a hope in hell of getting ahead in public life. Today, if you don’t believe in gay marriage, you don’t have a hope in hell of getting ahead in public life. There’s a real, ugly element to this and I think, you know, you really see it with the whole cake shop phenomenon. This whole thing around the western world where people are going to Christian traditional cake shops and saying to them, "Hey, you stupid Christians, make this cake for me", and if they don't they call the police. There are equality cases. Shops have closed down. It’s like a 21st century form of religious persecution. It’s horrendous and I think, you know, of course some people support gay marriage, as we’ve heard. That's absolutely fine. But what's extraordinary and unacceptable is that they cannot tolerate the existence of people who do not support gay marriage and I think we sometimes fail to understand how extraordinary that is and I think the reason Tony Abbott is very defensive on this issue and is erming and ahing and shifting from the free vote to the not free vote and all this stuff, he clearly has a problem with gay marriage but he can't articulate it because we live in a climate in which it’s not acceptable, as we have just seen in Sam's attack on Katy, calling her hateful and saying she’s talking claptrap, it’s not acceptable to express this sentiment in public life.
SAM DASTYARI: Well, hang on, no, Brendan...
BRENDAN O'NEILL: And I think so Tony Abbott - Tony Abbott is now being described as someone from the dark ages for believing what humanity has believed for thousands of years. Within the space of a decade, something that humanity believed for thousands of years has suddenly become a form of bigotry, a form of hate, something you’re not allowed to express in public life. That extraordinary shift in intolerance is something I think all Liberals like me should be worried about. Gay marriage is not a Liberal issue. It has a deeply illiberal streak.
Spot on.
Tuesday, August 11, 2015
Thoughts on Jacqui Lambie's son's meth addiction
Jacqui Lambie is a pretty colourful character who has copped a lot of derision. This is understandable as she's clearly not the sharpest pencil in the box and can at times be quite alarmingly aggro. Then there's that voice of hers!
But you'd have to be a very cold person not to feel pity for her in her current predicament. The poor woman's son is a meth addict, and she's at a complete loss about how to solve the problem.
I don't know that opening up to the meeja about it in the way that she has was a wise decision. I'd imagine that most pollies in similar situations would do all they could to keep the details out of the public eye. Still, she's just trying to do the right thing. And given how destructive the drug is, I doubt her recent pronouncements could make things any worse than they are already.
The way she talks about ice's effect on her son is very sad and disturbing. She says the young man she knew is gone; that she may as well be talking to a drug.
The way that meth seems to completely possess the addict is truly frightening. I have seen this at close quarters. Several years back I lived in a small bock of units in Leichhardt in Sydney's inner west for a few months. A young couple living there were clearly addicted to ice. They were like manic zombies. They would walk past my window at all times of the day and night, muttering crazily.
Through that same window I once overheard the mother of the female addict talking to the landlord. It was a heartbreaking tale. She said her daughter was a sweet, stable girl who did well at school, had heaps of friends. Now it was like she was a completely different person, lost to her for good.
Not sure what happened to this young woman. But I hope she got some help eventually and has managed to find her way back to normality. Still, given the sheer ferocity of the drug, I doubt that this was the case.
But you'd have to be a very cold person not to feel pity for her in her current predicament. The poor woman's son is a meth addict, and she's at a complete loss about how to solve the problem.
I don't know that opening up to the meeja about it in the way that she has was a wise decision. I'd imagine that most pollies in similar situations would do all they could to keep the details out of the public eye. Still, she's just trying to do the right thing. And given how destructive the drug is, I doubt her recent pronouncements could make things any worse than they are already.
The way she talks about ice's effect on her son is very sad and disturbing. She says the young man she knew is gone; that she may as well be talking to a drug.
The way that meth seems to completely possess the addict is truly frightening. I have seen this at close quarters. Several years back I lived in a small bock of units in Leichhardt in Sydney's inner west for a few months. A young couple living there were clearly addicted to ice. They were like manic zombies. They would walk past my window at all times of the day and night, muttering crazily.
Through that same window I once overheard the mother of the female addict talking to the landlord. It was a heartbreaking tale. She said her daughter was a sweet, stable girl who did well at school, had heaps of friends. Now it was like she was a completely different person, lost to her for good.
Not sure what happened to this young woman. But I hope she got some help eventually and has managed to find her way back to normality. Still, given the sheer ferocity of the drug, I doubt that this was the case.
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