Tuesday, July 27, 2010

INVASION SMAZION

Last Saturday, the good ol' Telegraph reported that 800 Indonesians 'could' be arriving on our shores. The headline shrieked and blared 'Invasion'. In Abbott and Gillard's televised debate on Sunday night, the 'boats' (we're not talking dragon boats or Sydney to Hobart yachts here) were mentioned several times. Ah, the doctoring, fashioning and promotion of boat people phobia - how our media and governments love it!

I'd like to know how many people in Australia actually fear refugees/asylum seekers. How many of us really think people smugglers are 'evil' or 'scum of the earth', to quote a couple of Labor leaders? I'd like to meet an Indonesian refugee and a people smuggler just to see what sort of person they are, so I could form my own opinion, not be manipulated by the rhetoric of Suits fostering and selling paranoia.

Every Australian government from now to the end of the world will campaign on the 'here comes the gruesome OTHER, ready to take our homes, our jobs, our children' theme. There are WW2 echoes of 'the Hun' and 'the Jap' here. There needs to be sensible discussion about the processing and accommodation of asylum seekers from our leaders, not empty words about stopping boats from departing their destinations and turning boats back. This will never happen in a sustained, effective way. As long as there's war, neglect, tribalism, global warming leading to rising sea levels, genocide, hatred, xenophobia, religious persecution etc. overseas there will be hopeless people fleeing countries that are a mess. We need to learn how to embrace these escapees.

Vietnamese, Polish, Italian, Greek, Armenian, Lebanese, and many other races, have helped shape Australia. Many of these people were escapees. As Mick Jones, in the immortal Big Audio Dynamite, once sang, 'Don't anybody know that this city was made of immigrant blood and money?'

LJ, July 28 2010.

Wednesday, July 21, 2010

TEN POTENTIAL AUSSIE BAND NAMES...

Deadset Nutbags
Azaria's 21st
Bogan Wagon
Where's Holt?
Bottle O
Inside The Rock
Chuck a U-ee
Howard as Beatboxer
When Keating Krumped
Spinifex

LJ, July 21 2010.

Sunday, July 18, 2010

THE PRIME MINISTER AS WOOLLY RHINO

Julia Gillard makes me think of the woolly rhino - hardy, powerful, unflappable, chilled out and unconventionally attractive. And, of course, there's the nose/horn thing.

LJ, July 19 2010

Wednesday, July 14, 2010

NOT A COMPLETE DOG BOX

Currently, my life is all about the draining search for real real estate. I'm living and breathing dimensions, pest inspections, cosmetic needs, the search for cracks and rising damp, praying for extraordinary architectural bones and fitting economics. One local agent recently promoted a property by saying, "It's not a complete dog box". What an ambassador for the cause! I'm sure the incomplete dog box's vendors would've loved to have heard that.

LJ, July 15 2010.