"Victimhood" is now

an industry. It seems we all need to be victims of some sort or another. We need to have a grievance. Something has to be "not fair" and, if something is "not fair" then we need to be "compensated" for it.

Nobody from the "Yes" campaign knocked on the door yesterday. There was nobody in the street. Never mind there are a few weekends to go before the referendum yet. No doubt they will still be accosting people at the library and in the shopping centre and elsewhere. They will tell you "it isn't fair" and "if you vote no then you are racist". I am not sure what that means.

I have been listening to the "leaders" of the Yes side. One of them has actually spoken of plans to "smash your Constitution". The list of things they plan to demand "when the Voice gets up" is ever growing.  Their voices are getting more strident all the time. 

Our Constitution is a written one. It is the document which allows parliament to make laws for the good governance of the country. It should be something which unites us, not divides us. This is one reason to oppose the proposed Voice. It puts a division in place, a division which could only be removed by another referendum. It is really stating "Aboriginals will always be disadvantaged. We need to feed that disadvantage to justify its place in the Constitution." It is about ensuring that the "gap" so often spoken about can never be closed for if it is closed there is no need for that Voice.  It is about ensuring that grievances remain live.

They are now getting schoolchildren to raise money to provide more books for Aboriginal children. Sounds like a good thing doesn't it? But these books will be books "in their own language". They are not really designed to "preserve a culture". That "culture" has already been lost. There was never a written form of any Aboriginal language before white settlement. What little has been passed down has changed beyond recognition. These books are not about cultural preservation they are about maintaining a gap. The initiative is dressed up in all sorts of ways but this is about the power to control. It is about attempting to turn people into victims - and yes, you are a victim if those above you make decisions which deliberately disadvantage you. 

"It's better than nothing" you tell me? I think not. It is surely better to have ten books about their life in English than one in a poorly reconstructed version of a language spoken by very few which tells you, "I am a victim."

 

 

 

 

Door knocking?

Don't do it here.

There is a polite message at our front door asking people not to knock. Obviously this does not include people I know or people I have asked to come. 

It does include people collecting for charity, religious groups, environmental activists and others.

Charity groups need to be aware that I have a limited income and I do what I can with that. I am not going to donate to people at the door or in the shopping centre because, more often than not, you are being paid to collect and the money is going to charities where as little as eighteen cents in the dollar is actually going on a service to help those in need. I want my money to go to those actually in need, not the person organising the distribution.

It is much the same with environmental organisations. They could do far more if they got out there and actually planted trees instead of handing out glossy pamphlets. (How many trees were cut down to print those?)

Religious groups infuriate me. I haven't seen any Mormons lately. Perhaps the pandemic has reduced their activities and I must admit the one lot before that just walked out again. They must have read the notice. 

I have had more than one run in with the Jehovah's Witnesses. They were so persistent that I ended up writing to their head honcho and threatening legal action. I would take it too. They prey on families of the deceased and I find that despicable. 

There is another persistent group from a local "Bible" church. I thought all churches were Bible based but apparently I am wrong. This lot believe that they, and they alone, are right and they are determined the rest of us should know it. It isn't really helping those in need.  They even tried confronting an Anglican priest who happened to be here one day. He was in civvies. He let them talk for a moment and then, gently, told them what his occupation was and suggested that they find better ways to support people in need. They scuttled off.

And now it seems there is to be a "massive" door knocking campaign for that "other" issue - the Voice issue. It will be "all about Yes". 

I have no doubt they will ignore the notice on the door. They will knock. They will see it as their right to "inform" me. That I might already be well informed, perhaps even better informed, will be of no interest to them. In this district they will inevitably come from the "reconciliation" group.

I wish they really were a "reconciliation" group. If they were they would think very differently. They would not be trying to divide the community with the proposed "voice". They would not be playing into the hands of people who are determined to forever maintain that gap by way of their grievance industry.  It will do so much harm. 

I'd like to try but I don't think they will listen to my voice.  

Political campaigns

should not be conducted by local councils in this country. It may well be that elsewhere it is acceptable. Councils elsewhere have other functions and politics do come into that.

Here councils are there to deal with things like roads, rates, rubbish, community facilities and the like. They are not there to donate ratepayer funds to one side of a political campaign and not the other. They are not there to support one side of a referendum and not the other.

Our local council has gone too far, much too far. They have donated $50,000 of ratepayer funds to "Yes" for the upcoming referendum. They have donated nothing to "No". They should not have donated money to either side. What is more this has been done without the approval of - or even consultation with - ratepayers. $50,000 would do a great deal more good elsewhere in our area.

No, I am not happy with what they have done and many other people feel the same way. It has even got a negative mention in this morning's editorial. 

The council has added to the problem by allowing a "Reconciliation" group to station themselves at the entrance to the library. They are campaigning for "Yes" of course. It is a highly political group which has been able to get a number of items through council - name changes and a refusal to make an environmentally sound change that might have "disturbed" something we have been told is "significant".

I was at the library yesterday and saw this for myself. Indeed I was not able to go into the library without being stopped by these people. Even when I made it clear, quite politely, I did not want to speak to them they persisted. 

I spent a little time observing them. Did they do the same to other people? Yes, they did. 

As I left the library they tried again. Outside someone I know by sight said, "I don't like that."

No. I don't like it either. I know that a "No" group has been denied the same right to put their case.

There are two, perhaps more, sides to this referendum. At one time the government did not even want to send out a "yes/no" case, just a yes case. It is only funding, albeit indirectly, the Yes case. There are serious flaws in the Yes case, flaws which could lead to unexpected places.  The No case is leading to other problems but would at least maintain the status quo for now and may even lead to changes in the future.

Whatever happens I believe the council should be neutral. It should not be spending funds on anything like this, particularly without ratepayer approval. It should not be approving one side of such a serious issue and not permitting the other to be heard.

And all readers should be able to enter the library without being harassed by a group which is feeding division in the community.  

Country people are

different. No, not all of them of course but there is something which marks them out. There is something about people who come "from the bush", or from "out back".

I was, briefly, in the shopping centre yesterday. Coming back from the chemist I have to pass four clothes' shops. The first of these is rather expensive but there is usually a "sale" rack out the front. A blue cardigan caught my eye, not for me but for one of the residents of a local nursing home. She had asked me to keep an eye out for such a thing. If it was her size it might, if under a certain price, be something I could ask the manager to put aside for a day. (I know the manager for other reasons.) 

It was not her size and it was more expensive than I or L... would have been prepared to pay for it. The other woman looking at it shook her head as well. 

"Good wool is so expensive and we don't get much for it," she told me. 

Immediately I knew she was from the country. It wasn't just her words. They are common enough among the farmers or graziers in this country. The days when we "lived off the sheep's back" have long gone but we still grow some of the best wool in the world. No, there was just that "something" about her. The way she was dressed was smart enough but it was practical. Her hair style was practical. Her nails were short. Her skin was that of someone who has, while attempting to protect it, spent years outside.

I asked her where she was from, "A little place you have probably never heard of," she told me and named it.

"Just north of where I was born," I told her with a smile.

"Oh," she looked delighted and we went on chatting for a little while finding people she knew and who might have been there when I was a very small kitten. Some of the names were familiar.

Her daughter reappeared with her shopping and we laughed at the "coincidence". 

"We'll be down again for the Show," I was told.

"Come and find me in Handicrafts on the Wednesday and Saturday," I told them, "I'll give you a guided tour of the exhibits."

"Yes. I was going to put in some spinning but...things happened. It was so good to meet you."

Off they went with a smile and a wave. And yes, unlike a lot of other casual conversations of that nature, we might briefly meet again. This is what happens when people live in more remote places. Those apparently casual conversations mean more to people who might not see anyone apart from family for days on end. They make connections city dwellers cannot make in the same way. 

 

Too expensive? Price gouging?

The state's annual agricultural and horticultural "Show" is coming up at the beginning of next month. The ticket prices have just been announced. Yes, they have gone up. 

There have been wails of protest. People are saying it is "too expensive". Even the editorial in this morning's paper was saying this.

I looked at the prices. I then looked up the price of going to a football match - the AFL sort. I also thought back to the price of going to the much talked about "Taylor Swift" concerts. 

The Show is a once a year event. You can go early in the morning and stay until late in the evening. Along the way you can see all sorts of animals, farm produce, market garden produce, flowers, art, wine, honey, handicrafts, wood chopping, all sorts of other events in the arena (lots of horsey things if you like horses) and displays of all sorts. The police band plays and there are other free concert events for adults and children. There is an art display. Add to that there are side shows and rides and all sorts of businesses displaying their wares.  In the evening there is a fireworks display as well. (Yes, I hope it doesn't rain!)

If you pre-purchase your ticket it is actually cheaper to go to enter the Show for the day than it is to go to the footy for an afternoon. You can take your own food and drink to the Show if you don't want to buy anything there. You cannot do that at the footy. It is cheaper to do either of these things than go to that concert for a couple of hours.

The Show is run by a private not-for-profit charity. It relies heavily on the services of volunteers. Without them it would be much more expensive. It is also the premier event for the rural community. We need the farmers and other agricultural people. Awards there can boost business and that helps the entire state.

It was a little disconcerting to find the editorial complaining about the price rises. Yes, they were steep but the Showground lost money for the two years the event could not be run. Like every other organisation the RAHS has to pay taxes and wages for the permanent staff. Costs have risen.

It is still a cheap day out compared with that concert or the footy.  

"The Beatles are coming!"

I can remember hearing that a very long time ago now. I can remember the excitement of the person who told me. 

"Yes! It's going to be fantastic! Amazing! I've just got to go and see them!" 

We went in the school gates. Even the prefect on duty (checking hat, gloves, stockings) looked excited.

I was bewildered. I had found out who the Beatles were by then but we didn't listen to that sort of music at home. If my parents turned the wireless on - a rare occurrence apart from the news services - it was to listen to something entirely different. In the rural area I had been living in most students knew more about classical music because that was what the farmers played to the cows as they did the milking.

At the all girls high school in the city it seemed each girl had "my Beatle". They discussed them at recess and lunch times. They discussed ways of getting their parents to agree to them going to the concert and whether they would be able to skip school to go and line the streets from the airport when the Beatles arrived.

I don't think anyone in Intermediate A went to the concert. If they did they most certainly did not boast about doing it. The rest of the class would not have appreciated that. In the week before the Beatles landed there was a school assembly. I remember the Deputy Headmistress standing there and telling us that on the big day there would be a roll call for every lesson. Any girl who was not there had to have a medical certificate or a verifiable reason for absence that did not include lining the streets. 

The disappointment was palpable. I was still bewildered. It would never have occurred to me to skip school to go and stand on the side of the road and hope I might see these people. It was clear however that the other girls were very, very disappointed. There were a great many grumbles.

On the great day we were all at school. There was still a buzz of excitement. The girls had all decided they could go and stand outside the hotel these people were staying at. If they were lucky they might catch a brief glimpse of these people. There was a decided lack of concentration in classes.

And then we had a Latin lesson. The teacher was close to retirement age. She came in and put an alarm clock on the desk and set it going. "Now girls, when the alarm rings the plane will land. At that time we will stop work and you can tell me about these Beatles. Before that I expect you to work."

She was as good as her word. The last ten minutes of what should have been a Latin lesson was spent in the other girls telling her how "fabulous" the Beatles were. 

I don't think any other teachers did anything like that. If they did we didn't hear about it. We thought, as one of the girls put it, our Latin teacher was "pretty terrific".

Now we apparently have Paul McCartney coming to give a concert. I wonder how many of the girls I went to school with will remember that - and will they go to the concert?

Concussion in soccer

has barely rated a mention recently. How dare I even mention it when there is something called the "Women's World Cup" being played here and across the pond?

Regular readers of my witterings will know I managed to concuss myself some weeks back. As concussion goes it was not serious but I was very conscious of the after effects. Perhaps they were more noticeable in someone who just happens to have a very poor sense of balance at any time. Yes, I really noticed it. I am still not fully recovered all these weeks later. 

So how is it that people can play soccer and get concussion and go on playing? Now they may not go on playing immediately but they are often back on the field just a few days later. Is this really wise?

I tried to find some information before writing this because I had a brief conversation with two men I know last week about concussion in football - our sort of football, not the American sort. One of them said to me, "Concussion is more severe now than it was when the game started. It's because the players are bigger and stronger and faster. When they knock into each other it packs a real punch." Ugh!

I have never watched a football match or a soccer match. I have no desire to do either. Yes, I see snippets during the news services and on big screens in other places. Those snippets are enough to tell me I don't want to see any more. It doesn't excite me in any way. I wince each time two or three players collide with each other - and don't get me started on the way they start a rugby match! 

Apparently more than ten percent of serious injuries in soccer are concussion injuries among men and boys and about twenty percent of injuries among women and girls are concussion injuries. The statistics do not take into account the continual hitting of the head with the ball. Why the difference you ask? I suggest it has something to do with the fact that women are generally smaller and lighter than men who play the same sport. (If ever there was a reason to consider the issue of transgender people in sport surely this is it?) 

All this does not consider the damage that continued "heading" of the ball can do over many years. Who thought that one up? It's madness. No wonder Middle Cat didn't want her two playing such games on a regular basis. 

The two men and I briefly discussed this after one of them inquired as to whether I had "recovered". They are retired and they were enjoying a leisurely coffee after going to the gym. (Yes, they had drunk water as well.) Their "workouts" there are probably suited to their age and state of health. One of them still does some rowing. They both play golf about once a week. I imagine they are reasonably fit for their age. 

"I can tell you one thing we have never done Cat," one of them said. I looked at him and waited. "We have never done any boxing."

No. Boxing is absolute madness. There is no sport at all in a "game" designed to knock your opponent out. Who on earth would want to actually want to hit someone until they had a concussion?