If you are to undergo a painful separation from a romantic or sexual partner, you will find yourself in no shortage of advice on how to deal with it. Much of this advice will be completely useless to you, but you'll certainly be able to find it. Friends will offer it, TV and movies will offer it, songs will offer it, lifestyle magazines will offer it by the ton. Getting over a break-up is hell, but you've always got options available as to how you go about it.
More importantly, it's accepted that you will go about it. When you break up, it's expected you'll undergo a period of sadness and misery and mood swings and over-eating. A mourning period is exactly what you're supposed to go through, and society will smile upon your emotional turmoil.
But there is no such formula when it comes to the platonic break-up: the break-up of a platonic relationship. What do you do to get over it when your friends dump you?
I seem to have become quite adept at shedding friends, much the same way as a snake sheds its skin, except snakes don't cry. Like, ever. They're really repressed.
Anyway, the point is in the past year or so I have lost a few friends. Not in the genuinely sad way, in the lame petty sense that they're not my friends anymore. I don't really know why they're not my friends anymore, because they didn't tell me.
And that's one of the issues. When you're sleeping with someone and they tell you that you can't sleep with them anymore, it's perfectly acceptable to demand an explanation. And they'll say "It's not you, it's me", or "We're just two very different people", or "Sex with my sister is one thing, but with my budgie?" You'll probably end up feeling like a total prick, but at least you'll know what it was that's driven them away.
Whereas in this case I feel like a total prick but remain unaware of just what variety of total prick I am. Look, I'm sure it was my fault. Believe me, I have no trouble imagining why someone might not want to be my friend - it's people who still do want to be my friend who persistently baffle me. But it's just that I wished I knew what it was that had caused the state of friendship to morph into the state of non-friendship. I might have suspicions, but it's impossible to know - I'm so obnoxious in so many different ways that it's difficult to determine which one they picked.
And the problem with being dumped by a friend is that you can't just ask them what went wrong. I mean, you can, but then you're kind of being a dick, right? I firmly believe nobody has an inherent right to friendship from anybody else, and if someone decides they'd rather not associate with someone, they're perfectly entitled to stop associating with that person, and they don't owe anyone any explanation.
So yeah, these friends of mine who aren't friends of mine anymore, they're well within their rights. There's no reason for them to tell me why, or let me beg them to take me back. Which I would never do, even though I want to.
All this is because breaking up with a friend isn't really "breaking up", is it? It's not really a thing. It's not a phenomenon that merits cultural recognition and respect. It's childish to even speak about it, really. When a friend stops being your friend, you're supposed to just dismiss it with a wave and cry, "Good riddance!" If you've lost a friend, they were never really your friend. You're better off without them. You'll be happier this way. And certainly, it's nothing at all like the agony of breaking up an actual relationship.
But oh lord.
It still hurts.
It shouldn't hurt, it's pathetic for it to hurt. But it does. Friendships are precious to me. I treasure them, even if by doing so I am deluding myself into believing the friendship is as important to the other party as it is to me. Friendships boost me, and sustain my self-esteem. Every friend I have I count myself fortunate for, and flatter myself over - if another human being likes me, I might be sort-of OK? This is what I tell myself.
And so, eventually they become fed up or bored or annoyed or whatever, and they ditch me, and fair enough. But that really bites deep - that flattering I mentioned gets turned on its head: if having someone desire friendship from me is evidence of my excellence, having someone cease their desire for that friendship is evidence of my failure as a human being. And obsessing over just what I did to put myself beyond the pale does not improve this state of mind.
So, I hurt, and I mourn, and I turn into a big fat sook. Well I turn into a sook, anyway: the big fat bit was already there am I right? High five!
But there's no routine, there's no procedure. There's no correct way to mourn over a broken friendship. You're not really supposed to mourn at all. It's a secret activity. I don't even know whether other people do it. But I do.
Every friendship I've screwed up, in whatever way, I mourn, Every friend I no longer have, I miss. And I apologise to the thin air they've left behind for the ways I wronged them.
And I just wish there was a way to do this properly. But then that's what blogs are for, right?
Tuesday, April 23, 2013
All Yay
Apparently I am a finalist in the Australian Writers' Centre Best Blogs 2013 Competition.
I know, right? How do these things happen?
Anyway this means I get a thing for my blog that looks like this:
Yay me! And yay you! We are all yay!
I know, right? How do these things happen?
Anyway this means I get a thing for my blog that looks like this:
Which is nice, yeah?
I think this means that some people think my blog is quite good. Good on you, some people, you are good eggs.
Also there's a People's Choice category in this competition, so you could go there and vote for me, if you really really wanted to.
Yay me! And yay you! We are all yay!
Saturday, April 20, 2013
It's Over!
Yes, today is the last day of the Melbourne International Comedy Festival. My own show, Let's Put On A Show, finished last weekend and won several major awards only for these results to be suppressed and hidden from the public due to certain dark government conspiracies. However, a good time was had by all, and some of the action from the run will be up on YouTube for you to watch soon, if you missed it live. The six shows which my audiences and I managed to put on were :
Vegemite in Your Ladyparts
How Seal Ate His Own Children (Featuring Colleen)
The Drunken Elephant's Triple Word Score
Captain Roderick van der Camp and the Domestic Violence Cat
The Despair of the Onion and the Happy Terrorist
Zombie Greg Ritchie Learns The Essential Futility Of The Modern Romantic Construct And Gets Shot
It was lots of fun and laughter was heard in Fitzroy. Read some reviews of the show if you'd like to know how it went:
What's On Comedy
Australian Stage
Five Frogs Blog
Herald Sun
That's done and dusted, then. Eyes peeled for my next show yeah?
Vegemite in Your Ladyparts
How Seal Ate His Own Children (Featuring Colleen)
The Drunken Elephant's Triple Word Score
Captain Roderick van der Camp and the Domestic Violence Cat
The Despair of the Onion and the Happy Terrorist
Zombie Greg Ritchie Learns The Essential Futility Of The Modern Romantic Construct And Gets Shot
It was lots of fun and laughter was heard in Fitzroy. Read some reviews of the show if you'd like to know how it went:
What's On Comedy
Australian Stage
Five Frogs Blog
Herald Sun
That's done and dusted, then. Eyes peeled for my next show yeah?
Monday, April 8, 2013
C'mon...you guys.
OH GOD I'M SO NERVOUS
Look, tonight my show, Let's Put On A Show, begins at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival, first night of a six-night run at Gertrude's Brown Couch in Fitzroy. You should come along, honestly. Tickets are here, but you can also just rock up and buy them at the door. And tonight is half-price! Only ten bucks! But even on the other nights it's pretty cheap, considering that going to see Stephen K. Amos will set you back over a thousand dollars, I'm pretty sure I heard somewhere.
And this is a show tried and tested at the 2012 Melbourne Fringe Festival, where with the help of my audience, I crafted seven different shows on seven different nights, those shows being:
Alan Jones Presents Comedy Dinosaur Gladiators
Sushi Lemonade Solar System Warriors
Mermaid To Order (a tail of the sea and collective bargaining)
Baby's Shitty Christmas Dinner
Moose Politics
So Much Penis In My Face
Barbarella and the Slit-Faced Woman Go Camping
Yes, every night of LPOAS is a DIFFERENT show! So you could come EVERY night and not get bored due to my clever improvisations and unpredictable temper.
I hope to see you there, we'll have a lot of fun. Don't believe me? Ask Mr WIL ANDERSON:
Don't believe HIM? Ask ME...and my KIDS!
Or perhaps STUTTER RAP can convince you!
I know right? Come to my show!
Look, tonight my show, Let's Put On A Show, begins at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival, first night of a six-night run at Gertrude's Brown Couch in Fitzroy. You should come along, honestly. Tickets are here, but you can also just rock up and buy them at the door. And tonight is half-price! Only ten bucks! But even on the other nights it's pretty cheap, considering that going to see Stephen K. Amos will set you back over a thousand dollars, I'm pretty sure I heard somewhere.
And this is a show tried and tested at the 2012 Melbourne Fringe Festival, where with the help of my audience, I crafted seven different shows on seven different nights, those shows being:
Alan Jones Presents Comedy Dinosaur Gladiators
Sushi Lemonade Solar System Warriors
Mermaid To Order (a tail of the sea and collective bargaining)
Baby's Shitty Christmas Dinner
Moose Politics
So Much Penis In My Face
Barbarella and the Slit-Faced Woman Go Camping
Yes, every night of LPOAS is a DIFFERENT show! So you could come EVERY night and not get bored due to my clever improvisations and unpredictable temper.
I hope to see you there, we'll have a lot of fun. Don't believe me? Ask Mr WIL ANDERSON:
Don't believe HIM? Ask ME...and my KIDS!
Or perhaps STUTTER RAP can convince you!
I know right? Come to my show!
Tuesday, April 2, 2013
A Bit of a Chat
One of the best things about this business is the people you meet. I recently got to have a nice friendly relaxed totally natural conversation with famous comedian Wil Anderson, just two guys chatting as equals about our art. And Wil was even nice enough to say some complimentary things about my upcoming Comedy Festival show, even though he was under no coercion or threats of physical violence or harassment whatsoever!
Monday, March 18, 2013
ABORTION! Now that I've got your attention: abortion
OK. Fine. Right. Abortion, yeah?
I don't really like writing or talking about abortion, because...well, who does? Anytime you express an opinion on abortion you're likely to get someone calling you a monster or a Nazi or demanding to know how YOU would feel if you'd been aborted, and then you have to give them a lesson about logic and it goes on and on forever.
But look I've been thinking about abortion, and much like a mushroom sprouting from soil, an opinion has burst out on top of my head, so feel free to pick it.
The reason I'm thinking about it is because it's in the news a bit lately. Tasmania has introduced a bill to finally decriminalise abortion, and there is a bit of speculation swirling regarding the fact that in Victoria, the Liberals rely on the vote of rabid pro-lifer and perks-enjoyer Geoff Shaw, and that if Tony Abbott becomes prime minister he may have to rely in the Senate on the DLP's pro-life, pro-insanity Senator John Madigan.
So it's a bit topical. And really, it's always topical, because there are always people who won't let go, and keep trying to wind the clock back.
But here is the thing: I feel like a lot of the arguments go in the wrong direction, and they tend to go in the wrong direction because the anti-abortion lobby knows just which buttons to push. I think there is a line of thought which is not used often enough, and this is important because to me the real battle to defend abortion rights isn't in trying to convince pro-lifers to change their stance, but in the big middle ground of "don't-knows", the people who maybe haven't put much thought into it, but are ripe for the convincing by a pious-looking politician with a sincere-sounding speech.
First, we have to recognise that "pro-lifers" fall into two broad categories: real pro-lifers and fake pro-lifers.
The real pro-lifers are a minority - most "pro-lifers" are faking it. Real pro-lifers are the people who genuinely believe conception is the beginning of, not just life, but personhood. They sincerely believe that a foetus is a person with all the concomitant human rights that you or I have, and that aborting a foetus is the same as killing an actual child. They really believe the rubbish they spout about "the rights of the unborn child", and they won't listen at all when you point out that this is an oxymoron and there is actually no such thing as an "unborn child", given a "child" is someone who has been born. They also won't listen if you tell them that abortion can't be "murder" because murder is by definition illegal. Basically they won't listen to anything, so it's pointless to even try with these people.
And that pointlessness is, in fact, the point. The REAL pro-lifers are batshit insane. These are the ones who end up bombing abortion clinics and shooting doctors, and why wouldn't they? If you heard that down the road there was a government-sanctioned facility where doctors were shooting five-year-olds in the head, wouldn't you say some pretty extreme measures were needed to stop this? Wouldn't you, even if you lacked the courage to directly attack the child-killers yourself, heartily applaud those who did? How could you look negatively upon someone who stepped in to prevent children being slaughtered?
Well, that's how real pro-lifers see it. They are insane, and therefore their insane actions seem perfectly reasonable. And so naturally, there's no point trying to reason with them. They're fringe lunatics: we don't need to argue with them, we need to ignore them.
But then there are the fake pro-lifers. These are the ones who claim to be concerned about "the rights of the unborn child", but when faced with what is purportedly a nightmarish holocaust of kid-slaughter, say things like "safe, legal and rare", or demand that Medicare funding be removed.
I mean, imagine! Imagine believing that children are being murdered, but wanting it to be "safe, legal and rare"! Imagine saying, "Child murder is OK, but don't use taxpayer's money on it"! Come on.
Look at the debate that flares sometimes over instances of rape or incest. If you genuinely believed that foetuses were people, how could you make exceptions for rape or incest victims? "I don't think we should kill children except when their father's a rapist - babies need to be punished for that!" Please.
But a rape-incest exception, in fact, betrays a fake pro-lifer for what they are: a woman-punisher. The reason many "pro-lifers" are willing to entertain exceptions is because those exceptions deal with women whose pregnancy is not their fault.
And there is the key. The vast majority of "pro-lifers" are frauds who are simply out to punish women for having sex. They don't care about the "unborn children", or else they'd be marching with burning torches in the streets, storming abortion clinics daily. They will say their concern is for the poor dead babies, but then they'll go ahead and push for measures that allow abortion, but make it more expensive and difficult for a woman to access. Or they'll push to make it illegal, but exempt those women who came by their condition through "no fault of their own".
It is quite clear what these people are about. They are about ensuring that women don't "get away with it". They are about ensuring that if a woman DOES have the irrepressible audacity to have sex, she damn well better suffer for it. Either through a pregnancy or making abortions so difficult, expensive or dangerous that it turns her life upside down. The important thing is that women are made aware that their sin will not go unpunished. The important thing is that women NEVER feel free to enjoy sex without the threat of dire consequences.
And so what I say is, let's call these fake pro-lifers out. Every time a politician or a commentator or an activist claims they want to stop the killing of unborn babies, let's point out just how hypocritical they're being. Let's point out that if all they're willing to do is talk about it, call for cuts to funding or reductions in the numbers, they surely cannot be serious about considering these to be actual children.
And let's make sure those in-betweeners who haven't made their minds up and are just now looking curiously at the issue realise that the "pro-lifers" they see in the papers and on TV are full of disingenuous and malicious cant, and that if you want to be a pro-lifer, you can either join the lunatics or the liars.
Call 'em out, guys. The only way to make sure women retain control over their own bodies, is to make sure the other side doesn't get away with pretending that's not the field we're fighting on.
I don't really like writing or talking about abortion, because...well, who does? Anytime you express an opinion on abortion you're likely to get someone calling you a monster or a Nazi or demanding to know how YOU would feel if you'd been aborted, and then you have to give them a lesson about logic and it goes on and on forever.
But look I've been thinking about abortion, and much like a mushroom sprouting from soil, an opinion has burst out on top of my head, so feel free to pick it.
The reason I'm thinking about it is because it's in the news a bit lately. Tasmania has introduced a bill to finally decriminalise abortion, and there is a bit of speculation swirling regarding the fact that in Victoria, the Liberals rely on the vote of rabid pro-lifer and perks-enjoyer Geoff Shaw, and that if Tony Abbott becomes prime minister he may have to rely in the Senate on the DLP's pro-life, pro-insanity Senator John Madigan.
So it's a bit topical. And really, it's always topical, because there are always people who won't let go, and keep trying to wind the clock back.
But here is the thing: I feel like a lot of the arguments go in the wrong direction, and they tend to go in the wrong direction because the anti-abortion lobby knows just which buttons to push. I think there is a line of thought which is not used often enough, and this is important because to me the real battle to defend abortion rights isn't in trying to convince pro-lifers to change their stance, but in the big middle ground of "don't-knows", the people who maybe haven't put much thought into it, but are ripe for the convincing by a pious-looking politician with a sincere-sounding speech.
First, we have to recognise that "pro-lifers" fall into two broad categories: real pro-lifers and fake pro-lifers.
The real pro-lifers are a minority - most "pro-lifers" are faking it. Real pro-lifers are the people who genuinely believe conception is the beginning of, not just life, but personhood. They sincerely believe that a foetus is a person with all the concomitant human rights that you or I have, and that aborting a foetus is the same as killing an actual child. They really believe the rubbish they spout about "the rights of the unborn child", and they won't listen at all when you point out that this is an oxymoron and there is actually no such thing as an "unborn child", given a "child" is someone who has been born. They also won't listen if you tell them that abortion can't be "murder" because murder is by definition illegal. Basically they won't listen to anything, so it's pointless to even try with these people.
And that pointlessness is, in fact, the point. The REAL pro-lifers are batshit insane. These are the ones who end up bombing abortion clinics and shooting doctors, and why wouldn't they? If you heard that down the road there was a government-sanctioned facility where doctors were shooting five-year-olds in the head, wouldn't you say some pretty extreme measures were needed to stop this? Wouldn't you, even if you lacked the courage to directly attack the child-killers yourself, heartily applaud those who did? How could you look negatively upon someone who stepped in to prevent children being slaughtered?
Well, that's how real pro-lifers see it. They are insane, and therefore their insane actions seem perfectly reasonable. And so naturally, there's no point trying to reason with them. They're fringe lunatics: we don't need to argue with them, we need to ignore them.
But then there are the fake pro-lifers. These are the ones who claim to be concerned about "the rights of the unborn child", but when faced with what is purportedly a nightmarish holocaust of kid-slaughter, say things like "safe, legal and rare", or demand that Medicare funding be removed.
I mean, imagine! Imagine believing that children are being murdered, but wanting it to be "safe, legal and rare"! Imagine saying, "Child murder is OK, but don't use taxpayer's money on it"! Come on.
Look at the debate that flares sometimes over instances of rape or incest. If you genuinely believed that foetuses were people, how could you make exceptions for rape or incest victims? "I don't think we should kill children except when their father's a rapist - babies need to be punished for that!" Please.
But a rape-incest exception, in fact, betrays a fake pro-lifer for what they are: a woman-punisher. The reason many "pro-lifers" are willing to entertain exceptions is because those exceptions deal with women whose pregnancy is not their fault.
And there is the key. The vast majority of "pro-lifers" are frauds who are simply out to punish women for having sex. They don't care about the "unborn children", or else they'd be marching with burning torches in the streets, storming abortion clinics daily. They will say their concern is for the poor dead babies, but then they'll go ahead and push for measures that allow abortion, but make it more expensive and difficult for a woman to access. Or they'll push to make it illegal, but exempt those women who came by their condition through "no fault of their own".
It is quite clear what these people are about. They are about ensuring that women don't "get away with it". They are about ensuring that if a woman DOES have the irrepressible audacity to have sex, she damn well better suffer for it. Either through a pregnancy or making abortions so difficult, expensive or dangerous that it turns her life upside down. The important thing is that women are made aware that their sin will not go unpunished. The important thing is that women NEVER feel free to enjoy sex without the threat of dire consequences.
And so what I say is, let's call these fake pro-lifers out. Every time a politician or a commentator or an activist claims they want to stop the killing of unborn babies, let's point out just how hypocritical they're being. Let's point out that if all they're willing to do is talk about it, call for cuts to funding or reductions in the numbers, they surely cannot be serious about considering these to be actual children.
And let's make sure those in-betweeners who haven't made their minds up and are just now looking curiously at the issue realise that the "pro-lifers" they see in the papers and on TV are full of disingenuous and malicious cant, and that if you want to be a pro-lifer, you can either join the lunatics or the liars.
Call 'em out, guys. The only way to make sure women retain control over their own bodies, is to make sure the other side doesn't get away with pretending that's not the field we're fighting on.
Monday, March 11, 2013
It's Time To Put On A Show!
And to tantalise your comedy-buds, check out this exclusive PROMO VIDEO, starring me and SPECIAL GUEST STARS Jonah, Kaia and Layla Pobjie! It demonstrates just how many hats I wear as a comedian.
Now go and buy some goddamn tickets!
Now go and buy some goddamn tickets!
Sunday, March 10, 2013
This Is Me
I like to count my blessings. I don't do it often enough, but I've been doing it more lately because I know what a good thing it is to do, to remind myself of what's fantastic about life.
And I have many blessings. My marvellous wife, my spectacular children, my adorable friends, the opportunity to get paid to write, and to have large numbers of people see my work. An absence of famine, war or violence from my life. The privilege of living as a thirtyish white man in a first world country. I am safe, well, and loved. Hell, my cup overfloweth.
I have a good life. I have a great life.
In fact, the only parts of my life that aren't good are the parts that are absolutely awful.
But those parts don't really count because they're not real. They're all in my head. They're my own weakness and stupidity overwhelming the logic centres of my brain. They're bullshit.
However, they do provide a fascinating (not really) insight into how a person can know their life is brilliant at the same time as they feel their life is unbearable.
But it's not real. Let me stress that. Let me stress in particular that I know it's not real. I already know.
Let me stress also that, as I mentioned above, I know how good my life is. I count my blessings.
This is relevant because when you talk about what's awful in your life, people tend to try to remind you of all the good things and try to scold you for not appreciating them, so it's useful to make it absolutely clear: yeah, I got that.
I got it. I got the good stuff. I got the blessings. I got what I need to be grateful for.
But there'll always be times when life remains awful, for one simple reason: I hate myself.
I've often heard it said that you can't love others until you love yourself. That sounds to me like crap, and I hope I'm right, because I like to think I love a great many people, but I could hardly hate myself more.
It may be that my overwhelming self-loathing is part of the bullshit I mentioned earlier. It may be it's all in my head. But I nevertheless know it to be true.
I know that I'm a failure. I know that I let my friends and family down every day. I know that I have wasted my time and my talent all my life. I know I'm ignorant, and lazy. I don't do enough, and I couldn't do enough if I wanted to because I lack the ability. I know I'll always have delusions that I can achieve beyond my grasp, and I know I'll be constantly disappointed when they're smashed time and again, and I know it won't stop me forming new ones and chasing after success like a pathetic dog running after a car.
I know I'm neglectful and callous. I know I treat people badly and that they deserve more from me, and I deserve less than I get from them. I know I disappoint people I love like it's going out of style and I know I have no idea how to maintain decent human relationships. I'm terrible in company and I'm useless alone. I unsettle people with my obnoxiousness and I disgust people with my desperation to be loved. I'll never have the love I want and I'll always have more than I deserve, if only out of pity, because if there's one thing I am worthy of, it's pity. No more so than the poor bastards caught up in my orbit though. Because I know I'm annoying, and insufferable, and destructive.
And I know I'm fat and I'm ugly and I'm flat-out disgusting. I feel sick every time I look in the mirror, and I know that's only fair because I'm repellent. And I know that this is mainly my own fault and I have brought my own revulsion upon myself through greed and laziness and lack of self-respect. And I know I won't change because I know I haven't got it in me. I know no matter how much I swear to improve myself, I'll fail. It's in my blood. I know I'll keep looking at the mirror, at that fat repulsive utterly unloveable creature, and feeling my stomach turn, till I go to the grave. I know every time I venture out I'm inflicting myself on the world, taking up too much room, getting in the way, turning off all I meet with my hideous size and unspeakable visage.
And I know most of all I deserve everything I get and more. I know when I look at myself I want to punch my face, hard and repeatedly, until I bleed, until I fall. I know when I think about myself I want to smash my head into a wall. I know every time I make a mistake, every time I let someone down, every time I make an unsuccessful pitch, every time I make a joke that doesn't get a laugh, every time I make a mess, every time I miss a day of work, every time I spill a drink, every time I forget to buy milk, every time I don't reply to an email...every single time I want to beat myself into unconsciousness.
And that's just what I want to do now, for my unmitigated narcissism in writing this. Because if there's anything worse than how much I hate myself, it's the burden I place on the world by insisting on sharing it with others. I'm very sorry.
I am, as Whitman said, large. I contain multitudes. I am smart and funny and dull and wise and foolish and arrogant and shy and loud and quiet and loving and kind and vicious and cold and sad and happy. But of all my shining facets, the biggest, the one that outshines all others, is self-loathing.
This is what it's like. Knowing you have a great life, and knowing it feels terrible. This is what it's like. Knowing you're a good person, and knowing you're a dreadful person.
This is what it's like.
When you say these things people tell you you're wrong, or that you need to snap out of it, or that you should adopt a more positive attitude. They tell you to count your blessings.
All of it's useless. I know I'm wrong, but I know I'm right. I don't want to be told anything. I just want to tell you - whoever "you" might be - that this is what it's like. Hating yourself.
Depression claimed me years ago, and it's made sure that my worst enemy is myself.
And I just want him gone.
And I have many blessings. My marvellous wife, my spectacular children, my adorable friends, the opportunity to get paid to write, and to have large numbers of people see my work. An absence of famine, war or violence from my life. The privilege of living as a thirtyish white man in a first world country. I am safe, well, and loved. Hell, my cup overfloweth.
I have a good life. I have a great life.
In fact, the only parts of my life that aren't good are the parts that are absolutely awful.
But those parts don't really count because they're not real. They're all in my head. They're my own weakness and stupidity overwhelming the logic centres of my brain. They're bullshit.
However, they do provide a fascinating (not really) insight into how a person can know their life is brilliant at the same time as they feel their life is unbearable.
But it's not real. Let me stress that. Let me stress in particular that I know it's not real. I already know.
Let me stress also that, as I mentioned above, I know how good my life is. I count my blessings.
This is relevant because when you talk about what's awful in your life, people tend to try to remind you of all the good things and try to scold you for not appreciating them, so it's useful to make it absolutely clear: yeah, I got that.
I got it. I got the good stuff. I got the blessings. I got what I need to be grateful for.
But there'll always be times when life remains awful, for one simple reason: I hate myself.
I've often heard it said that you can't love others until you love yourself. That sounds to me like crap, and I hope I'm right, because I like to think I love a great many people, but I could hardly hate myself more.
It may be that my overwhelming self-loathing is part of the bullshit I mentioned earlier. It may be it's all in my head. But I nevertheless know it to be true.
I know that I'm a failure. I know that I let my friends and family down every day. I know that I have wasted my time and my talent all my life. I know I'm ignorant, and lazy. I don't do enough, and I couldn't do enough if I wanted to because I lack the ability. I know I'll always have delusions that I can achieve beyond my grasp, and I know I'll be constantly disappointed when they're smashed time and again, and I know it won't stop me forming new ones and chasing after success like a pathetic dog running after a car.
I know I'm neglectful and callous. I know I treat people badly and that they deserve more from me, and I deserve less than I get from them. I know I disappoint people I love like it's going out of style and I know I have no idea how to maintain decent human relationships. I'm terrible in company and I'm useless alone. I unsettle people with my obnoxiousness and I disgust people with my desperation to be loved. I'll never have the love I want and I'll always have more than I deserve, if only out of pity, because if there's one thing I am worthy of, it's pity. No more so than the poor bastards caught up in my orbit though. Because I know I'm annoying, and insufferable, and destructive.
And I know I'm fat and I'm ugly and I'm flat-out disgusting. I feel sick every time I look in the mirror, and I know that's only fair because I'm repellent. And I know that this is mainly my own fault and I have brought my own revulsion upon myself through greed and laziness and lack of self-respect. And I know I won't change because I know I haven't got it in me. I know no matter how much I swear to improve myself, I'll fail. It's in my blood. I know I'll keep looking at the mirror, at that fat repulsive utterly unloveable creature, and feeling my stomach turn, till I go to the grave. I know every time I venture out I'm inflicting myself on the world, taking up too much room, getting in the way, turning off all I meet with my hideous size and unspeakable visage.
And I know most of all I deserve everything I get and more. I know when I look at myself I want to punch my face, hard and repeatedly, until I bleed, until I fall. I know when I think about myself I want to smash my head into a wall. I know every time I make a mistake, every time I let someone down, every time I make an unsuccessful pitch, every time I make a joke that doesn't get a laugh, every time I make a mess, every time I miss a day of work, every time I spill a drink, every time I forget to buy milk, every time I don't reply to an email...every single time I want to beat myself into unconsciousness.
And that's just what I want to do now, for my unmitigated narcissism in writing this. Because if there's anything worse than how much I hate myself, it's the burden I place on the world by insisting on sharing it with others. I'm very sorry.
I am, as Whitman said, large. I contain multitudes. I am smart and funny and dull and wise and foolish and arrogant and shy and loud and quiet and loving and kind and vicious and cold and sad and happy. But of all my shining facets, the biggest, the one that outshines all others, is self-loathing.
This is what it's like. Knowing you have a great life, and knowing it feels terrible. This is what it's like. Knowing you're a good person, and knowing you're a dreadful person.
This is what it's like.
When you say these things people tell you you're wrong, or that you need to snap out of it, or that you should adopt a more positive attitude. They tell you to count your blessings.
All of it's useless. I know I'm wrong, but I know I'm right. I don't want to be told anything. I just want to tell you - whoever "you" might be - that this is what it's like. Hating yourself.
Depression claimed me years ago, and it's made sure that my worst enemy is myself.
And I just want him gone.
Wednesday, February 27, 2013
Wednesday, February 20, 2013
A Giggle of Googs
"What are you doing, Ben?" I hear you whine nasally.
LET ME TELL YOU!
For TWO NIGHTS at the Adelaide Fringe this weekend, I'll be hosting Our Little Stories, a collection of masterful comics telling tales of various heights. Friday and Saturday, 10.45pm at Gluttony. That's right! I'm taking it ON THE ROAD. Interstate. Get into it, South Australian people, with all your eccentric half-hour time differencey ways. Tickets here.
THEN...Tuesday, February 26, I'm popping up at PUGGS IN SPACE, at Pugg Mahones, 106 Hardware St, Melbourne. The estimable Anne Edmonds is MCing, and besides me you'll see the legendary Geraldine Hickey, the radiant Adam Knox, and MORE. Kicks off at 8.30pm
And guys it's FREE! Say hello!
And oh my God it KEEPS ON COMING! March 5 I'll be getting distinctly wordy at BAR STANZA, at the Owl and the Pussycat, 34 Swan St, Richmond. I'll be getting back to my spoken-word roots as part of a killer line-up including Sean M. Whelan, Steve Smart, and host divine Anthony WP O' Sullivan! Can you even believe that? Doors open at 7.30pm, it's only $5, how can you lose?
You won't believe this, but there's STILL MORE. March 13! Comedy at 59! Station 59, at 59 Church St, Richmond! That's a lot of 59s! Stone-cold stand-up guys! It starts at 8! It's free! That means NO MONEY. Look it up, that's what it means!
And oh wow, the VERY NEXT NIGHT I am becoming extremely LITERARY and also CONVERSATIONAL, talking to the genius philosopher and author Damon Young about his book Philosophy in the Garden. This is ESSENTIAL for fans of THINKING and READING. It's at Readings Hawthorn - book here!
Oh no, we're not stopping yet you guys. Gonna be throwing some MORE POETRY at you, on April 6. Come down to the Dan O'Connell in Carlton at 2pm for an afternoon of words and raucous guffaws. Poetry at the Dan is a Melbourne institution, and I'll be your featured poet, leading you through the windmills of my mind. Get in there, sons and daughters!
But of course ALL of the above is a mere aperitif, for some VERY serious business - the business of the MELBOURNE INTERNATIONAL COMEDY FESTIVAL. It's a festival full of brilliant people doing brilliant stuff, and I promise you some of that brilliant stuff will be happening in darkest Fitzroy, in the sweet, warm surrounds of Gertrude's Brown Couch, where I shall be reprising my splendid little Fringe show, Let's Put On A Show. FOR SIX NIGHTS ONLY, it's bigger, it's better, it changes EVERY SINGLE NIGHT as I take my cue from what YOU want me to talk about, and we create an award-winning show together! If you missed it at the Fringe, don't miss it again! If you saw it at the Fringe, no two nights are the same, so come see it once more! In fact, why not see it SIX times more? That's right - come along to every show and win a fabulous prize probably! Information and tickets HERE, I would sincerely love to see you all there. Even you, Anonymous.
That's a LOT of gigs, guys, and a LOT of chance to see me, hear my mellifluous tones, and pry into the deeper recesses of my psyche. It's gonna be fun, my friends, I will see you there. And there. And there. And...
LET ME TELL YOU!
For TWO NIGHTS at the Adelaide Fringe this weekend, I'll be hosting Our Little Stories, a collection of masterful comics telling tales of various heights. Friday and Saturday, 10.45pm at Gluttony. That's right! I'm taking it ON THE ROAD. Interstate. Get into it, South Australian people, with all your eccentric half-hour time differencey ways. Tickets here.
THEN...Tuesday, February 26, I'm popping up at PUGGS IN SPACE, at Pugg Mahones, 106 Hardware St, Melbourne. The estimable Anne Edmonds is MCing, and besides me you'll see the legendary Geraldine Hickey, the radiant Adam Knox, and MORE. Kicks off at 8.30pm
And guys it's FREE! Say hello!
And oh my God it KEEPS ON COMING! March 5 I'll be getting distinctly wordy at BAR STANZA, at the Owl and the Pussycat, 34 Swan St, Richmond. I'll be getting back to my spoken-word roots as part of a killer line-up including Sean M. Whelan, Steve Smart, and host divine Anthony WP O' Sullivan! Can you even believe that? Doors open at 7.30pm, it's only $5, how can you lose?
You won't believe this, but there's STILL MORE. March 13! Comedy at 59! Station 59, at 59 Church St, Richmond! That's a lot of 59s! Stone-cold stand-up guys! It starts at 8! It's free! That means NO MONEY. Look it up, that's what it means!
And oh wow, the VERY NEXT NIGHT I am becoming extremely LITERARY and also CONVERSATIONAL, talking to the genius philosopher and author Damon Young about his book Philosophy in the Garden. This is ESSENTIAL for fans of THINKING and READING. It's at Readings Hawthorn - book here!
Oh no, we're not stopping yet you guys. Gonna be throwing some MORE POETRY at you, on April 6. Come down to the Dan O'Connell in Carlton at 2pm for an afternoon of words and raucous guffaws. Poetry at the Dan is a Melbourne institution, and I'll be your featured poet, leading you through the windmills of my mind. Get in there, sons and daughters!
But of course ALL of the above is a mere aperitif, for some VERY serious business - the business of the MELBOURNE INTERNATIONAL COMEDY FESTIVAL. It's a festival full of brilliant people doing brilliant stuff, and I promise you some of that brilliant stuff will be happening in darkest Fitzroy, in the sweet, warm surrounds of Gertrude's Brown Couch, where I shall be reprising my splendid little Fringe show, Let's Put On A Show. FOR SIX NIGHTS ONLY, it's bigger, it's better, it changes EVERY SINGLE NIGHT as I take my cue from what YOU want me to talk about, and we create an award-winning show together! If you missed it at the Fringe, don't miss it again! If you saw it at the Fringe, no two nights are the same, so come see it once more! In fact, why not see it SIX times more? That's right - come along to every show and win a fabulous prize probably! Information and tickets HERE, I would sincerely love to see you all there. Even you, Anonymous.
That's a LOT of gigs, guys, and a LOT of chance to see me, hear my mellifluous tones, and pry into the deeper recesses of my psyche. It's gonna be fun, my friends, I will see you there. And there. And there. And...
Saturday, February 16, 2013
None Like It Hot
Climate change is a serious issue, and it needs serious people to solve it. Is Bob Rumsden interested in solving it? No, Bob Rumsden is interested in only two things: making you afraid of it, and hot-air ballooning. Well I say the Australian people deserve more in a prime minister than a fictional American in a balloon. Australian people deserve a PRO-ACTIVE prime minister who will FIX climate change through the magic of community togetherness.
In my latest video I demonstrate, thus:
In my latest video I demonstrate, thus:
Thursday, February 14, 2013
MR BEN'S SEX QUIZ!!!!!
Hey there readers! Are you feeling loved up? Or are you wondering whether you're as spicy a fajita as you always thought you are?
Thank goodness there's an easily accessible Web 2.0 solution for anyone looking to ascertain whether they're an Enrique Iglesias or an Olive from On The Buses. And that solution is right below, in the form of my scientifically formulate SEX QUIZ for Lovers and Swingers. Just answer these simple multiple choice questions, and you'll quickly know whether you're HOT, or just sweaty.
1. On average, I have sex:
a) Once a week
b) Eight times a week
c) Less than three times a decade
d) Every few minutes
2. I believe the secret to great sex is:
a) A strong emotional connection
b) A powerful erotic odour emanating from the armpits
c) A willingness to experiment with borderline racist roleplaying
d) A stuffed marlin
3. I lost my virginity:
a) Before I was 18
b) After I was 40
c) In a refrigerated truck
d) To a Blakeney twin
4. The sexiest animal is:
a) The tiger
b) The wolf
c) The mosquito
d) The sea cucumber
5. Foreplay is:
a) Absolutely crucial
b) A complete waste of time
c) A kind of fish
d) An offence against God
6. How long should a penis be?
a) More than fifteen metres
b) Less than half an inch
c) Two and a half hours
d) It depends what kind of wood you're making it from
7. What is the most erotic dream you've ever had?
a) The one about Graham Kennedy and the ride-on mower
b) I'm being chased by angry ballerinas but their knees have faces
c) Will.i.am hiding under my bed softly reading Dr Seuss while I'm trying to sleep
d) The one where I find out my gynaecologist is an elk
8. How long does it usually take you to have an orgasm?
a) Less than a second
b) More than a second
c) At least until my sixteenth birthday
d) Between one and three Pirates of the Caribbean movies
9. What part should pornography play in a healthy relationship?
a) It should be banned
b) It can really bring people closer together and also you can have a wank
c) It can be useful, but better as a supplementary source of income rather than a full-time job
d) Ideally it should overwhelm every aspect of your life until you know nothing else
10. How many times have you had sex while doing this quiz?
a) Four
b) Five
c) Twelve
d) The sea cucumber
HOW TO INTERPRET YOUR RESULTS:
Mostly As: You are a sexually normal, healthy person, but you smell a bit and need to shower more.
Mostly Bs: You are probably gay, but refuse to admit it, even to yourself, but your wife suspects, because when you talk in your sleep you keep mentioning someone called "Declan", and it's tearing your marriage apart, but neither of you are willing to discuss it. It's pathetic.
Mostly Cs: You are a wanted fugitive. You mostly only have sex with wild grasses.
Mostly Ds: Your relationship is passionate and loving, but prone to outbursts of irrational rage and inexplicable itches at inconvenient times. You and your partner are both happy to experiment and be open about your fantasies and fetishes, but it will turn out shortly that your partner is imaginary. Sorry.
Thank goodness there's an easily accessible Web 2.0 solution for anyone looking to ascertain whether they're an Enrique Iglesias or an Olive from On The Buses. And that solution is right below, in the form of my scientifically formulate SEX QUIZ for Lovers and Swingers. Just answer these simple multiple choice questions, and you'll quickly know whether you're HOT, or just sweaty.
1. On average, I have sex:
a) Once a week
b) Eight times a week
c) Less than three times a decade
d) Every few minutes
2. I believe the secret to great sex is:
a) A strong emotional connection
b) A powerful erotic odour emanating from the armpits
c) A willingness to experiment with borderline racist roleplaying
d) A stuffed marlin
3. I lost my virginity:
a) Before I was 18
b) After I was 40
c) In a refrigerated truck
d) To a Blakeney twin
4. The sexiest animal is:
a) The tiger
b) The wolf
c) The mosquito
d) The sea cucumber
5. Foreplay is:
a) Absolutely crucial
b) A complete waste of time
c) A kind of fish
d) An offence against God
6. How long should a penis be?
a) More than fifteen metres
b) Less than half an inch
c) Two and a half hours
d) It depends what kind of wood you're making it from
7. What is the most erotic dream you've ever had?
a) The one about Graham Kennedy and the ride-on mower
b) I'm being chased by angry ballerinas but their knees have faces
c) Will.i.am hiding under my bed softly reading Dr Seuss while I'm trying to sleep
d) The one where I find out my gynaecologist is an elk
8. How long does it usually take you to have an orgasm?
a) Less than a second
b) More than a second
c) At least until my sixteenth birthday
d) Between one and three Pirates of the Caribbean movies
9. What part should pornography play in a healthy relationship?
a) It should be banned
b) It can really bring people closer together and also you can have a wank
c) It can be useful, but better as a supplementary source of income rather than a full-time job
d) Ideally it should overwhelm every aspect of your life until you know nothing else
10. How many times have you had sex while doing this quiz?
a) Four
b) Five
c) Twelve
d) The sea cucumber
HOW TO INTERPRET YOUR RESULTS:
Mostly As: You are a sexually normal, healthy person, but you smell a bit and need to shower more.
Mostly Bs: You are probably gay, but refuse to admit it, even to yourself, but your wife suspects, because when you talk in your sleep you keep mentioning someone called "Declan", and it's tearing your marriage apart, but neither of you are willing to discuss it. It's pathetic.
Mostly Cs: You are a wanted fugitive. You mostly only have sex with wild grasses.
Mostly Ds: Your relationship is passionate and loving, but prone to outbursts of irrational rage and inexplicable itches at inconvenient times. You and your partner are both happy to experiment and be open about your fantasies and fetishes, but it will turn out shortly that your partner is imaginary. Sorry.
Sunday, February 10, 2013
Let's Have It All
Remember when Freddie Mercury sang "I want it all"? It wasn't very good, was it? Killer Queen was a much better song. Luckily, though, Freddie Mercury wasn't a woman, or else he might have been "tying himself in knots" over the question of having it all, apparently, according to the Daily Telegraph which opened its interview piece with Julie Bishop with the assertion that this is what women do when considering the matter of all, re: having it.
OK, so first of all I am going to question the truth of this knot-tying claim. I know quite a few woman - in fact some of my best sisters are women - and I've never seen them tie themselves in knots. In fact I've never seen them tie anything in knots: is that weird? I wonder if they know how to tie knots. But I digress.
First of all, I want to see some cold hard figures on how much time women spend worrying about whether they can "have it all". In my experience, if there's one area in which women are a lot like men, it's in the area of not spending vast swathes of their lives fretting over what percentage of all they can have, instead choosing to get the fuck on with life. And if there's another area in which women are a lot like men, it's in almost every other area there is, so maybe we, as a species, can ease back the throttle on this wacky battle-of-the-sexes bullshit we've been punching ourselves in the face with for the last ten thousand years.
Secondly, tell me what "it all" means. Some have told me it means having a great career and a nice family and a good place to live and a bunch of nice stuff; in other words, "it all" just means "being happy". In which case, yeah I guess women CAN have it all. I think there are happy women out there.
But no, I don't think that's what it DOES mean, when someone in the so-called media refers to "having it all". Let's not spend too much time interrogating ourselves over the exact meaning of our idiom when we all have a basic shared understanding of what we're talking about.
Essentially, when we talk about women having it all, we're asking whether the mum who's waiting after school every day with a tray of cookies can be Julia Gillard, and whether Julia Gillard can be the cookie-mum. We're asking whether Gail Kelly can run a multi-billion dollar financial behemoth and still never miss her kids' soccer games. We're asking whether Nicole Kidman can win Oscars and be back from the ceremony in time for school drop-off.
We are asking, in essence, can a woman scale professional peaks without giving up their natural, Jesus-assigned roles as primary caregiver and lactating nurture-queen?
Or to put it perhaps more cynically, can a woman avoid our disapproval for abandoning her traditional role, while simultaneously absolving us of any blame for stopping us from living the life she wants to?
Can, in the end, a woman, so to speak, have, when you get right down to it, it all?
No.
Look I don't want to make you pull out your hair and throw yourselves into bonfires, but Julie Bishop is right. Women can't have it all.
Know why?
Because nobody can.
You know men? You've probably met some. They're those women who sweat more than usual, and for some reason never ask whether they can have it all. People often think men don't ask that because they already know they CAN have it all.
No.
Men don't ask whether they can have it all, because they already know they can't. Or at least they should. They probably don't because they're morons, but if they thought for a second they'd know I'm right. So, guys - think, OK?
Nicola Roxon recently announced she was quitting politics, because she didn't want to sacrifice time with her children for the sake of her career. She found it impossible to "have it all", so she had to make a choice: miss out on some of the benefits of parenting, or miss out on some of the benefits of politicking.
She didn't have to make that choice because she's a woman, she had to make that choice because she's a human being. Every man in politics makes that choice too. Yes, indeed - when a man decides to head to Canberra, he's deciding to absent himself from his family for big chunks of time, just as a woman is.
When a man decides to put in 16-hour working days to make his business grow, he's slicing those hours off the time he has to be with his kids, or off the time he has to HAVE kids, or a decent relationship, or any other trappings of domesticity he might want.
When I decide to write article after article and book after book, and go out to tell jokes to strangers, I'm choosing to pursue my career instead of play with my kids. And when I decide to turn down those opportunities because I want to play with my kids, I'm handicapping my career for the sake of my family. And when I decide to work three or more jobs at once, I'm desperately trying to strike the right balance so I can have a little bit of both worlds, instead of throwing in the towel on one front and storming full-bore at the other.
What I'm NOT doing is committing myself 100% to my career AND committing myself 100% to my family, because that would involve a denial of basic mathematics, and I would consider that a gesture of unforgivable rudeness towards the numerical community.
I can't have it all. You can't have it all. None of us can have it all. Our lives are about chasing happiness, not some insane regretless Shangri-La of personal fulfilment.
And that's why "can women have it all?" is a dumb question, based on a moronic premise and infused with the half-witted artificial gender divisions that have been making us miserable throughout history. And I object strongly to the question's existence in our public discourse, let alone the myriad attempts, both by those propping up their own vested interest in keeping the question current, and by those gullible enough to be fooled into believing it's in their own interests to keep trying to answer it. And here's why.
Firstly, as I briefly alluded to above, it's a question with an ulterior motive. The question is asked in order to position "having it all" as a desirable goal for a woman, and it positions it thusly to achieve the twin goals of making women feel ashamed if they don't behave the way a nice girl should, and to make society feel better about standing in the way of women with ambition. We're talling you that you SHOULD be trying to have it all, and so if you're a less-than-perfect mother, you've let us all down, lady; and at the same time if you're finding you can't make your way up the greasy pole, it was nothing to with us - we WANTED you to have it all.
So Julia Gillard and Julie Bishop are unnatural for not having kids, and Nicola Roxon just couldn't hack the pressure.
But here's the other side of that: as I said, nobody is asking whether men can have it all. It's assumed that a failure to achieve total contentment in every facet of life is a uniquely female problem. But as I also said, that is patently not true. Yet every time the subject comes up, it's only women who are apparently struggling with this.
And why is that? It's because it's assumed that it's easy for men to have it all, because it's assumed that men don't care about the things they have to give up. It's assumed there's no tension between family and career for a man, because family is something men don't care about. You're working non-stop and your kids are in bed by the time you get home every night? You're always away from home on business and only see your family a few days every month? Your wife is practically a single parent because you just can't afford to stop? As a MAN, that must be exactly what you want!
And so, we are told, men breezily go about having it all to their heart's content, because whatever bit of "all" they don't have won't matter to them. They'll leave the domestic guff to the ladies, because that's what "having it all" is to a man. The ladies, of course, won't be able to have it all, and shame on them.
If this situation is reversed, of course, the woman jetsetting off to a high-flying career while the man keeps the home fires burning, nobody's having it all. The woman was supposed to be able to do both, because of her magic vagina, and the man might as well have a vagina of his own if he's going to go about acting like a woman.
And there you have it. Women can't have it all because they're not good enough: men can have it all because they don't give a shit about their families.
And so know this, social commentators and cultural pundits, armchair philosophers and tabloid sexperts: every time you push the question "Can women have it all" out into the public consciousness, you're being sexist in two directions at once and letting us all, men and women, know that our hunch was right: we should all be hating ourselves as hard as possible all the time.
So for fuck's sake, you guys, stop doing it.
OK, so first of all I am going to question the truth of this knot-tying claim. I know quite a few woman - in fact some of my best sisters are women - and I've never seen them tie themselves in knots. In fact I've never seen them tie anything in knots: is that weird? I wonder if they know how to tie knots. But I digress.
First of all, I want to see some cold hard figures on how much time women spend worrying about whether they can "have it all". In my experience, if there's one area in which women are a lot like men, it's in the area of not spending vast swathes of their lives fretting over what percentage of all they can have, instead choosing to get the fuck on with life. And if there's another area in which women are a lot like men, it's in almost every other area there is, so maybe we, as a species, can ease back the throttle on this wacky battle-of-the-sexes bullshit we've been punching ourselves in the face with for the last ten thousand years.
Secondly, tell me what "it all" means. Some have told me it means having a great career and a nice family and a good place to live and a bunch of nice stuff; in other words, "it all" just means "being happy". In which case, yeah I guess women CAN have it all. I think there are happy women out there.
But no, I don't think that's what it DOES mean, when someone in the so-called media refers to "having it all". Let's not spend too much time interrogating ourselves over the exact meaning of our idiom when we all have a basic shared understanding of what we're talking about.
Essentially, when we talk about women having it all, we're asking whether the mum who's waiting after school every day with a tray of cookies can be Julia Gillard, and whether Julia Gillard can be the cookie-mum. We're asking whether Gail Kelly can run a multi-billion dollar financial behemoth and still never miss her kids' soccer games. We're asking whether Nicole Kidman can win Oscars and be back from the ceremony in time for school drop-off.
We are asking, in essence, can a woman scale professional peaks without giving up their natural, Jesus-assigned roles as primary caregiver and lactating nurture-queen?
Or to put it perhaps more cynically, can a woman avoid our disapproval for abandoning her traditional role, while simultaneously absolving us of any blame for stopping us from living the life she wants to?
Can, in the end, a woman, so to speak, have, when you get right down to it, it all?
No.
Look I don't want to make you pull out your hair and throw yourselves into bonfires, but Julie Bishop is right. Women can't have it all.
Know why?
Because nobody can.
You know men? You've probably met some. They're those women who sweat more than usual, and for some reason never ask whether they can have it all. People often think men don't ask that because they already know they CAN have it all.
No.
Men don't ask whether they can have it all, because they already know they can't. Or at least they should. They probably don't because they're morons, but if they thought for a second they'd know I'm right. So, guys - think, OK?
Nicola Roxon recently announced she was quitting politics, because she didn't want to sacrifice time with her children for the sake of her career. She found it impossible to "have it all", so she had to make a choice: miss out on some of the benefits of parenting, or miss out on some of the benefits of politicking.
She didn't have to make that choice because she's a woman, she had to make that choice because she's a human being. Every man in politics makes that choice too. Yes, indeed - when a man decides to head to Canberra, he's deciding to absent himself from his family for big chunks of time, just as a woman is.
When a man decides to put in 16-hour working days to make his business grow, he's slicing those hours off the time he has to be with his kids, or off the time he has to HAVE kids, or a decent relationship, or any other trappings of domesticity he might want.
When I decide to write article after article and book after book, and go out to tell jokes to strangers, I'm choosing to pursue my career instead of play with my kids. And when I decide to turn down those opportunities because I want to play with my kids, I'm handicapping my career for the sake of my family. And when I decide to work three or more jobs at once, I'm desperately trying to strike the right balance so I can have a little bit of both worlds, instead of throwing in the towel on one front and storming full-bore at the other.
What I'm NOT doing is committing myself 100% to my career AND committing myself 100% to my family, because that would involve a denial of basic mathematics, and I would consider that a gesture of unforgivable rudeness towards the numerical community.
I can't have it all. You can't have it all. None of us can have it all. Our lives are about chasing happiness, not some insane regretless Shangri-La of personal fulfilment.
And that's why "can women have it all?" is a dumb question, based on a moronic premise and infused with the half-witted artificial gender divisions that have been making us miserable throughout history. And I object strongly to the question's existence in our public discourse, let alone the myriad attempts, both by those propping up their own vested interest in keeping the question current, and by those gullible enough to be fooled into believing it's in their own interests to keep trying to answer it. And here's why.
Firstly, as I briefly alluded to above, it's a question with an ulterior motive. The question is asked in order to position "having it all" as a desirable goal for a woman, and it positions it thusly to achieve the twin goals of making women feel ashamed if they don't behave the way a nice girl should, and to make society feel better about standing in the way of women with ambition. We're talling you that you SHOULD be trying to have it all, and so if you're a less-than-perfect mother, you've let us all down, lady; and at the same time if you're finding you can't make your way up the greasy pole, it was nothing to with us - we WANTED you to have it all.
So Julia Gillard and Julie Bishop are unnatural for not having kids, and Nicola Roxon just couldn't hack the pressure.
But here's the other side of that: as I said, nobody is asking whether men can have it all. It's assumed that a failure to achieve total contentment in every facet of life is a uniquely female problem. But as I also said, that is patently not true. Yet every time the subject comes up, it's only women who are apparently struggling with this.
And why is that? It's because it's assumed that it's easy for men to have it all, because it's assumed that men don't care about the things they have to give up. It's assumed there's no tension between family and career for a man, because family is something men don't care about. You're working non-stop and your kids are in bed by the time you get home every night? You're always away from home on business and only see your family a few days every month? Your wife is practically a single parent because you just can't afford to stop? As a MAN, that must be exactly what you want!
And so, we are told, men breezily go about having it all to their heart's content, because whatever bit of "all" they don't have won't matter to them. They'll leave the domestic guff to the ladies, because that's what "having it all" is to a man. The ladies, of course, won't be able to have it all, and shame on them.
If this situation is reversed, of course, the woman jetsetting off to a high-flying career while the man keeps the home fires burning, nobody's having it all. The woman was supposed to be able to do both, because of her magic vagina, and the man might as well have a vagina of his own if he's going to go about acting like a woman.
And there you have it. Women can't have it all because they're not good enough: men can have it all because they don't give a shit about their families.
And so know this, social commentators and cultural pundits, armchair philosophers and tabloid sexperts: every time you push the question "Can women have it all" out into the public consciousness, you're being sexist in two directions at once and letting us all, men and women, know that our hunch was right: we should all be hating ourselves as hard as possible all the time.
So for fuck's sake, you guys, stop doing it.
Saturday, February 2, 2013
DEAR BERNARD
An open letter in response to Bernard Gaynor's open letter in response to Mia Freedman's open letter in response to Bernard Gaynor's tweet in response to the indoctrination of our children by homosexualists.
Dear Bernard,
I am writing this open letter because, as I am sure you know, open letters are how we get things done in this country. I myself am currently running for prime minister, and I can assure you that when elected I will be pursuing a very open-letter-heavy agenda.
As I was reading your letter to Mia Freedman, I couldn't help but notice that you are extremely stupid, and so I wondered if you had any advice for me as a parent. My children are still too young for any definitive conclusions to be made, but early testing indicates they are at risk of being stupid as well, so I was wondering whether you have any tips about how to live a fulfilling life as a stupid person: what sort of obstacles and prejudices have you faced, and what kind of strategies do you put in place to overcome your stupidity? I hear that meditation is good - do you meditate? Probably not because meditation is a bit gay, but maybe if we meditate about karate movies it would be all right.
Your views on homosexual teachers are quite interesting and merit further examination. Like you, I once went to a school and was shocked by the amount of penetrative sex that goes on in the average classroom. While I understand that there will always be times when curriculum requirements necessitate sexual intercourse between teachers and students, I, like you, am worried that if homosexuality is normalised, this sexual intercourse may cease being strictly heterosexual, as is traditional in Australian schools, and begin to be homosexual, which is a bit gross, isn't it? I read a book once about homosexual intercourse and I was shocked at the things those people do to each other. As Catholics, you and I know that some things should not be put inside other things. You wouldn't stuff a turkey with a ferret, would you? No.
But likewise, as a good Catholic I am sure you will agree there is no need to actually ban penetrative sex in classroom environments: we must be careful that the cure does not become worse than the disease, causing our children to grow up having no idea what sex with teachers feels like at all. We just need to find a way to stop our kids becoming "gay". By the way, did you know your name has "gay" in it? That's pretty funny isn't it? Did kids make fun of you at school and call you Gay Bernard? Or did they mainly make fun of you for being stupid? At my school we made fun of stupid kids mostly, but if we'd had a boy with "gay" in his name things might have been different.
Why does "gay" mean "homosexual" anyway? Wouldn't it better if we went back to "gay" meaning "happy", and came up with a new word for homosexuals, like "Demoncocks"? I would like to hear your thoughts on this. Maybe you could come over to my house and watch karate movies with me and we could talk about it. I promise not to let the evening progress beyond some light kissing.
Most of all I want to throw my support behind your desire to allow parents the right to decide who teaches their children. Personally I would like my children to be taught by boxing legend "Aussie Joe" Bugner, but as yet the Department of Education has been stypically stiff-necked and refuses to allow even an hour a week of Bugner lessons, let alone the full-time Aussie Joe curriculum that I would prefer. Bureaucracy, huh? It is very gay.
I'm not saying that you should also let your kids be taught by Aussie Joe, of course. I think that you should be allowed to select whichever former boxing great you like to teach your children. I hope you choose wisely, as I'd hate to see your children be hindered in their development any more than they already have been by the unfortunate circumstances of their birth.
I guess what I'm saying, Bernard, is keep up the good work. If you would like to get in touch with me, I have disconnected my telephone and deleted all my email accounts, as from now on I will be communicating only via open letters, but feel free to drop me an open letter any time, whether on your own site, on Mamamia, on The Punch, or on Aussie Joe Bugner's official fan club Facebook page. Explicit photos of yourself can, as always, be dropped in my home mailbox.
Yours in Christ,
Ben Pobjie (future prime minister)
Dear Bernard,
I am writing this open letter because, as I am sure you know, open letters are how we get things done in this country. I myself am currently running for prime minister, and I can assure you that when elected I will be pursuing a very open-letter-heavy agenda.
As I was reading your letter to Mia Freedman, I couldn't help but notice that you are extremely stupid, and so I wondered if you had any advice for me as a parent. My children are still too young for any definitive conclusions to be made, but early testing indicates they are at risk of being stupid as well, so I was wondering whether you have any tips about how to live a fulfilling life as a stupid person: what sort of obstacles and prejudices have you faced, and what kind of strategies do you put in place to overcome your stupidity? I hear that meditation is good - do you meditate? Probably not because meditation is a bit gay, but maybe if we meditate about karate movies it would be all right.
Your views on homosexual teachers are quite interesting and merit further examination. Like you, I once went to a school and was shocked by the amount of penetrative sex that goes on in the average classroom. While I understand that there will always be times when curriculum requirements necessitate sexual intercourse between teachers and students, I, like you, am worried that if homosexuality is normalised, this sexual intercourse may cease being strictly heterosexual, as is traditional in Australian schools, and begin to be homosexual, which is a bit gross, isn't it? I read a book once about homosexual intercourse and I was shocked at the things those people do to each other. As Catholics, you and I know that some things should not be put inside other things. You wouldn't stuff a turkey with a ferret, would you? No.
But likewise, as a good Catholic I am sure you will agree there is no need to actually ban penetrative sex in classroom environments: we must be careful that the cure does not become worse than the disease, causing our children to grow up having no idea what sex with teachers feels like at all. We just need to find a way to stop our kids becoming "gay". By the way, did you know your name has "gay" in it? That's pretty funny isn't it? Did kids make fun of you at school and call you Gay Bernard? Or did they mainly make fun of you for being stupid? At my school we made fun of stupid kids mostly, but if we'd had a boy with "gay" in his name things might have been different.
Why does "gay" mean "homosexual" anyway? Wouldn't it better if we went back to "gay" meaning "happy", and came up with a new word for homosexuals, like "Demoncocks"? I would like to hear your thoughts on this. Maybe you could come over to my house and watch karate movies with me and we could talk about it. I promise not to let the evening progress beyond some light kissing.
Most of all I want to throw my support behind your desire to allow parents the right to decide who teaches their children. Personally I would like my children to be taught by boxing legend "Aussie Joe" Bugner, but as yet the Department of Education has been stypically stiff-necked and refuses to allow even an hour a week of Bugner lessons, let alone the full-time Aussie Joe curriculum that I would prefer. Bureaucracy, huh? It is very gay.
I'm not saying that you should also let your kids be taught by Aussie Joe, of course. I think that you should be allowed to select whichever former boxing great you like to teach your children. I hope you choose wisely, as I'd hate to see your children be hindered in their development any more than they already have been by the unfortunate circumstances of their birth.
I guess what I'm saying, Bernard, is keep up the good work. If you would like to get in touch with me, I have disconnected my telephone and deleted all my email accounts, as from now on I will be communicating only via open letters, but feel free to drop me an open letter any time, whether on your own site, on Mamamia, on The Punch, or on Aussie Joe Bugner's official fan club Facebook page. Explicit photos of yourself can, as always, be dropped in my home mailbox.
Yours in Christ,
Ben Pobjie (future prime minister)
Thursday, January 31, 2013
THE TIME IS NOW
My fellow Australians,
An election has now been set down for September, and it is never more than at those moments when an election is set down for September that good-hearted patriots must turn their thoughts lightly to what they might DO for their country. A true patriot doesn't just THINK, he DOES, and today I can honestly say that I am ready to DO what it takes. The Australian people deserve ACTION, and that's what I deliver here now.
That is correct, today I announce my candidacy for the post of Australian Prime Minister.
As a patriot, I believe in this country. I believe in mateship, and outbacks, and the flag.
That's the Australian flag, and if a lifetime of Australian has taught me one thing, it's that a flag is not just a flag, it's a way of life. And it's my way of life, and if living the flag lifestyle is against the law these days then I guess just lock me up and call me Mr Jail.
Running for prime minister is not a decision I take lightly: every prime minister should take these decisions heavily, and if elected I promise my decisions will be twenty percent heavier than my opponents' at all times. The Australian people deserve heavy decisions, and as a politician I consider myself a slave to the Australian people. Chain me up Australian people, I am ready to work your plantations.
It's not just hollow rhetoric that causes me to say that mateship is my religion. The Australian people deserve more than hollow rhetoric, and I promise that if elected, I will give them more more-than-hollow rhetorics per day than any other politician in history. That's what mateship means to me, and the Australian people deserve mateship more than ever in today's modern world.
A great Australia doesn't just happen overnight. I promise not to make a great Australia happen overnight with the last breath in my body, and that's a promise you can take to the bank. But what you can't take to the bank is a bad economy, and that is why I promise to give the Australian people the economy they deserve which is not a bad one.
Under my prime ministership, the economy will be not only robust, but expansionary. The Australian people deserve economic security, and I promise that their security will be more economic than ever. The Australian people are sick of governments spending like drunken sailors, and that's why I am making a solid, rolled-gold, rigor mortis commitment to spending like sailors who have not drunk very much at all. The sailors I spend like will practise moderation, while enjoying a glass or two of red wine to unwind at the end of the day. The Australian people deserve heart-smart sailors, and there's no doubt that when the budget is in balance we'll enjoy our economy all the more. A strong economy is the foundation of a strong country, and I believe in a strong country which is this one.
That country is strong, and it's from our strength that we draw our power. The Australian people deserve strength, which is why as prime minister I will work out every day almost with weights and everything.
Part of being strong is industrial relations, and as an industrial relationist I promise that my prime ministership will be full of fairness. The Australian people deserve fairness, and fairness is more than anything the thing I will be fair about.
The environment is also important and I support it. The Australian people deserve an environment.
Why am I running now? I am running because I love my country. I love its men and its women and its animals and its grass and its trees. The Australian people deserve a prime minister who loves Australia. I promise to love Australia more than my opponents and I promise to show this love in several ways.
I am committed to loving Australia even more than I love other countries. I love things like kangaroos and Tasmanian tigers and vegemite jandals, and I have made a full and firm commitment to keep loving everything about Australia until I die and even afterwards if my brain is intact and can be put into a machine that breathes and things. The Australian people deserve my love now more than ever, especially with the internet transforming our modern world into a terrifying wasteland. The Australian people deserve a world-class terrifying wasteland and it is that wasteland that I promise to love more and more every day.
Australia is about families, and as prime minister I promise to have a family more than any prime minister before myself. The Australian people deserve families, and I have the power to grant that through my grace and commitment. The Australian people deserve my grace and commitment and to hell with anyone who says otherwise. As prime minister I will never say otherwise.
My fellow Australians, it is time to get this country moving forward again. As a freedom-loving plutocratist, I believe in forward movement, and I believe that the Australian people deserve a country that moves forward. Never again will our country have to move backward due to a weak economy or rabbit plagues. The Australian people deserve sustainable rabbit populations, and on my first day in office I will sustainabilise every rabbit in this great sunburnt country. The Australian people deserve sustainable sunburns.
Over the coming months and weeks I look forward to sharing with you more of the vision for our future that we deserve as we move forward and not sideways or up. The Australian people deserve a country that moves only on one axis. My fellow Australians, the fightback starts HERE.
Thanks, you all.
An election has now been set down for September, and it is never more than at those moments when an election is set down for September that good-hearted patriots must turn their thoughts lightly to what they might DO for their country. A true patriot doesn't just THINK, he DOES, and today I can honestly say that I am ready to DO what it takes. The Australian people deserve ACTION, and that's what I deliver here now.
That is correct, today I announce my candidacy for the post of Australian Prime Minister.
As a patriot, I believe in this country. I believe in mateship, and outbacks, and the flag.
That's the Australian flag, and if a lifetime of Australian has taught me one thing, it's that a flag is not just a flag, it's a way of life. And it's my way of life, and if living the flag lifestyle is against the law these days then I guess just lock me up and call me Mr Jail.
Running for prime minister is not a decision I take lightly: every prime minister should take these decisions heavily, and if elected I promise my decisions will be twenty percent heavier than my opponents' at all times. The Australian people deserve heavy decisions, and as a politician I consider myself a slave to the Australian people. Chain me up Australian people, I am ready to work your plantations.
It's not just hollow rhetoric that causes me to say that mateship is my religion. The Australian people deserve more than hollow rhetoric, and I promise that if elected, I will give them more more-than-hollow rhetorics per day than any other politician in history. That's what mateship means to me, and the Australian people deserve mateship more than ever in today's modern world.
A great Australia doesn't just happen overnight. I promise not to make a great Australia happen overnight with the last breath in my body, and that's a promise you can take to the bank. But what you can't take to the bank is a bad economy, and that is why I promise to give the Australian people the economy they deserve which is not a bad one.
Under my prime ministership, the economy will be not only robust, but expansionary. The Australian people deserve economic security, and I promise that their security will be more economic than ever. The Australian people are sick of governments spending like drunken sailors, and that's why I am making a solid, rolled-gold, rigor mortis commitment to spending like sailors who have not drunk very much at all. The sailors I spend like will practise moderation, while enjoying a glass or two of red wine to unwind at the end of the day. The Australian people deserve heart-smart sailors, and there's no doubt that when the budget is in balance we'll enjoy our economy all the more. A strong economy is the foundation of a strong country, and I believe in a strong country which is this one.
That country is strong, and it's from our strength that we draw our power. The Australian people deserve strength, which is why as prime minister I will work out every day almost with weights and everything.
Part of being strong is industrial relations, and as an industrial relationist I promise that my prime ministership will be full of fairness. The Australian people deserve fairness, and fairness is more than anything the thing I will be fair about.
The environment is also important and I support it. The Australian people deserve an environment.
Why am I running now? I am running because I love my country. I love its men and its women and its animals and its grass and its trees. The Australian people deserve a prime minister who loves Australia. I promise to love Australia more than my opponents and I promise to show this love in several ways.
I am committed to loving Australia even more than I love other countries. I love things like kangaroos and Tasmanian tigers and vegemite jandals, and I have made a full and firm commitment to keep loving everything about Australia until I die and even afterwards if my brain is intact and can be put into a machine that breathes and things. The Australian people deserve my love now more than ever, especially with the internet transforming our modern world into a terrifying wasteland. The Australian people deserve a world-class terrifying wasteland and it is that wasteland that I promise to love more and more every day.
Australia is about families, and as prime minister I promise to have a family more than any prime minister before myself. The Australian people deserve families, and I have the power to grant that through my grace and commitment. The Australian people deserve my grace and commitment and to hell with anyone who says otherwise. As prime minister I will never say otherwise.
My fellow Australians, it is time to get this country moving forward again. As a freedom-loving plutocratist, I believe in forward movement, and I believe that the Australian people deserve a country that moves forward. Never again will our country have to move backward due to a weak economy or rabbit plagues. The Australian people deserve sustainable rabbit populations, and on my first day in office I will sustainabilise every rabbit in this great sunburnt country. The Australian people deserve sustainable sunburns.
Over the coming months and weeks I look forward to sharing with you more of the vision for our future that we deserve as we move forward and not sideways or up. The Australian people deserve a country that moves only on one axis. My fellow Australians, the fightback starts HERE.
Thanks, you all.
Saturday, January 26, 2013
Guerrilla Halal!
Some bigots refuse to eat meat that has been turned towards Mecca and blessed. Ben Pobjie has some bad news for them: you never know where or when the Halal Guerillas will strike.
Check out all our other stuff at http://www.gatheraround.me
Check out all our other stuff at http://www.gatheraround.me
Tuesday, January 22, 2013
Have you ever wondered...
...what breastfeeding is all about?
WONDER NO MORE, as Gather Around Me expands its empire into the world of VIDEO!
WONDER NO MORE, as Gather Around Me expands its empire into the world of VIDEO!
Sunday, January 20, 2013
25 MORE SIGNS YOU ARE A WRITER
One of the things I worry about the most while writing is the question of whether I actually am a writer. "Am I?" I ask myself, frettingly biting my nails. "If only I knew the signs to look out for!"
So what a piece of luck that I found this helpful article to let me know the little signs that indicate whether someone is a writer or not. For example:
Ha! Isn't that priceless. "Fuel crisis"! Oh my yes, we writers certainly do like to procrastinate, don't we?
Or this classic:
Oh mercy! Pop culture, eh?
Or how about this:
Now this is just adorable. And so true, too - every writer knows that it is impossible to finish writing something, until you do. Life is hard, for writers. Yet also cute and whimsical.
But those 25 signs, as irresistibly truthful and hilarious as they are, just aren't enough, you know? There are so many other ways to decide whether you're a writer or not, even if you don't have an erotic fixation with typewriters or waste all your money on awful tattoos. And so to provide further help to my brothers and sisters in words, and to pay tribute to "Nico Lang", I've come up with my
So what a piece of luck that I found this helpful article to let me know the little signs that indicate whether someone is a writer or not. For example:
6. When you hear the words “I’m on deadline,” you immediately burst into action, a Pavlovian response to a) always having something due and b) always being behind on it. You’re certain that if they were able to make your procrastination into an energy source, it will solve our nation’s fuel crisis. Or at least make gas cheaper.
Ha! Isn't that priceless. "Fuel crisis"! Oh my yes, we writers certainly do like to procrastinate, don't we?
Or this classic:
11. You have really weird dreams about writing or your favorite writers — like that you suddenly have a great idea for a story but then your computer eats you or that you’re best friends with Emily Dickinson — which, truth be told, is a little boring. Agoraphobes aren’t great partiers. You also dreamt that you were the manager of a Bronte sisters girl group. Charlotte was the Beyonce, Emily was the Kelly and Anne was the Michelle, the one everyone forgets about.
Oh mercy! Pop culture, eh?
Or how about this:
23. You never stop writing something after you’re done with it, which makes publishing difficult. Eventually you just put a gun to your head and say, “Screw it, I’m done with this.” (Which is how Obama must feel every day.) You’ll later come up with the perfect ending for that piece — a month after publishing it.
Now this is just adorable. And so true, too - every writer knows that it is impossible to finish writing something, until you do. Life is hard, for writers. Yet also cute and whimsical.
But those 25 signs, as irresistibly truthful and hilarious as they are, just aren't enough, you know? There are so many other ways to decide whether you're a writer or not, even if you don't have an erotic fixation with typewriters or waste all your money on awful tattoos. And so to provide further help to my brothers and sisters in words, and to pay tribute to "Nico Lang", I've come up with my
25 MORE SIGNS YOU'RE A WRITER
1. You are, essentially, better than other people.
2. Not only do you carry a pen everywhere, but you constantly hallucinate that there are pens that aren't actually there, and frequently startle passersby with your loud cries of "Ho! Pens!"
3. You are an alcoholic.
4. You write inspirational-yet-incomprehensible slogans on pieces of cardboard like "failure is the first step towards the second step" or "all writing is rewriting" and stick them up on your walls so you can look at them and get a warm glow while you read a magazine profile on Nikki Gemmell.
5. You tell people that you just let the characters take you where they want you to go and don't notice that this makes you sound insane.
6. You literally eat ink.
7. You dress up as your favourite characters from literary history and appear uninvited at strangers' parties bellowing their most memorable lines (see point 3).
8. You slowly begin to metamorphose into a book.
9. You kidnap your editor's children and threaten to slaughter them if they delete a single word from your piece. You do this every week and everyone is used to it by now.
10. You eventually find your typewriter too modern and begin carving all your work into massive stone tablets, which you hurl out your window in a fit of despair after realising you'll never be as great a writer as Kathy Lette.
11. Your name is JK Rowling.
12. When you hear the words "I'm on deadline", you immediately bite whoever said it on the leg, a Pavlovian response to the fact that you used to bite people on the leg pretty often.
13. You have a tattoo of the face of your favourite writer covering your entire face, so you can impersonate them.
14. You often sit in cafes holding a pen against your cheek with a thoughtful-yet-cute expression on your darling little face.
15. You occasionally write something.
16. You are morbidly obese and unable to leave your bed, communicating by hurling Doritos in meaningful patterns on the carpet.
17. You have become firmly convinced that you are a Canadian goose and accuse everyone you meet of stealing your eggs, and I don't know you write a story about this or something maybe.
18. You have an almost insatiable desire to commit acts of violence upon members of your immediate family.
19. You have lost control of your bowels.
20. You keep complaining that sport gets more funding than the arts and so you have no friends.
21. You plan to make everyone pay someday.
22. You own more than fifty high-powered assault weapons.
23. Your muscles have atrophied from lack of use and there is a spider living in your mouth.
24. You can't stop writing lists of signs that you are a writer to reassure yourself that your entire life is not a futile sham concocted by your self-delusive brain in order to avoid facing reality in any way whatsoever.
25. You have just been arrested for molesting a horse.
Wednesday, January 9, 2013
A True Larrykin
If there is one thing I love, it's a larrikin. Know what I mean? A good old-fashioned, mischievous, good-humoured, larrikinish larrikin, the kind of larrikin that made Australia what it is today: i.e. a country full of larrikins.
The trouble, of course, is that although this country is full of larrikins, we are ruled over by a bunch of decided non-larrikins. Our politicians are all so soft and wishy-washy and feminised they wouldn't know larrikinism if it jumped up and shoved a sugar glider down their pants.
Our media is decidedly non-larrikinish too. Michelle Grattan is a poor excuse for a larrikin. And with the best will in the world, I think you'd have to concede that Ross Gittins is very far from being the intellectual heir of famed SCG wag "Yabba" Gascoigne. In fact, the entire press gallery is not the intellectual heir of famed SCG wag "Yabba" Gascoigne, and it seems a bit of a shame that the media watchdog is so obsessed with so-called "cash for comment", and never gives the slightest thought to redressing the lack of "Yabba"-resemblers in our media landscape.
However, we need not immerse ourselves entirely in gloom, because there is one man willing to stand up for tradition and patriotism and not-climate change left in our great nation, and that man is Larry Pickering.
Pickering has been one of our greatest larrikins for decades, of course, his larrikinish cartoons bringing joy to millions and keeping alive the larrikin flame that has been burning bright since Gallipoli, when the Anzacs staved off the horrors of war with cheeky japes and drawings of Billy Hughes's cock.
It is in that tradition that Pickering continues to hold the "stuffed shirts" to account on his website, and in particular in brave, truthful-yet-larrikiny pieces like this one, in which he exposes the monstrous threat to our democracy that is Anne Summers and her radical femo-socialist agenda, finally pricking that balloon of man-hating, excessive body hair and mandatory lesbianism that has been hovering over the great southern land ever since Paul Keating rammed through legislation that allowed women to exit buildings.
In the best larrikin tradition, of course, Pickering is not a vindictive man. He is slow to anger, but sharp as a tack and full of boisterous and wittily logical argumentation when roused, and this was no exception. As he writes:
See how he first demonstrates how he is the bigger man - he had not even heard of Summers, because he has better things to do, like defending our democracy. He emphasises how far above the pettiness of the world by indicating that he doesn't even care how Summers's name is spelt. This is a good sign of a lofty mind.
But then we get to the nub: the reason why any man of good conscience would speak up at this point: Summers accused Larry Pickering of being responsible for Jill Meagher's death.
What's worse, she did it "somewhere": if there is anything worse than a woman who calls an innocent man a murderer, it is a woman who calls an innocent man a murderer in an indeterminate and ill-defined location. Luckily, I've sleuthed a tad and found out exactly what Summers said in this disgraceful smear. Her words are as follows (be warned it is fairly strong stuff):
I'm sorry I had to put that on the blog, but you had to know how depraved "radical womanhood" (god Pickering has a way with words) can get. Look at that paragraph. "It was a beautiful sight" she writes. "Most Australians are decent honourable people". "I just saw television footage".
VOMIT.
We know what you're saying. You can couch in separatist anarchist neo-Greerist psychobabble all you like, Ann(e), but when you write "disgusted", we can read between the lines: you are saying that Larry Pickering murdered Jill Meagher. We're onto you. What a revolting accusation.
But all good larrikins know how to make freedom-lemonade out of feminazi lemons, and Pickering does so by taking the opportunity to expose the misandry and harridanism at the heart of public life. Having gone to notorious communo-hotbed "The Drum", a website run by the ABC Politburo, Pickering found more of Summers's "work". Like any red-blooded larrikin, Pickering "couldn't bring myself to read it closely", and who could blame him? But reading things is unnecessary to identify radical agendas - indeed it can be counterproductive. The important thing is that in his article he draws, with uncanny plausibility, a direct line between Summers, her big fans Christine Milne and Lee "Uncle Joe" Rhiannon, the plummeting value of Whitehaven Coal shares, Tanya Plibersek's husband-fronted drug operation, child sex, drink-driving, fraud, and prunes. It's a vast conspiracy and it takes a journalistic mind of remarkable acuity to pull it all together so neatly, but that's what Pickering has done, and it's a relief to us all I'm sure that he's manning the parapets as Castle Australia is assaulted by this army of green red pink warmenist homosexual vagina-owning orcs.
And it's those aforementioned prunes, the ones clogging up Summers's reproductive tract, that as Pickering notes, are the whole problem, as they have led to this she-beast breathing fire all over our constitutional rights and causing us to not only have to stand an "elected" prime minister with ill-fitting jackets, but also enabled the violent, financial and sexual crimes of the modern Australian Labor Party. Thanks a lot Anne, you armpit-hair-encouraging, child-molester-enabling, economy-destroying, lipstick-flaunting "writer". You have wrecked Australia and now we may as well live in Afghanistan, if it's not already infested by all the feminists which Larry Pickering's blog commenters wish to send there.
So all power to you, Larry Pickering. You are not only a savvy journalist and a masterful artist, you are a patriot, a freedom fighter, and most improtantly, a larrikin of rare note. Don't listen to those who wish to silence you, who wish to repress the truth. Don't listen when they tag you "sexist" or "misogynist" or "racist" or "insane" or "a bankrupt serial conman" or "a sad old derelict sniggering at his own dick-pictures" or "a rambling maniac who can't even concentrate on one thing for the five minutes it would take to compose a coherent blog post".
Don't listen to any of them, Larry. We TRUE Aussies know what you are, and we salute you for it. As your loyal reader "gungit" notes:
"Why is it all the ugly woman are so prejudiced?"
Exactly. EXACTLY.
The trouble, of course, is that although this country is full of larrikins, we are ruled over by a bunch of decided non-larrikins. Our politicians are all so soft and wishy-washy and feminised they wouldn't know larrikinism if it jumped up and shoved a sugar glider down their pants.
Our media is decidedly non-larrikinish too. Michelle Grattan is a poor excuse for a larrikin. And with the best will in the world, I think you'd have to concede that Ross Gittins is very far from being the intellectual heir of famed SCG wag "Yabba" Gascoigne. In fact, the entire press gallery is not the intellectual heir of famed SCG wag "Yabba" Gascoigne, and it seems a bit of a shame that the media watchdog is so obsessed with so-called "cash for comment", and never gives the slightest thought to redressing the lack of "Yabba"-resemblers in our media landscape.
However, we need not immerse ourselves entirely in gloom, because there is one man willing to stand up for tradition and patriotism and not-climate change left in our great nation, and that man is Larry Pickering.
Pickering has been one of our greatest larrikins for decades, of course, his larrikinish cartoons bringing joy to millions and keeping alive the larrikin flame that has been burning bright since Gallipoli, when the Anzacs staved off the horrors of war with cheeky japes and drawings of Billy Hughes's cock.
It is in that tradition that Pickering continues to hold the "stuffed shirts" to account on his website, and in particular in brave, truthful-yet-larrikiny pieces like this one, in which he exposes the monstrous threat to our democracy that is Anne Summers and her radical femo-socialist agenda, finally pricking that balloon of man-hating, excessive body hair and mandatory lesbianism that has been hovering over the great southern land ever since Paul Keating rammed through legislation that allowed women to exit buildings.
In the best larrikin tradition, of course, Pickering is not a vindictive man. He is slow to anger, but sharp as a tack and full of boisterous and wittily logical argumentation when roused, and this was no exception. As he writes:
I had never heard of a person called Ann Summers (not sure Ann is with or without an "e" and I couldn't care less really) until she said somewhere that my scribblings were responsible for Jill Meagher's murder.
See how he first demonstrates how he is the bigger man - he had not even heard of Summers, because he has better things to do, like defending our democracy. He emphasises how far above the pettiness of the world by indicating that he doesn't even care how Summers's name is spelt. This is a good sign of a lofty mind.
But then we get to the nub: the reason why any man of good conscience would speak up at this point: Summers accused Larry Pickering of being responsible for Jill Meagher's death.
What's worse, she did it "somewhere": if there is anything worse than a woman who calls an innocent man a murderer, it is a woman who calls an innocent man a murderer in an indeterminate and ill-defined location. Luckily, I've sleuthed a tad and found out exactly what Summers said in this disgraceful smear. Her words are as follows (be warned it is fairly strong stuff):
I just saw television footage of thousands of people walking in a peace march along Sydney Road past Hope Street to honour the memory of Jill Meagher. It was a beautiful sight and a powerful reminder that for all the Alan Joneses of this world, most Australians are decent honourable people who are disgusted by this culture of vilification and violence.
I'm sorry I had to put that on the blog, but you had to know how depraved "radical womanhood" (god Pickering has a way with words) can get. Look at that paragraph. "It was a beautiful sight" she writes. "Most Australians are decent honourable people". "I just saw television footage".
VOMIT.
We know what you're saying. You can couch in separatist anarchist neo-Greerist psychobabble all you like, Ann(e), but when you write "disgusted", we can read between the lines: you are saying that Larry Pickering murdered Jill Meagher. We're onto you. What a revolting accusation.
But all good larrikins know how to make freedom-lemonade out of feminazi lemons, and Pickering does so by taking the opportunity to expose the misandry and harridanism at the heart of public life. Having gone to notorious communo-hotbed "The Drum", a website run by the ABC Politburo, Pickering found more of Summers's "work". Like any red-blooded larrikin, Pickering "couldn't bring myself to read it closely", and who could blame him? But reading things is unnecessary to identify radical agendas - indeed it can be counterproductive. The important thing is that in his article he draws, with uncanny plausibility, a direct line between Summers, her big fans Christine Milne and Lee "Uncle Joe" Rhiannon, the plummeting value of Whitehaven Coal shares, Tanya Plibersek's husband-fronted drug operation, child sex, drink-driving, fraud, and prunes. It's a vast conspiracy and it takes a journalistic mind of remarkable acuity to pull it all together so neatly, but that's what Pickering has done, and it's a relief to us all I'm sure that he's manning the parapets as Castle Australia is assaulted by this army of green red pink warmenist homosexual vagina-owning orcs.
And it's those aforementioned prunes, the ones clogging up Summers's reproductive tract, that as Pickering notes, are the whole problem, as they have led to this she-beast breathing fire all over our constitutional rights and causing us to not only have to stand an "elected" prime minister with ill-fitting jackets, but also enabled the violent, financial and sexual crimes of the modern Australian Labor Party. Thanks a lot Anne, you armpit-hair-encouraging, child-molester-enabling, economy-destroying, lipstick-flaunting "writer". You have wrecked Australia and now we may as well live in Afghanistan, if it's not already infested by all the feminists which Larry Pickering's blog commenters wish to send there.
So all power to you, Larry Pickering. You are not only a savvy journalist and a masterful artist, you are a patriot, a freedom fighter, and most improtantly, a larrikin of rare note. Don't listen to those who wish to silence you, who wish to repress the truth. Don't listen when they tag you "sexist" or "misogynist" or "racist" or "insane" or "a bankrupt serial conman" or "a sad old derelict sniggering at his own dick-pictures" or "a rambling maniac who can't even concentrate on one thing for the five minutes it would take to compose a coherent blog post".
Don't listen to any of them, Larry. We TRUE Aussies know what you are, and we salute you for it. As your loyal reader "gungit" notes:
"Why is it all the ugly woman are so prejudiced?"
Exactly. EXACTLY.
Thursday, January 3, 2013
A low down dirty shame
OK so I need to talk about this comic, which I found through the @EverydaySexism twitter account. Have a look, we'll continue below.
So, this roused great emotions within me, not because the behaviour depicted in the comic is horrible, awful, heinous behaviour. I mean, it IS, but that fact isn't what gets me going.
What gets me going is that apparently this actually happens.
Seriously - it doesn't just happen in comics. I know women, and I hear women tell stories, and situations like the one in the comic happen. In real life.
Isn't that insane? I mean, I know that stuff like this happens, but most of the time I don't think about it, and whenever I do think about it, I feel like I've just found out that Die Hard is based on a true story.
Because that...that is just not the way human beings behave. Is it? Obviously it is. Obviously there are a bunch of actual, human, grown adult male people who go around shouting obscenities at women they don't even know.
And I can't fathom that. My mind's gears loudly grind when it tries to process this thought.
Because here's the thing: I'm not a very good guy. On any objective scale, I am a weak-willed, cowardly, thoughtless, selfish, greedy, lazy, uninteresting, socially inept man. This I know. This, I think, is not a secret.
But there is one thing I can say in my favour: it has never occurred to me to shout "show us your tits" at a woman in public. It has never occurred to me to call a woman I don't know a slut because she doesn't enjoy the experience of being sexually harassed. It has never occurred to me to make sexual advances to a stranger at all, let alone one who is simply passing by exhibiting no signs of wishing to be subjected to loud, braying comments upon her physical appearance. Whatever such signs may look like: I don't really know.
And when I say it has never occurred to me, I don't mean that I look at women in the street and make a considered decision not to yell at them. I mean the thought that this might actually be a course of action open to me has never even entered my head. I've never had to make this decision, because I have never, in my entire life, found myself in a situation where I've thought, hmm, maybe I could shout "Nice boobs!" at that lady.
Never. Not once has this happened. Never have I had to weigh the advisability of acting like the men in that comic, because never has my mind even entertained the possibility that I could. Thinking about whether I should harass women on the street is basically in the same category, for me, as thinking about whether I should travel across the Pacific standing upright on the wing of a 737: it's just not an option. The reason I've never had to make a decision about shouting "Show us your tits" is the same reason I've never had to make a decision about eating a live rhinoceros.
And that's why I don't get it: how can these men actually be behaving this way? How can human minds actually not only contain the outright ludicrous concept of publicly bellowing sexually aggressive inanities at someone you've never met, but go on to decide that acting on the thought would be a good expenditure of time and breath?
How? How can this happen in real life?
And yet it does happen in real life, and it's a disgrace. A disgrace for many reasons, but most of all, for this: these men make me look good.
As mentioned before, I'm not much of a man. I am, essentially, lame. But compared to these guys - who seem to be quite numerous - I appear to be some kind of patron saint of sensitive modern masculinity. They are making me look fantastic in contrast to themselves. It therefore becomes possible for me to give myself big ups, to portray myself as a really sensationally nice guy, simply by behaving at a sort of base level of civilised human decency. I'm not really being nice, I'm just being barely ordinary and maintaining a fairly unexceptional belief that the people around me are human beings irrespective of what kind of fleshy lumps their body might be sporting. But when I see other men behaving in the manner detailed above, I feel like I'm actually a pretty nice guy.
The fact is, these guys are giving me a good name. And that is just plain wrong.
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