Poor Countries Haemorrhaging Doctors

I once read that Ghana, a country with a population of 20 million, has only 1500 doctors. It's an interesting comparison given the size of the population, which is similar to Australia's: the number of doctors in Australia stood at 54000 in 2002.

As an article in the New York Times reveals, it's a common phenomenon. A new study published in the New England Journal of Medicine has shown that there has been a consistent flow of doctors out of poor countries in Africa and the Caribbean into four wealthy, english-speaking nations. And we're one of the four, along with Britain, the US and Canada.

Given the workload that this must place upon the few doctors left in places like Ghana, the rest of them must be busting to get out too.

"I have at least nine hospitals that have no doctor at all, and 20 hospitals with only one doctor looking after a whole district of 80,000 to 120,000 people," Dr. Akosa said. Women in obstructed labor all too often suffer terrible complications or death for lack of an obstetrician, he said.

The study found that Ghana, with only 6 doctors for each 100,000 people, has lost 3 of every 10 doctors it has educated to the United States, Britain, Canada and Australia, each of which has more than 220 doctors per 100,000 people.

He said the flight of doctors was less the result of deliberate policies in the wealthy countries than of their failure to train enough doctors to fill their own needs. For example, the United States has about 17,000 medical school graduates each year for 22,000 first-year residency slots.

The US is pinching 5000 doctors a year. How many doctors are we sapping from countries that need them more than we do?

Something that will benefit these countries, who faithfully keep educating young people to become doctors only to lose them to the better pay and conditions in countries like Australia, is if our governments, State and Federal, get their acts together and help create more university places in medicine for Australian students. Otherwise we are effectively receiving a form of aid from some very poor countries, at great cost to themselves.

Haranguing Bratz

I learned everything I know from Paris Hilton... Everything!

Regarding HarrangueMan's latest fine post; after writing about half of what I've written here in his comments box without having finished I figured I'd better not be so rude as to take up his entire page, so I'm posting my reply here instead.


[Regarding Bratz dolls]
I'm always amazed that parents buy their daughters such things, but it is no wonder the little girls are after them: Porn-Star-Paris is a regular on the cover of Dolly magazine (aimed at 11-15 year old girls!), and you only have to look at a Britney Spears music video to see what kind of role models are being promoted.

Bratz dolls are kind of a reflection of this, as girls who are a bit too young to be thinking about boys and sex have a natural tendency to emulate older female role models.

I have to say, though, the importance of parents educating their daughters on the issues surrounding these trends can't be overstated. I was a teenage girl not so long ago, and I can still remember as a young teenager feeling miffed that I was never allowed to wear midriff tops like some of my friends; I was allowed to get my first bikini (a modest Speedo racerback one) at 15. The reasoning behind my parents' controlling these things was partly their distaste for the sexualisation of young girls that seems so widespread, but mainly my father's strong christian belief that any kind of sexuality in an unmarried person is bad. And that, to me, seemed unreasonable.

When you're a teenager, life consists of constantly attempting to appear more grown up and sophisticated than you really are. No 12 or 13 year-old girl thinks 'Maybe I'm a little young to be going around in a short skirt and knee-high boots'. And certainly very few 12 or 13 year old girls want to take tips from their parents about what to wear, so I think in addition to parents maintaining some control over what kind of clothes their kids buy, other, more authoritative role models such as magazines aimed at teenage girls, need to take some responsibility too, instead of helping to promote whatever trend they are paid to.

HarrangueMan asks:

But what do you people out there think? Is female raunch, and the Bratz dolls, and their stripper fashion an example of the natural ascendency of woman, even those who are girls and no where near being a woman? Or is it that somehow, somewhere, the sexualization of women got distorted along the way by corporations hungry for a new demographic to twist and exploit to their shareholder hungry whims?

I'd opt for pointing the finger at corporations, specifically American ones. It might sound like a cliche, but I think they, along with parents who aren't being parents, have a lot to answer for. While I don't advocate authoritarian parenting, I do believe that parents who make a decision and can explain to their child with sound reasoning why they made it are a lot better than overly permissive parents who hand over wads of pocket money and leave everything up to the child. I'm a big believer in freedom of sexuality along with everything else, but I'm not a believer in the freedom of corporations to exploit young girls who have only the barest knowledge of what sexuality is all about. I also believe that in a way this phenomenon is a form of 'grooming' teenage girls for expoitation in their later years: there is no-one more easily parted with their money than a woman who feels insecure with her appearance, and by creating a standard of beauty that is manufactured, not natural, every woman can be made to believe that if only she spends enough money she will be 'beautiful' too.

Dita Von Teese

One of those women who are just inherently great to look at because they're a little different to this, this and this. Dita Von Teese was a pretty famous burlesque artist before she became the girlfriend and soon-to-be-wife of Marilyn Manson. She was on the cover of the first Playboy magazine I ever bought, in a beautifully-shot pictorial: probably one of the reasons I thought the magazine was worth buying again.

What makes her really worth posting about apart from the perve factor and the nice underwear she is always photographed in is the fact that she always comes across as likeable in her interviews. I did a google image search on her after seeing her in Playboy, and frankly was a little disappointed. She, surprise surprise, wasn't as good looking as she was in her Playboy pictorial. Early this year, however, I bought a copy of the UK magazine loaded while we were waiting around for our flight with Gam's family at Johannesburg airport. Needless to say I had to read it with the cover bent back to avoid embarrassing Gam, but it was a very good read (note: I have bought a subsequent copy of loaded and it was crap, so don't take this as an endorsement... it's a pretty sucky mag). Dita Von Teese was on the cover, and inside was an interview with her. Despite the usual calibre of the questions they ask of their subjects in such magazines (something to do with tits is always in there), I found it an enjoying read. My favourite part?

[as a child] I was constantly overdressed, just like I am nowadays. I'm a pretty plain-looking woman underneath all this stuff and I was always a fairly plain-looking little girl too...

She was also in the New York Times recently. Some choice quotes from that:

[of her upcoming marriage to Marilyn Manson]
"I just have a maid of honor, and he has a best man," she said. "And a worst man. He had to have that."

"Everybody asks me, 'Can I wear black?' " Ms. Von Teese said. "I said: 'Of course you can wear black. Whose wedding do you think you're going to?' "

So there you go. Meet Dita Von Teese.

Miranda Devine: Now Pounding the Nutrition Pulpit

Disclaimer: The first thing I'd like everyone to know is that I studiously avoid reading Miranda Devine columns. I just can't be bothered wading through bullshit and falsehoods. Usually her columns are easily spotted: the words 'evil' and 'green' in the same headline are often the giveaway. Occasionally I am caught out, however, by an eye-catching headline in the side-column of the SMH website, and it is not until after clicking the link that I discover I have stumbled into a Miranda Rant. I always feel terrible when this happens, because I hate to inadvertantly boost her ratings and contribute to the prospect of her ongoing employment. Today's headline gave me no clue whatsoever as to the author of the article. I study nutrition, and the headline ("Monica's no cereal offender") caught my eye as a topical issue. I copied the article and posted it in my new articles blog so that I won't be providing Ms Devine with any more hits but I save space here. Yes, I'm petty.

Some background: Coco Pops, as you all know, are a popular and widely known breakfast cereal targeted at the child demographic. Monica Trapaga is a former presenter of ABC children's show 'Playschool'.

Monica Trapaga was paid by Kelloggs to do an advertisement for cocoa pops. In it, she says:

Coco Pops can help children get the calcium they need. In fact, Kellogg's Coco Pops with milk provides more than 25 per cent of daily calcium needs. Around 10 per cent of it from the cereal alone. Kellogg's Coco Pops - you learn something new every day.

It's nice of Kelloggs to take credit for the calcium contained in milk in order to boost the supposed nutritional value of their relatively nutritionally empty product in the eyes of Australian parents. Two and a half to three glasses of milk per day will easily fulfill the RDI for calcium of children aged 1-11. What Kelloggs don't pay children's TV presenters to advertise, or put in bold letters on the nutrition panel for Coco Pops is that they contain 36% sugar. That means over 1/3 of every serve is made up of refined sugar. Coco Pops are also extremely low in fibre, at 1.2%- only 12g per hundred grams. Compare this with 11.6% fibre for whole wheat mini wheats (also made by Kelloggs), or 9.2% for blackcurrant mini wheats (a flavour probably more acceptable to kids than plain). In short, Kelloggs Coco Pops are not the sort of thing that should be promoted as an everyday part of your child's diet.

Gam often calls me a food nazi, so before he comes in here and starts shouting 'sig heil!' I want to state that I'm not anti-junk food. I'd be a hypocrite if I were- I polished off an entire bag of mint patties after our football game today, and barely a day goes by without me ingesting some sort of 'junk'. However, I am a big believer in people knowing what they are getting, and I think it's entirely inappropriate to deliberately mislead consumers into thinking a product is healthy when it in fact isn't. Admittedly it isn't the brightest thing in the world to trust an advertisement to provide you with all you need to know on the nutritional value of a certain product, but many, if not most consumers genuinely don't know any better, and the advertisement serves to create an association in their mind between product and positive nutritional value. This, in the end, can be detrimental to the consumer's health.

Miranda Devine rips into critics of the advertisement as 'fascists' (I never would have guessed that Gam had anything in common with Miranda, but there you go). She misses the point entirely when she says:

Trapaga, 39, is whippet slim despite the fact she ate Coco Pops as a child.

Strangely enough, plenty of slim people have a dark history of occasional Coco Pops, Big Mac and Coca-Cola consumption. It is easy to forget that, in moderation, as a treat rather than a substitute for daily meals, sugary low-fibre calories do no harm.

The point, Miranda, is that the advertisements are not for Coco Pops as a 'treat' for your kids: they are advertised as a healthy, everyday breakfast cereal. No-one is saying that eating Coco Pops will make children fat, so trying to score a smart-arse point by saying that Monica Trapaga consumed Coco Pops as a child really falls flat for any readers not missing one or both hemispheres of their cerebral cortex.

She can't resist a stab at hippy/greenie types (can she ever?) either. With a wail of "Where will it end?" Miranda envisions a world where vegans dictate that we stop consuming meat and eggs, and attempts to attach veganism to the wealthy liberal elite by pointing out that some millionaire called Brian Sherman, who owns a place in Paddington (Sydney) is a vegan and employs vegan chefs. Somehow this is different to the many non-vegan multimillionaires who hire chefs to cook food that they like.

Funnily enough, she mentions the so-called 'Cheeseburger Bill' which was passed in the US House of Representatives last week. It's a bill that holds that overeating and obesity are matters of personal responsibility: sentiments I wholeheartedly agree with.

What I don't agree with is the companies that produce certain unhealthy foods promoting them through advertising as being good for consumers, or their children. Miranda Devine is on the side of the companies, however:

And if parents cave in to children demanding Coco Pops for breakfast every morning, that's not the fault of television or the government. It's because they won't say "No".

The advertisement featuring Monica Trapaga was not one designed to induce the 'nag factor' in children. It was aimed at conveying to their parents the message that Coco Pops was a healthy, nutritious breakfast cereal for their children. After supporting the misleading messages directed towards parents, Miranda Devine then attacks them for making bad decisions with regard to their childrens' health.

She also quotes Tony Abbott from his appearance on the Four Corners program on childhood obesity as saying:

But if parents don't think Coco Pops are good for their kids there's a very simple solution - don't buy it.

But what if the parents, wrongly, are led to think that Coco Pops are good for their kids? Led to the wrong conclusion by advertisers loudly backed by Tony Abbott and Miranda Devine. What then? Do their children deserve to suffer the consequences?

Latham Diaries Excerpt

Included in Gam's latest post.

Faulkner: 100 Ways to Fix the ALP

The headline in the SMH was 'Now Faulkner sticks the knife into Latham'. I read it expecting to see the usual blustering a la Beazley on the issue. Not so. Faulkner appears to be making the exact same criticisms of the Labor Party as Mark Latham makes, but he criticises Latham for basically picking up his toys and going home, and advising the Australian public to do likewise. It is a half-valid criticism, in my opinion. Mark Latham basically took the steps he needed to preserve his mental health, and I applaud that. However, I disagreed with his proclamation that Australians should stay away from organised politics. If we do that, we wind up with the situation we have now: a corrupt, self-interested bunch of scumbag careerists running the country and a nepotistic, self-interested bunch of scumbag careerists doing a piss-poor job of opposing those running the country.

If Faulkner can stick it out in the cesspool that the ALP has become, I hold onto my faint hope that the ALP will change for the better and provide a real alternative to the godawful government we have now.

Michelle Leslie Not a Drug-User: Father

From the SMH.

"As far I know, Michelle has never been a drug user of any kind - not even a headache or cold tablet"

So... what is the name of that doctor again? Maybe Renee Lawrence could try the same trick, so long as Daddy doesn't open his big mouth until after the trial. Oops.

Eating Kangaroos

This isn't a nice issue. In theory I'm a supporter of killing roos for meat under certain conditions. In practice I rarely eat any meat, so I don't know if that makes me more objective or less so than anyone else on the matter.

What I don't agree with is the wholesale killing of kangaroos with a bounty paid by the government to the shooter and the roo getting minced up and put into pet food. That is just a shameful waste.

The SMH raised the issue today in an article by Daniel Lewis.

What I've never liked about the issue is that farmers indulge in wholesale land-clearing, which results in more grass growing (the farmers' desired outcome), which results in perfect conditions for kangaroos to thrive, and their populations to increase in size. The farmers then complain about the roos being 'vermin' that must be shot to keep their numbers down, when it is their own actions that led directly to the large numbers of roos in the first place.

When I say I'm in favour of kangaroos being killed for meat, I mean being farmed in place of cattle. Why? It's much more environmentally friendly. I know that's got a snowflake's chance in hell of happening, given the vast changes it would entail to the national diet, but it would mean a greatly reduced level of environmental damage caused by over-grazing, if not eliminating the problem altogether.

Mike Archer, a Professor of Science at the University of NSW thinks along similar lines, according to the SMH:

If farmers can earn a decent return on kangaroo, Archer argues, they will see the animal as a resource rather than a pest. And by farming kangaroos instead of sheep or cattle, they will help save ecosystems

Lewis then tries to make out like Archer's colleague, David Croft, also working for UNSW at its Arid Zone Research Station near Broken Hill, disagrees with him.

[according to Croft]
the industry is controlled by graziers who do not see kangaroo as an alternative but as vermin and a 'competing red meat'."

Kangaroo is mostly being processed into dog food or sausages for Russians, and Croft says farmers "simply want to turn the kangaroos into the woodchip of the Australian mammal fauna".

Personally, I don't see too much conflict between the arguments, as they seem to be arguing different things. Archer speaks of the change that is needed in the attitudes of farmers and consumers for killing of roos to ever become a truly sustainable industry, while Croft is referring to the current situation, the traditional resistance to change among Australian farmers. In short, he is saying most of them are stubborn, reluctant to face up to environmental consequences, and averse to taking their farming methods beyond merely exploiting and pillaging the environment.

Their current solution when lands are over-grazed is to simply clear more land for grazing. Not exactly a long term solution. Given the difficulties in creating a wholesale switch in the national diet from cow to kangaroo, I can hardly blame farmers for wanting to take the easy option, however.

Even as an animal lover, I know that most people aren't vegetarians and never will be. I'm not- I eat red meat and fish every couple of months. I do believe, however, that animals should be kept humanely and killed as humanely as possible, all in a way that impacts on the natural environment as little as possible. Replacing beef cattle with kangaroos would be the best solution for the Australian environment. Like I said earlier, it's not exactly going to happen overnight, but any moves in that direction by farmers and the meat industry can only be a good thing, given that kangaroos are being widely slaughtered already and sold as pet food.

Ahhh, Fresh Air!

The weather here over the past few days has been grey and... soggy. Just awful. It cleared up this afternoon though, having taken all the nasty particles out of the air and leaving it smelling fresh and clean on our way to meet up with some friends at the Red Room- the uni bar.

Gam and I arrived 10 minutes before polls closed for the student union elections and were accosted by 3 different people from 'Thrive', 'Last Chance' and 'Jolt' as soon as we set foot on uni grounds. The parties change their names every bloody year, so it's hard to keep track of which one is affiliated with which political party, but we knew 'Jolt' is the Young Liberals. The only one who would admit to a political affiliation was Ms Last-Chance, who admitted to being an ALP member.

What was interesting was that when we asked the individuals from each party questions on their policies, 'Thrive' and 'Last Chance' both claimed to be preparing for what they saw as the inevitability of VSU. Ms Last-Chance said that one of their policies was to cut the salaries of various Union positions to save money. Something that probably should have been done a long time ago, yeah, but I like that.

Ms Jolt, however, said to us "Well, VSU hasn't come in yet" and proceeded to tell us how Jolt would force the businesses on campus to cut the price of a bottle of Coca Cola from $2.00 to $1.70. I'm the wrong person to talk to about cheap Coke, because I don't drink the stuff, but not only that- this chick is a member of the party who is forcing VSU upon us and yet she refused to say how her party were going to fund their policies under VSU.

Needless to say we both put Jolt last on our ballots.

I'd only been to the Red Room once- walk in, walk out. It was early when we got there, about 4pm, but it quickly filled up with campaigners after the polls closed. The place sells only 4 kinds of beer, none of them good, but the entire inside area is non-smoking. This was the first time in my life I've been able to sit in a bar, have a beer with friends and walk out not smelling of stale cigarette smoke. Damn it was good.

Cannabis Less of a Cancer Risk

From the BBC.

The article confirms what many people have long suspected: that smoking cannabis doesn't seem to be anywhere near as bad for you as smoking cigarettes.

I almost laughed out loud at this sentence, though:

"Cannabis remains the most commonly-used drug in the UK with one in 10 people using it in the last year"

So fewer than one in 10 Brits smoke or drink alcohol, I take it?

Peter Beattie: Future Liberal Party Leader?

I don't know what to make of Peter Beattie's move to 'solve' the health-system crisis in Queensland by abolishing universal free public health care. The world has gone topsy-turvey all of a sudden, and it has even caught Tony Abbott on the back foot, forcing him to defend Medicare.

Federal Health Minister Tony Abbott has condemned the Queensland Government's hospital reform plan, describing it as "illegal" and an "affront to Medicare".

However the Premier, Peter Beattie, is standing firm, saying be believes the system will eventually be rolled out across Australia.

Now, if you'd handed me that little excerpt a week ago with the names of people and governments blanked out, I would have guessed that the first statement would have come from a Labor Party figure and the second from a Liberal Party figure.

The level of income above which patients will be expected to pay for elective procedures is only around $30000. This looks to me like another step towards the Americanisation of the Australian health-care system, and Queensland is to suffer the ignominy of being the first to introduce such measures.

The AMA, predictably, has welcomed the measures; President of AMA Queensland Steve Hambleton proclaimed that "There's no doubt that the public already understands that universal free health care providing everything for everybody is unsustainable". I don't, Steve. In fact, I don't appreciate people like doctors and politicians who earn plenty of money and will never bother 'choosing' to use a public hospital because they can afford not to think about it telling Queenslanders what's best for them. Why else do we pay taxes?

There's a lot of talk of having an Australian Bill of Rights at the moment, because we are one of the few Western nations not to have one. Well, I think one of the first things to go in a Bill of Rights should be the right for all Australians to have a free, universal health care system. Peter Beattie, Steve Hambleton and John Outridge talk about 'elective' surgery like it's something people do for fun. John Outridge mentioned knee replacements as an example. My father finally had a knee replacement in July (something that he's needed since the 1970s after a severe motorbike accident) under the private system, in a private hospital, partly because my parents could afford it, and partly because under the public health system in NSW it would have taken him 3-5 years to receive treatment. The waiting lists in Queensland are no better.

I don't care what Peter Beattie & Co. say: no-one waits 5 years for a knee or hip replacement to stay in a public hospital in a shared room just to save a buck or two. They do it because that's what they can afford. If they're a big enough tight-arse to put up with 5 years of pain and disability just so they don't have to pay for a private health-care operation, I say we should indulge them, because it's better than the risk of forcing someone to pay who really can't afford it.

Our health system might be broke, but Peter Beattie's proposal ain't the way to fix it.

I thought I'd include this article from the New York Times as a taste of what we may have to look forward to. It's seven pages long, but that's telling, really:

EDIT: I have created a separate blog so I can reproduce pay/membership articles and long articles without taking up the whole of this blog :)

Go here for the article.

Woman Receives 6 Weeks Jail for Torture-Killing of Pet Cat

I think the poor RSPCA guy must have been putting on a brave face when he called the 6 week sentence for this unspeakable bitch a "strong message". Fuck that. Six weeks in jail for taking your pet cat, shutting it in the washing machine, setting it to 90 degrees celcius, and switching the machine on, boiling the cat alive in front of your young daughters, then boasting about it to your ex-husband. Six fucking weeks. For a psychopath. Who wants someone like that to be living freely in society after 6 weeks? Who wants someone like that living freely in society ever? I'm ashamed to say that the sentences meted out for animal cruelty here in Australia simply aren't any better. People who commit violent crimes against animals have been shown to be more likely to commit violent crimes against humans, and frankly even if that wasn't the case I still think the fuckers should be locked up for a very long time, and upon their release have 10% deducted from their earnings (or dole) for the rest of their life and donated to the RSPCA. People who commit crimes like this should pay dearly.

Amanda Vanstone Strikes Again

"He's one of the lucky ones! I usually eat the poor and downtrodden for breakfast"

Less than a year after the Immigration Department's turnaround on deporting a frail 104 year-old Chinese woman with no living relatives outside Australia, comes this:

The only son of a gravely ill 70 year old woman has been deported to Indonesia after living here for 25 years. This occurred even after Tony Abbott's own department sent a fax to Amanda Vanstone saying "Minister, please give consideration to granting permanent residency to Mr Mardoyo, or allowing an onshore visa application... This would ensure ongoing care for his mother."

The guy was deported the next day. The immigration department has a policy of deporting people as fast as they can, before the media catches on. Most recently they deported a Palestinian guy, rushing him out of the country even after the UNHCR said they had information on his case that they wanted to share with Immigration. Once the media got hold of the story, the guy was held in Dubai for a couple of days before being flown back to Australia. I think they would have deported 104 year-old Mrs Hu if the media hadn't run with the story. Obviously this time around they were a lot more efficient in rushing this Indonesian guy out of the country.

It would cost an awful lot in excess baggage fees for us to deport Amanda Vanstone, but I would happily mortgage my soul to help with the cost just to make Australia a more decent, compassionate country.

SerfChoices

Yes, yes, I like overtime without penalty rates!!

Of course she's now free to negotiate with her employer, thanks to WorkChoices.

I stopped reading Heckler soon after it was introduced because it's usually written by people who want to be published for the sake of being published, but I found yesterday's one by Charles Purcell a nice little read.

And on an almost unrelated note- has anyone else ever typed 'slave' into a Google image search with safe search off? Sorry to any sensitive types who might happen to be reading... I couldn't resist the pictures...

Those Pirate Ads

You know, the ones that breathily announce "you wouldn't steal a car... " they screen at the cinema at the movie you've paid to see. Not exactly the audience they need to be targeting, you might think... Bloody oath they're annoying! Just a small rant I've been meaning to make for a while.

Lessons in Ethics from Kim Jong Il & BAT

2 billion cigarettes for 22 million people? Hey kids, if you don't starve to eath before you turn 10, BAT can give you lungs like these!


There's nothing a tobacco company won't do for a buck. They've been killing people and lying about it for almost a century, and now it turns out that British American Tobacco have been in bed with North Korea for the last four years. Funnily enough, BAT's annual accounts have never mentioned that they have a factory in Pyongyang producing more than 2 billion cigarettes per year. Don't worry though, the ever-trustworthy people at BAT assure us that those 2 billion cigarettes are only for the North Korean market. That previous incident where they were busted smuggling tobacco was just an accident!

Asked about North Korea's human rights record, the spokeswoman said: "It is not for us to interfere with the way governments run countries." She said BAT could "lead by example" and assist the country's development by meeting internationally accepted standards of businesses practice and corporate social responsibility.

Any country following the example of a tobacco company would be a pretty damn scary place to live, I think.

So-Called Self-Sacrificing CEOs

Maybe it's just that being a poor student gives me a slightly different perspective on things, but when I hear about a person on a multimillion dollar salary 'giving up' their cushy position for a salary worth 'mere' hundreds of thousands, I don't buy the line that it's somehow a charitable act.

Maybe rich people like Fred Hilmer find it hard to live on only $750000 a year. After all, it's only 93.75 times more than a student on centrelink receives. I think it's great that he's switching to a job he loves, I really do. I think it would be great if everyone were able to have a job they really enjoy. I just don't need to hear how Fred Hilmer, or any of our scumbag politicians, or the head of the American Red Cross are 'giving back to society' somehow by foregoing millions of dollars a year in return for several hundred thousand. I really don't think anyone 'deserves' to earn more than a million dollars a year. Now, you know I wouldn't turn down a million dollar salary. Not that many people would. I would make a point of doing something worthwhile with it. For instance, I don't know when multimillion dollar houses, a garage full of luxury cars, designer clothes and bags etc. that cost more than your average australian earns in a week (or your average citizen of a developing country earns in a year) actually became anything more than a shameful extravegance. What else do rich people do with their millions of dollars? If you're Kerry Packer you gamble, I guess. On the more positive side, Bill and Melinda Gates manage to live extremely well but still contribute admirably to causes like AIDS and education.

But when all that is being asked to solve the current food crisis in Malawi is $88 million- less than three times what Kerry has been known to spend at a casino in a single trip- it kind of makes me feel slightly queasy that the people who have enough money to solve this kind of thing in the blink of an eye simply don't care that babies and young children are dying for want of a couple of dollars while their wives buy more Prada and LV.

$88 million is not a lot of money, but getting the rich to contribute to a good cause is like squeezing blood from a stone.

Tagged

...by Larry Bonewend of Watermelon Rant. I gather it's just 20 random things about me...

1. I'm a world-class procrastinator. Lists like these are one of just many ways to procrastinate- I often read other peoples' textbooks around exam time, and even housework can become fun if you have a particularly important assignment to do!

2. I'm very quiet. I'm a terrible conversationalist and a good listener. If I'm talking a lot, it's usually a sign that I'm drunk.

3. I only drink coffee with ice, never hot. Hence I drink it only in the warmer months, because I hate being cold. Tea in winter, coffee in summer.

4. I hate being cold. I have an abnormal ability to lose heat to the surrounding environment. On a 25 degree day I will still be wearing ugg boots around the house. After sitting in an air-conditioned room for an hour my fingernails go a fetching shade of pale blue.

5. I aim to have a job where I don't have to sit in an air-conditioned room all day.

6. Ideally that job would be somewhere tropical, and definitely not south of Brisbane, but as Gam has a tendency to melt into a puddle of sweat at temperatures above 25 degrees (and his parents are West African, go figure), I sense that we'll have to compromise.

7. One day I'm going to own a Nigerian Dwarf Goat. Stumpy little animals the size of a small to mid-sized dog; the babies are as small as kittens. I kept trying to feed the local goats when we stayed in Cape Coast, Ghana. As if I didn't stand out enough by being white, people probably thought I was crazy too.

8. Gam's parents have often told me the story of when they were students in Australia some old guy gave them a pet goat. That poor goat wound up dinner for a bunch of students. I'll have to keep a sharp eye on any pet goats I have if Gam's parents come to stay with us.

9. Every time I grow my hair past shoulder length I get sick of it and have it all cut off. Hairdressers seem really uncomfortable cutting it all off- as if I might change my mind once it's done, and blame them. After that, I grow it long again. I last had it cut short in February.

10. One day... one day I am going to stop ranting about the things I don't like in politics and get off my arse to go help out the Greens' campaign at election time or something. Actually, I doubt I will ever stop ranting, but I might go help out.

11. Some of the things I used to find somewhat embarrassing about my family (not owning a TV until I was 12, having healthy food instead of chips & chocolate in my school lunchbox) I am now starting to think are pretty good ideas. I might even inflict them, to a lesser extent, on any children Gam and I have.

12. Some of the things I used to find somewhat embarrassing about my family (being forced to attend church every week, having to say grace at dinner time) I still think are terrible ideas and I will never inflict them on any children that Gam and I have.

13. I think it's completely stupid that it's illegal to own rabbits in Queensland. Rabbits are great!

14. I'm really soft when it comes to animals. Not just cute ones... I hate digging in the garden because of the risk of chopping a worm in half. If I see slugs hiding under a pot I can't move the pot because they might dry out and die. I have no mercy on mosquitoes or nasty house-cockroaches, but I put vegetable scraps in the garden for the little slater-cockroaches that live there.

15. I have fairly good instincts about people- my first impression usually turns out to be correct, even if I am not so sure in the short term.

16. I tried pot once. I did inhale but I didn't get high. I have never, not even once, taken a puff on a cigarette, but I've been exposed to other peoples' smoke millions of times. I'd much prefer to be exposed to the smoke from other peoples' joints, because they smell nicer than cigarettes. I have never tried any other drug except alcohol. Okay okay, and caffeine, for anyone who wants to be picky about what constitutes a 'drug'.

17. When I received a bookshop gift voucher for getting dux of year 9 in highschool I bought Stephanie Alexander's The Cook's Companion. Why a cookbook? I love food, and the cover design was nice. Best cookbook ever. I note, however, that not only does the latest edition have a nasty cover design, they upped the price of both it and the old edition, which now costs $99. I got it for $60! Never mind, however, because I'm keeping that book until I die, then passing it on to my children, it's that damn good.

18. I can't stomach fast food. Even the smell of a McDonalds burger makes me queasy. It's not that I don't like unhealthy stuff- it's just something wrong with the 'food' they serve in those places.

19. I'm not exactly what most people would call skinny, but when I went to meet Gam's grandmother (who doesn't speak English) in Cape Coast she told Gam's mother that she was very happy that her grandson was marrying a white girl, but couldn't I just get a bit fatter?

20. I have long, skinny toes that I inherited from my mother, and I like them. Bright pink is the only colour that looks good on my toenails.

=============================

I'm going to tag Gam's sister Delali, who just started a blog.

Come Back When You Have Ovaries, Tony Abbott

What the hell is this? What exactly does Tony Abbott think women are? To help stop abortions he wants to start paying the maternity allowance from as early in the pregnancy as 14 weeks- as if $500 is going to buy off a woman making one of the most important decisions of her entire fucking life. Bastard. If indeed he thinks that a lot of abortions occur because a woman feels she will be unable to financially support a child, why don't we have paid maternity leave? Why has the government he is part of presided over huge increases in the cost of childcare, and efforts to force single mothers into work by cutting their income assistance- even while the government is busy ensuring that workers can be made to work overtime without penalty rates and be sacked without a reason. Why are they busy surreptiously dismantling the public health system and favouring private schools over public if they want to ensure that women feel confident to carry through with having a baby?

When a woman falls pregnant and considers an abortion, she's not considering how soon she can get $500 from the government. She's looking forward at the next 20 years of her life, supporting that child. If there has been an increase in abortions, it's because she looks forward and the next 20 years of life don't look very appealing. Why might that be, Tony? You think you can buy a life for $500?

Latham Diaries- extract

Mark Latham winds up looking very sensible...

Thursday, 23 January (2003)

[...]
Laurie [Brereton] believes in an independent foreign policy but even he looked surprised when I said we should rethink the American Alliance. Under Bush and the hard-Right Republican hawks, the US is going to use the War on Terror as an alibi for a new round of expansionist and arrogant foreign policy. Internationally, it's a disaster, feeding the cause of militant Islam and alienating most Western nations. This is not the way to deal with terrorism- weakening the international coalition that emerged after September 11. It's going to turn this decade into an anti-American decade.
[...]


Friday, 24 January (2003)

Crean is bleeding to death on Iraq. He's incapable of coming up with a clean, straightforward position. Everything he says is heavily qualified by a series of caveats. I've never seen policy-making by caveats before- it's the political equivalent of water torture. Simon has come back from his trip to the US with yet another: 'we might support an American invasion that is not sanctioned by the United Nations if the majority of Security Council members vote to invade but one of the permanent members exercises a veto.' Try selling that jumble of words in Western Sydney.
Bob Brown is killing us on this issue through the power of a simple, commonsense message: Bush is an imbecile and Australia should not be part of his war. Mind you, our position could be worse- Conroy could be in charge. At today's Shadow Cabinet he formally moved that we endorse Howard's deployment of troops and an American invasion of Iraq, irrespective of the UN.
Not even the other Big Macs- the US faction of Rudd, Smith and Swan- could support him. All he had was his own vote. Imagine that: the ALP supporting Bush and Howard in the invasion of a country on the other side of the world without UN approval. If we followed the Conroy doctrine, after the next election, Brown would be the Leader of the Opposition.

Don't Close Your Eyes

If only this was on TV. From Watermelon Rant.

British Judges Halt Harare Deportations

Given the rhetoric so frequently spouted by Blair and the British government about the evils of Robert Mugabe you'd think that their consciences would not allow them to deport Zimbabweans seeking refuge in Britain back into the arms of Mugabe's police.

A conscience is a little too much to expect of anyone in power, evidently, whether they are supposedly 'evil' like Mugabe orsupposedly not, like the Blair government. It has taken a decision by Judges of the Asylum and Immigration Tribunal to halt the deportations.

The Blair government seemed barely conscious of the hypocrisy of their actions, let alone the immorality.

Bite the Bullet

From the SMH: While the 191 countries in the UN spent $US1 trillion ($1.3 trillion) on arms last year, they reduced their donations to international organisations.

Six million people around the world have died of hunger this year.

At least they died grateful to be safe from Saddam, I guess.

Latham Diaries: more extracts

I kind of picked 2 less-serious entries for this excerpt. I read a lot of entries today that were probably worth putting in, so I'll try and remember them for tomorrow.

Tuesday, 12 November (2002)

[...] earlier in the day, a classic example of a Young Technocrat in action. Towards the end of Question Time, Rudd asked Downer a legitimate question about Kopassus: have they been cooperating with the terrorist outfit Laskar Jihad? But straight after, Rudd raced up to the Indonesian Embassy to explain himself, petrified they might take offence. He's not in this to win public support for Labor. He's just an insider in the Canberra foreign-policy establishment. There was no need to explain himself to the Indonesians. It was just a question, and a good one at that.

Thursday, 14 November (2002)

Living on the edge, doing crazy things to alleviate the boredom of parliamentary life. Since my attack on the Tory elites, some of our people have wanted me to go further, to really unload on the neoconservatives. Last night, for instance, Jo Fox, one of Carmen Lawrence's advisers, issued a challenge: to describe Albrechtsen [Janet Albrechtsen, Right-wing columnist for The Australian], so heavily loathed by the Labor femocrats, as 'a skanky-ho who must die'.
I didn't understand what 'skanky-ho' meant; it sounded like more American rap rubbish to me. But I can't say no to a challenge, that's my problem. So, away I went this morning, slipping a line into my speech on the Financial Sector Leglislation Amendment Bill, which attacked Malcolm Turnbull over the HIH collapse. I described dirty Janet as 'a shanky-ho who will die in a ditch to defend the Liberal Party'.
Hopeless. I used the wrong term, that's how much I knew about it, so I had to alter the Hansard Greens this afternoon, changing 'shanky' to 'skanky'. Maybe not a smart move, as it turns out this is the equivalent of calling someone a 'filthy piece of rugby hot-box' (a time-honoured description from The Bulls Roar) [The official organ of the Liverpool Rugby Football Club- I have no idea what the preceding phrase means, however- S]. Outrageous when you think about it, not that many people noticed, just a couple of journalists, expertly deflected by Cooney [Michael Cooney, worked for Latham 2002-2005 in various roles]. It just goes to show: you can say anything down there, only two men and their dogs are listening. Parliament is a waste of space; tedious and irrelevant.
This is why Labor MPs, from time to time, play word games in the House. The best was in the last term of Parliament, after Rudd said he had received complaints about the GST from a constituent who manufactured products known as Dick Balm and Cock Paste, lubricants that he wanted to be GST-free. Julia Irwin and I managed to enshrine in the parliamentary record the names Dick Balm and Jock Paste. It added to the hilarity of a late night Caucus party. Go the skanky ho!

Michelle Leslie: Devout Drug User, Occasional Muslim

From Nude

To Prude

This girl's story gets sillier and sillier, but it's pretty clear she has herself a good lawyer, and now a Sydney doctor who is either a good friend of the family or not averse to charging a little higher than the scheduled fee.

Caught with 2 ecstasy tablets 'belonging to a friend' in her bag, she was facing 15 years in jail for possession. That's the law in Indonesia; it might be harsh and stupid, but it's the law. Next thing you know, young Michelle, fresh from the nightclub, has swathed herself in a burqua and claimed that she converted to Islam over 12 months ago. That was iced water she was drinking at the club, dammit, iced water! And that bodypaint she modelled a while back was all Halal!

Now, seeing that the 'they belonged to my friend' approach is not going to cut it, her lawyer has gone through the drug laws and come up with a brilliant defense: Michelle is an addict! Not addicted to nasty illegal drugs though, nothing that might place her under suspicion at home or harm her career too much. No, the poor dear is hopelessly addicted to prescription drugs.

Why is that a good defense? Because Indonesian law allows for a maximum sentence of 3 months for an addict... never mind that the drugs she claims to be addicted to are completely different from the ones she was caught with. They were her friend's, remember? She didn't even know what they were! Never mind that she must be the most naive 24 year old in Australia if she's at a nightclub and someone asks her to mind some pills and she doesn't know what they are. I've never taken any kind of illegal pill in my life, never even seen one, but I'm smart enough to know that in circumstances like that I wouldn't be clutching a couple of panadol!

During the prosecutor's questioning, Leslie, shaking her head, denied ever taking ecstasy before. Her lawyer interjected: "Just medicine, not ecstasy."

A doctor's report stated Leslie was addicted to prescribed medicine, not ecstasy, Leslie's lawyers said. The report states she underwent several months' treatment for addiction.

Sure she did...

Latham Diaries- extract 2

This is probably going to be my favourite part of the whole book.

Wednesday, 26 June (2002)

Pandemonium, simply because I called Howard an arselicker in today's Bulletin. If anything, I was restrained- Howard has got his tongue up Bush's clacker that often the poor guy must think he's got an extra haemorrhoid.
The thing I'm worried about from the interview lunch with the lovely Maxine McKew is some quotes on the politics of hate. I was lamenting the abolition of the Better Cities program in Campbelltown's public housing estates and how much I hated the Tories for it. Needless to say, hatred got a run in the article, but not the policy issue that got me fired up. Doesn't seem to matter- the media have gone off about the arselicker.
The papers had an advance copy of the thing, even a chance for the usual suspects to bag me off the record: Swan in the Courier-Mail with his mate Dennis Atkins, Rudd in the Age with Ab-Fab [journalist Louise Dodson], prissy Labor blokes complaining that I have had a dig at Howard- the revenge of the white-breads. Howard hasn't responded, leaving it to [Tony] Abbott, who reckons I am quite 'vile and scurrilous'.
The hypocrisy of this place is breathtaking. Labor, Libs, Nats, journos- most of them on the tarry-hoot, trying to throw the leg over, into everything but a bath- but today, feigning outrage because I called an arselicker an arselicker. That's what they should stick on my tombstone: Here Lies The Man Who Called Howard An Arselicker- Denounced As Morally Unsound By Tony Abbott In An Article By Louise Dodson, God Help The Poor Bastard.
Anyway, what are the rules of morality in Howard's Australia? Eight months ago he falsely accused some parents of throwing their children off a boat and has never apologised- and the commercial media could not care less. I call him an arselicker and the shock-jocks are all over it like a rash. This is what we are up against: the shameless double standards of the Australian Establishment.

A Nappy for Your Thoughts

Why not train all four?

What's surprising about this article from the New York Times is not the level of ignorance of child-rearing practices in other cultures. I would expect the same of Australians the British, and possibly some other Europeans. No, what I find really surprising is that when asked what they thought of the idea of toilet-training a baby instead of allowing it to wear nappies until it is 2 years old or more, ordinary Americans will bring up Freud.

Another mother in Toys "R" Us, who offered her opinion but wanted to remain anonymous, was aghast at the notion. "Have you read Freud?" she asked, worrying about the method's long-term effects. "I imagine it's going to come out in sexual ways."

Anyone who knows anything about Sigmund Freud knows that the guy practically invented the technique known as 'talking out of your arse'. Freud claimed that as a child he had sexual feelings for his mother- and he then extrapolated this to mean that every single child had sexual feelings for the parent of the opposite sex. Not exactly scientific. The guy was born in 1856- how exactly does that mother think the human race survived up to that point without worrying about the sexual outcomes of too-early toilet training? How do those primitive brown people in other countries who toilet-train their children before they are even 1 year old manage without sound, scientific knowledge such as this?

I guess that means all Kenyan, Indian and Chinese children must grow up to be obsessive-compulsive-disordered adults... right?

I can't imagine tolerating having a child in nappies when they are 3 or 4 years old, as that Wikipedia article (obviously written by an American) suggests. The sooner you don't have to come into contact with smelly baby poo every day the better!

The only people I can think of who benefit from late toilet training of children are the companies that manufacture disposable nappies.

Permanent link to article here.

The Latham Diaries- excerpt

I knew that when Mark Latham became leader of the Labor Party they put a hell of an effort into sanitising his image, and to an extent he must have gone along with it. Reading his book though, I find myself agreeing with probably 95% of what he says. If he had released his diaries before the last election I might even have voted for him. It's a very interesting insight into the ALP, admittedly only from his perspective, and I find myself wishing that more politicians would release books like this just as a reminder of what really goes on that we aren't usually privy to.

Every now and then I'm just going to type out a little excerpt that has caught my attention- probably mostly things that strike a chord with me. I've passed a few already (I'm up to the year 2000 so far) so I'll have to go back and dig them out to post up sometime in the future.

Today's excerpt:

Monday, 4 September (2000)

Last week the media carried a report that Kerry Packer lost $34 million on a gambling spree in Las Vegas, and I made a short speech about it in Parliament. Why not? He runs a media outfit that spends its time investigating other people's business; why shouldn't an MP reflect on the morality of hyper-gambling? It set the the media outlets off and even flushed out Packer himself, giving a rare interview to The Australian.
Some are suggesting that it's part of Keating's campaign against Packer, but I didn't make the speech because of the Packer-Keating thing. I made it because I find it morally wrong for any citizen to blow $34 million when there are so many better ways of using the money in our poverty-ridden society.
I also flushed out Howard last Friday, who described Packer's behaviour as that of 'a good corporate citizen'. So much for mutual obligation. What is more unacceptable: a young kid on the dole going to the beach or a business tycoon wasting $34 million dollars [sic] in a casino? Labor MPs should be exposing these double standards all the time, but our people are scared of Packer and co. That's why the Establishment gets away with it and remains the Establishment.
Australia's business culture is weak and inward-looking, especially compared with some of the great gestures overseas. Bill Gates, for instance, has committed his fortune to the global elimination of polio. Imagine an Australian businessman talking in similar terms about wiping out a debilitating disease from the planet. Now, that's real mateship, something our culture has lost, replaced by the arrogance and greed of corporate power.

I remember when Kerry Packer donated, if I remember correctly, $2 million to help fit NSW ambulances with defibrillators after he had a heart attack. It was a nice move, but it meant so little to someone who can drop $34 million on a single gambling spree. The number of people that could be helped with $34 million given to charity is a hell of a lot greater than the number of people who will be helped when $34 million is lost at a casino. Good corporate citizen, yeah. Good citizen of Australian society? Nope. I bet John Howard is still scraping his tongue clean...

Playboy: joke of the month

Two elderly men were talking about their sex lives. One told the other, " I had sex with a 30-year-old three times last night."

"Wow." said his friend, "You must be using that Viagra."

"No," the man said. "I know a little secret: wheat bread. Eat lots of it and you can have sex for hours."

So the second man ran to the nearest supermarket and grabbed six loaves of wheat bread. At the checkout counter the cashier said "That's a lot of bread. It will probably get hard before you're done eating it all."

"Well I'll be damned," the old man said. "Does everyone know about this but me?"

Just as Well it's not Campaign Time

... or I would be even more frustrated with Labor's response to the Howard Government's IR reforms. The reforms are deeply unpopular with the Australian public, who are obviously are a little on the slow side, seeing as this has been a while coming, and are generating what looks like being a major community reponse, instigated by the ACTU. Labor has been handed this issue gift-wrapped and on a silver platter. So why aren't we hearing anything other than bluster and hot air? They have said that although the reforms are 'bad for workers', if they get into power they won't scrap them. Now what the hell are we supposed to make of that? If they're against the legislation then why wouldn't they scrap it? Nothing has changed. I had a little deja vu when reading this couple of lines in Mark Latham's book:

Monday, 21 February (2000)

Our position is totally confused. When it first went through the House in December 1998, Crean put out a press release (a classic I immediately placed on my pinboard) describing the GST as the most 'misguided, inequitable, regressive and socially and economically damaging proposal [to ever] pass through the House of Representatives'. But our policy is to keep it.

They're doing it again. They did it in 2000 with the GST- saying they opposed it but they wouldn't get rid of it (although they had the State governments against them on that issue at least, which isn't the case now), and in 2001 when they attempted to win the anti-refugee-racist vote from Howard by being just as 'tough' in their policies, while simultaneously trying to win the votes of people who found such attitudes towards poor, stricken people fleeing tyrannical regimes abhorrent- and lost- this time they are trying to convince Australian workers that they are on their side while simultaneously trying to court the Business Council of Australia. It won't work. It's weak. It's despicable. It's hypocritical.

It's also just part of John Howard's typical election cycle. Get the nasties (GST, Telstra sale, IR reform, VSU) over and done with in the first 12 or 18 months, and then start thinking up the next election campaign. The ALP in its current incarnation has been god's greatest gift to John Howard. The reason I'm so disappointed in them is because I expect the kind of crap we get from the Coalition, but Labor in principle promises better- it just never delivers.

Australia Donates $500 000 for Earthquake Aid

Hey kid, how's it feel to be 5% as important as an American?

Aren't we wonderful? Our big-hearted government has donated half a million dollars!

Hang on just a second though, didn't we just donate $10 million for victims of Hurricane Katrina? Don't get me wrong, I think it's great that we did. It's just that, well, the richest nation on earth probably doesn't need quite as much help as the millions of people affected by this multi-national disaster that has apparently left 30000 people dead. And even if they did need as much help, why did the victims of this disaster get so much less? What makes a tragedy in the US worth twenty times as much attention from our government than a tragedy in another country?

The only comforting fact in all this is that the Pakistani government seems to be mounting a much more effective disaster response than the US government managed.

UPDATE 10/10/2005: Our government has increased its aid donation tenfold. That's still half of what we gave to the US.

Good News!

Ghana make their first-ever World Cup final!!

Fauxmenism

Avert your eyes, dear.
Nice girls should be ashamed to look at female breasts!

I find myself very uncomfortable with the type of sentiment found in the rash of articles on a book by a New Yorker named Ariel Levy. Salon, the SMH, and OpinionJournal.com are three perfect examples.

Ms Levy's book 'Female Chauvinist Pigs' sounds off about the phenomenon she refers to as 'Raunch Culture', into which she lumps Playboy, pole-dancing lessons and 13 year olds wearing 'porn star' t-shirts.

While I can understand peoples' discomfort with 13 year olds wearing raunchy t-shirt slogans, one of the reasons I personally dislike such t-shirts is because of the hypocrisy in our culture that merely tut-tuts a 13 year old for wearing one, while severely stigmatising the grown women who make up the profession as whores and victims. Also I don't know if most of these 13 year olds have had much of an exposure to porn, let alone enjoy it, but as it's not legal for them to access it I don't think the t-shirts should be encouraged either.

Another thing I find particularly annoying is the blame placed upon men for women who drink too hard, engage in 'meaningless' sexual encounters or read Playboy. According to Levy, they are trying to be like men. I'm sorry, but if meaningless sexual encounters were ever the sole domain of men at any point in human history that would make them all homosexual- after all, who were they having these encounters with? Society's disapproval of women engaging in sex outside of marriage is reflected in numerous surveys of males and females on their total number of sexual partners, number of sexual partners in the past 12 months and number of times they have cheated on a partner. Seemingly without exception, the females answer to fewer partners, fewer episodes of cheating and fewer partners in the past 12 months. Assuming the males aren't artificially inflating their numbers out of a desire to appear more macho and virile, either the females are lying or there is a very small group of very busy women out there who satisfy all those cheating men.

The Salon article by Christine Smallwood is possibly the worst. Of Playboy she says:

For some women -- those who are turned on by other women, for example -- the license to consume Playboy is unquestionably an advance; for others, though, you might wonder what they get out of page after page of identical bodies with identically parted lips. For instead of celebrating the diversity not only of shapes, but of desires, Playboy and its kin have commodified female sexuality into a series of recognizable poses that have been reproduced and repeated until they are now the very definition, the only definition, of sexiness. Hefner argues that female Olympians posed in Playboy as a way to tell the world that they "don't think that athleticism in women is at odds with being sexy." Interesting then, that to prove their sexiness, these athletes posed as soft, sedate pin-ups, not in action on the court.

According to Smallwood, the fact I'm not turned on by other women means I should have stuck to my 'proper' place as a woman and not subscribed to Playboy. I happen to find Hugh Hefner's current ideal of female beauty pretty damn unattractive. The women literally all pretty much do look the same: blonde hair, implants, anus-lipstick... but as anyone who has actually read the magazine knows, there are usually only 3 pictorials- the rest of the magazine is made up of articles on politics, and current affairs, some of the best interviews around, book, DVD and game reviews, a fashion section... Ooh, somewhat like a women's mag, in fact! I don't want to denigrate Playboy in any way- I have read a lot of women's mags, and Playboy is about a million times more intelligent and informative. You mean it's not all tits and ass? Now here's a novel idea, Christine- researching your article!

As for the US Olympians pictorial- I have that particular issue, and soft those women ain't. They're more hard-bodied and tough than almost any man you'd care to name, and they looked it. Sure, they have nice bodies and a lot less insecurity about them than your average woman. They were photographed in poses appropriate to their sport- on the court, as it so happens. Personally, I think it was a great pictorial, but then again, I actually saw it. The only thing that disappointed me about the pictorial was the complete lack of diversity; the women were all white, and nearly all blonde. Playboy alleges they asked many female athletes from different countries to take part, so I can only assume that the lack of diversity is because of a cultural stigma regarding female nudity in many countries.

Again regarding Playboy, Levy says "The FCP asks: Why throw your boyfriend's Playboy in a freedom trash can when you can be partying at the Mansion? ... Why try to beat them when you can join them?".

I shouldn't have to say it, but Gam had nothing to do with my subscribing to Playboy. I wouldn't say he has 'benefited' from it in any way either, because the women simply aren't his type. Up until a couple of years ago I had always assumed Playboy must be pretty hard-core. I was brought up in a nice, conservative, church-going household where Playboy was only mentioned in the same breath as 'moral decay'- although my father did admit to having a subscription at some time during the 70s (I wish he'd kept them- they're worth hundreds per issue now, and I'd love to collect them!). Anyway, finally one day a year or so after I'd left home I decided to buy one. To say I was surprised at the content would be an understatement. I'm not the sort of woman who is offended by female nudity- either my own or others, but now when I hear things such as the gossip-column item a while back that Courtney Cox Arquette made her husband David throw out his complete collection of Playboy issues from the past 16 years because he had to 'be a grownup now' I just assume that the silly woman has obviously never read an issue of the magazine in her life. David must have been a little miffed, particularly when all the headlines read that she forced him to 'throw out his porn collection'. Maybe I'm jaded, but Playboy is hardly pornographic. Then again, according to Levy I'm only saying that to fit in.

The SMH article borders on outright silliness. One choice claim is that "Now, every highly sexualised female singer is considered an empowered role model - even Britney Spears". Are you kidding me?! She is white trash, she married white trash and she had a baby white trash. Who considers that 'empowered' and a 'role model'?

On women paying for pole-dancing lessons you can practically hear the author gasp as he reveals that women pay $230 for bunch of lessons in "a style of dancing that was once synonymous with sleaze and exploitation". Funny how the supposedly seedy business was kept alive by regular guys buying lapdances. Calling stripping sleazy and exploitative is merely playing to a stereotype. The only thing even funnier is that strippers are now getting loads of money out of women as well as men. What I really don't get, however, is why women taking pole-dancing lessons or subscribing to Playboy are painted by Levy as symptoms of a societal disease, as falling victim to 'typical male' behaviour by becoming like 'them'. There's nothing worse than a feminist who wants to tell women what to do with their lives. That's just about all of them, I think.

Digital TV: Why Australians are Slow on the Uptake

There is a lot of hand-wringing by the government over the reasons why Australians are so slow about switching to digital television. I'll give them the answer for free: it's because they're making us pay. If, four years ago, the government had mandated that all new TVs sold be digital-integrated, there wouldn't be half as big a problem as there is now. The fact that you have to fork out a couple of hundred extra for an ugly set-top box is what makes most consumers think twice, and if the government wants to achieve its aims, it should be ensuring that consumers don't have to think at all. Allowing retailers to keep selling televisions that would essentially be defunct in under a decade was a very short-sighted move indeed.

The only thing that has given me pause for thought as to whether Gam and I should buy a set-top box is the fact that the new Chaser News Alert is being shown only on ABC2. Now that's just mean, taunting us like that... I think we'll just download it.

More on 4WDs

More cut & paste blogging- I just couldn't resist this article from the BBC:

Call for health warnings on 4x4s

The researches looked at studies into road accidents

Four-wheel drives - or 4x4s - should carry health warnings because of an increased injury risk to pedestrians compared to ordinary cars, experts say.

Trinity College Dublin experts say increasing numbers of people are driving these type of cars.

But, writing in the British Medical Journal, they say the risk to pedestrians comes from the car's design rather than the numbers on the roads.

They say warning notices should be put on 4x4s to raise awareness of risks.

SUVs are no more unsafe than any other type of car Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders spokesman

Sales of this type of car, also called sports utility vehicles (SUVs) have increased by 15% across Europe in the past year, while sales of standard cars have dropped by 4%.

The researchers add that in the US, 40% of new vehicles bought by drivers are classed as light trucks or vans - many of which are SUVs.

A recent study in America found that, for the same collision speed, the likelihood of a pedestrian fatality is nearly doubled in the event of a collision with a large SUV compared with a passenger car.

Other studies report higher rates (up to four times) of severe injury and death.

Risk reduction

Ciaran Simms, a lecturer in mechanical engineering and Desmond O'Neill, associate professor of medical care for the elderly, said that the increased risk from SUVs is caused by the design of the front end of the vehicles.

Pedestrian injuries from ordinary cars are mainly leg fractures and knee injuries from the initial impact with the bumper, and head injuries from the secondary impact with the bonnet or windscreen.

But researchers say that, because SUV bonnets are higher than those of cars, there is a more severe initial impact on the upper leg and pelvis, and a doubling of injuries to vulnerable regions such as the head, thorax, and abdomen.

The researchers add that elderly pedestrians are already known to be at high risk.

People over 60 are more than four times as likely to die if injured by a car than younger people.

Challenge

The report authors call for a number of measures to reduce the risks associated with SUVs, including changing crash investigations so the type of cars involved in accidents with pedestrians is identified.

They also call for warning notices on SUVs to help inform consumers of the increased risks of severe injuries and death associated with the vehicles.

They add: "Addressing the hazards posed by SUVs to pedestrians is an emerging and real traffic safety challenge in the developed world."

But a spokesman for the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders said: "We recognise that all vehicles can be dangerous when in an accident with a pedestrian."

He said the BMJ researchers had focussed on US research, rather than UK or European work - and US vehicles were bigger.

"SUVs are no more unsafe than any other type of car."

However, the Irish researchers said they had looked at European research, and their findings were valid for cars used in Europe, as well as the US.

Roar v Mariners 1-1

Man of the match: Hyuk Su Seo

Thanks to the SMH for writing a decent report on the match, which I'm reproducing here because I'm too tired and lazy to write my own.

Short rundown: the crowd was pitiful (13000) in size, but spirited as usual; the game was good, but unfortunately plenty of mistakes made by QLD Roar, and the referee was perhaps a little soft, but definitely consistent and fair, unlike the dickhead who refereed the Roar v Melbourne Victory match a couple of weeks ago and deservedly got booed off the pitch.

Stunning soccer goal gives Roar a point

October 7, 2005 - 10:35PM

Korean midfielder Hyuk-Su Seo produced a stunning long-range goal to give the Queensland Roar a share of the spoils in Friday night's A-League clash with the Central Coast Mariners.

Seo's goal was the highlight, but the Roar justifiably traipsed off Suncorp Stadium disappointed figures after the entertaining 1-1 stalemate on a hot Brisbane night.

The home side produced 18 scoring shots to the Mariners' eight, and dominated the attack-oriented match from the outset.

Their failure to convert chances meant the two sides remain locked together in fourth on the table with nine points after seven matches.

Central Coast skipper Noel Spencer threatened to continue the A-League's away anomaly when he headed home from a 41st-minute corner.

It was Spencer's third goal of the season, and with the canny Tom Pondeljak holding court, the injury-riddled pre-season cup champions were on track for an upset.

The Roar's dramatic equaliser came in the 57th minute when the hard-working Korean drilled a speculative 25-metre shot past a helpless Danny Vukovic.

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A rare shotmaker, Seo took everyone by surprise by delivering a perfect strike on the outside of his right boot after a short midfield run.

But the Mariners could thank Vukovic for getting a slice of the points after he pulled off an athletic save to stop super-sub Michael Baird's 67th-minute header.

Queensland had another gilt-edged chance with six minutes left when a Spase Dilevski corner went straight across the face of goals just out of the reach of Josh McCloughan.

It was the Roar's loose checking from a Mariners corner which allowed Spencer his goal after being outplayed for virtually the entire first half.

Spencer headed the ball into the back of the net as both 198cm defender Tyler Simpson and Hyuk-Su Seo failed to get a touch on Tom Pondeljak's corner to the back post.

The goal was met by disbelief from the vocal crowd of 13,195 who had watched the Roar commit raid after raid on the visitors goals.

Strikers Jonti Richter and Alex Brosque forever looked dangerous but neither could produce the magic needed.

It was attacking midfielder Warren Moon who went closest to reaping a reward for the persistence with a curling 25m free kick that just flew wide of the right post.

Richter was almost as close with a lob after some sloppy Mariners defence.

Pondeljak ensured it wasn't all one-way traffic with a classy pass to Dean Heffernan in the box that required Roar skipper Chad Gibson to produce a goal-saving tackle.

Referee Perry Mur let the captivating game flow and showed a blind-eye to only the most vigorous of challenges.

© 2005 AAP

Another Spot-on SMH Cartoon

High Court Victory for Game Console Owners

IT'S A GOOOOD MOTHERFUCKING BEER!!!

Mod chipping of Sony Playstations has been ruled legal by the High Court.

Earlier this year I decided I wanted to buy the first and second series of Chappelle's Show on DVD. First, I thought they might be available through SBS, who run their store through Dymocks. No luck. Then I tried Sanity's online store (don't ever order from them- it costs just as much as retail and takes weeks to arrive!). No luck there either. Then I tried Amazon, which has the series on DVD, but only for region 1. Australia is region 4. Region 1 DVD's will not play on a region 4 player. I searched everywhere for a site that sold region 4 coded DVD's of Chappelle's Show and couldn't find a single one. I don't think they even make them on region 4.

The only way we could legally own and watch Chappelle's Show on DVD is to get our X-box chipped or buy a region-free DVD player- and why should we be forced to buy a DVD player when we already have one? What Sony and Microsoft and other manufacturers have done by creating regions for their product to force consumers in each region to pay the price they set instead of being able to shop around is anti-competetive. I believe the Australian Consumers Association has made this argument in court. Funnily enough I'm not sure that the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission has. It seems that when companies collude in an anti-competetive practice that disadvantages the consumer but not each other, governments really couldn't care less. Which is why I'm surprised but very happy with the High Court's decision today. I hope that console and DVD player manufacturers are forced to abandon their practice of region encoding altogether, although I still plan on getting our X-box chipped in the mean time so we can get Chappelle's Show!

ACA: Trying to Teach the Bleedingly Obvious to the Australian Consumer

The first thing I did after reading this article on Australians' responses to a survey by NAB of 500 credit card holders was check the back of our most recent shopping docket.

All I can say is that the bank must be rubbing its hands in glee at having so many stupid people in possession of a credit card.

The survey asked people how they would go about saving $150. Simple question. Many respondents said they would use shop-a-dockets to save money, hence why I had a quick look at the back of our most recent docket. Here's what I found:

Rabbit Photo: 'Digital prints for 39c- buy one get one free (min. order 50 prints) *Gold Members Only'.

Now, the question to ask yourself when you are trying to save money is "Do I really need those 50 photos? That's $19.50, plus whatever 'Gold membership' costs, of course". In summary, unless you've just been to your own wedding, those 50 prints are hardly likely to be an essential expense. Just put the photos on the web and email the URL to your friends.

Oz Tan: 'Free Suntanning: Buy 4 sessions and receive another 2 free; Also 20% off all beauty services over $30'.

Solarium tanning: not essential. Getting a facial: not essential. You might be saving a small amount of money by using the shop-a-docket if you do go to a solarium 2-3 times a week, but guess what? You save much more money if you just don't go! No-one cares if you're not quite as 'sun-kissed' this week, darling.

The Coffee Club: 'Free Meal: Buy one main meal and get one free with any 2 drinks purchased (not valid on Public Holidays)'.

If you were planning on eating at the Coffee Club with a friend (and some people like the generic, trucked-in-by-catering-company food at Coffee Club) this is a good deal. It's pretty rare for eating out to be an essential expense, but unless you're a rich wanker who'll spend $100 on a main course at an over-hyped restaurant you can probably justify the expense for the convenience of eating out. Plus you'll save 12c on a dishwasher tab!

www.shop-a-holiday.com.au: '3 Night Break Surfers Paradise Only $199 per person'.

That's spending $199, not saving $150. Besides, no matter how much you spend on a holiday at the Gold Coast, it's too much. Ugh.

www.shop-a-holiday.com.au: '4 night Escape Gold Coast $209'.

Ditto.

balAnce hair & beauty: 'Free stylecut with any colour, value $50'.

Nope. One thing the article mentioned is that respondents were rather reluctant to dye their hair at home rather than have it done by a salon. I've done both, and the salon does a better job, but that fails to take into account that unless you're grey at 30, having your hair dyed is completely non-essential. I used to read womens' magazines. I used to pretty much think that dying your hair was essential (alright, if you'd asked me I wouldn't have said so, but I still did it regularly)- and if you read the magazines, they'll also have you believe that your hair needs to change according to the season, or what's in fashion, or what some celebrity has done with her hair. I'm no advocate of letting your hair grow like a hippy (as scruffy as I look in my profile photo), but women are conditioned to believe that what they have is not good enough, and if only they fork out for product X their hair/face/body/whatever will become acceptable. Not true. Most women are just fine as they are. Spending $100+ every time you get your hair done is completely unnecessary. Just a cut should do, and it's not likely to cost more than $40-50 unless it's a particularly wanky salon... Been there, done that!

Video Ezy: 'Rent any New Release for only $1.95; rent 5 Weekly movies $6.95'.

Technically, videos are non-essential, but if you want a little entertainment, spending $1.95 is a whole lot better than the $14 per person it'll cost you to see a movie in a mainstream cinema.

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Many respondents also said that switching to a low-interest credit card would be a good way to save $150. The spokesperson for the Australian Consumers Association, Lisa Tait, agreed. The way I see it, however, if you're paying interest on a credit card, you aren't saving money, you're spending it. People like Gam and I, who pay off the credit card in time every month, are known as 'deadbeats' in banking terminology, apparently.

Another thing that struck me was how reluctant respondents were to use public transport and use their car less, particularly with the way petrol prices are at the moment. I guess the quality of public transport varies from city to city, and it is practically non-existent outside of cities, but making less use of the car seems to me to be a very good way to save money. I guess it's another case of what becomes the norm then becomes seen as essential, just as in the case of women's hair. A bike is a much better mode of transport than a car, if you are not subject to long commutes, and if you are, a motorbike or scooter is cheaper and much more environmentally friendly; even car-pooling is an option. Most people who drive are using the vehicle to transport only themselves, which is highly inefficient.

The article pertinently mentions that "A separate study by the association has found that using a high-interest online savings account can earn $300 a year more on a $5000 deposit than an everyday bank account."

Possibly the best idea so far. In an ordinary bank account you're paying to keep the bloody thing open as well as to use it, while getting $0.01 interest per quarter if you're lucky. AMP and ING both offer rates of around 5% on their savings accounts.