Rainbow Coloured Broccoli

The ABC has gone to hell: ABC's priority is gossip over facts »

Prime Minister Julia Gillard held a press conference today (27/05/12) to explain the assistance that will start appearing from tomorrow in the bank accounts of Australians on low and middle incomes…

Nowhere in the ABC News online story covering the press conference does it mention the payments and the starting date, or incredibly what the press conference was even about. Instead it focused on the Prime Minister’s responses to questions on Chief Government Whip Joel Fitzgibbon’s alleged canvassing of support for Kevin Rudd. One would think the role of the media was to inform the public, however the ABC instead felt it was more in the public interest to engage in 600 words of leadership speculation.

…This is why we complain about the devolution of public discourse. Politicians can try to talk about policy rather than politics until their faces turn blue and the press will still turn it into a political discussion. We’re hearing about form over substance and that makes us think that there is no substance. If you asked people about the carbon price, most would talk about the politics of lies (form) and would know very little about how the policy works (substance). Is there a way to actually talk about policy in this political climate?

sprinkledwords:

Go Jenny!

But next election year I will probably get around to changing my address from my parents’ to where I now live in Batman. Martin Ferguson is undecided. Get on it Martin.

For what it’s worth, Martin Ferguson’s brother (Laurie Ferguson, who’s the federal MP for Werriwa) is in favour of marriage equality. I don’t know whether that implies anything about Martin Ferguson’s views, though.

I want this essay to go away now, ‘kay? I’ve got drafts of the other two assessments due next week and now I just want to rest. I want to be reading Game of Thrones, not writing an essay about it. Essays are stupid and make me want to cry.

(FYI, this is why I haven’t been posting this week. I have three assessments due between now and the end of Tuesday. I’m so ready for this session to be over so I can just go to sleep and not worry about uni.)

I’d vote for Penny Wong to be Prime Minister in a heartbeat.

I think there does need to be give and take on both sides, and this idea that sex is kind of a woman’s right to absolutely withhold, just as the idea that sex is a man’s right to demand I think they are both - they both need to be moderated, so to speak.

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Tony Abbott. Hey, rest of the world, did you know our next Prime Minister’s essentially a rapist? (via holyrattlesnakesbatman)

This is the sort of thing we really need to be talking about. I mean, he said this in 2009. It’s not like it was a million years ago and his opinions have changed—2009 is recent.

Here’s what the law in NSW says in relation to sex, consent and marriage:

61T Offender married to victim

The fact that a person is married to a person:

(a) upon whom an offence under section 61I [sexual assault], 61J [aggravated sexual assault], 61JA [aggravated sexual assault in company] or 61K [assault with intent to have sexual intercourse] is alleged to have been committed is no bar to the firstmentioned person being convicted of the offence, or

(b) upon whom an offence under any of those sections is alleged to have been attempted is no bar to the firstmentioned person being convicted of the attempt.

Basically—no, Tony Abbott, there isn’t give and take on both sides in relation to sex, even in a marriage. If a woman wants to withhold sex, that is absolutely her right. Her husband has no right to demand it—he can leave her, but he can’t do anything to force her to have sex with him. No absolutely means no. (And the same is true if the gender of either or both of the parties is flipped.)

I think it’s too strong to say that Abbott’s essentially a rapist (there’s nothing to suggest that he’s speaking personally). However, his views of gender dynamics in a marriage—that a man has a right to sex, that a woman shouldn’t have an absolute right to say no in whatever situation, that a woman can’t be the one who wants sex and can only do it to pleasure her husband—are incredibly problematic and play into a rape culture where women are seen as obliged to “give” sex to her partner. They play into a culture where women aren’t seen as being able to have the sexual agency to want sex for their own sakes, as opposed to putting up with it for the sake of their husbands. They play into a culture where no doesn’t mean no. And that’s really not acceptable when he seeks to be Prime Minister for all Australians.

Carr, Joyce accused by Slipper accuser »

I know that I’ve written before about the sexual harassment allegations against Peter Slipper and I’m not planning to go into the specifics of that again—but I think it’s important to say something about these comments by Bob Carr:

Ashby seems more rehearsed than a Kabuki actor.

That’s not acceptable. Even if—if—there were political motivations for the accusations in this case, there are so many genuine sexual harassment cases and it’s never okay to try to turn things on the victim. It’s never acceptable to put the victim on trial which is what Carr is doing. It’s also not acceptable to say that there are two sides to a case of harassment, as Barnaby Joyce did. In sexual harassment cases, the person who should be on trial is the perpetrator—in this case that’s Peter Slipper, not James Ashby.

It’s not acceptable because this isn’t happening in isolation. This is what happens to victims of sexual harassment (as well as victims of other crimes such as sexual assault and domestic violence) every day. This is why victims of sexual harassment often choose not to come forward. Both Bob Carr and Barnaby Joyce should know better—because the sorts of things they’re saying only give legitimacy to the others who will say exactly the same things in other cases. They have a position of power and should think about how they choose to use it.

I know what my family is worth

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Penny Wong, in response to Joe Hockey’s assertion that the best circumstance for a child is to have a mother and a father on QandA last night.

“When you say those things Joe, what you’re saying to me and people like me is that the most important thing in our lives – the people we love – is somehow less good, less valued.”

What a woman. (via mindheartandsol)

Australia is the world's 7th biggest polluter »

yeswecanberra:

Australia has been placed 7th on a list of the biggest polluters of 2012, rising from 2010. This is why the carbon tax is necessary. Australia is one of the world’s worst polluters and nothing is being done to remedy this.

Every country has the responsibility to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions if we’re to slow or stop the effects of climate change, and Australia is not wrong to lead the way.

Many other countries have praised Australia’s efforts to reduce it’s emissions and the government’s financial reimbursements (according to the latest Newspoll) have been accepted by households.

See, among all the talk of carbon pricing I somehow missed how high up Australia ranks in terms of pollution. We’re not a particularly big country in terms of population, but we’re the seventh biggest polluter in the world? That says a lot about our need to act on climate change.

holymotherofrowling:

when people complain about feeling the need to be “politically correct,” what they really always seem to be saying is “why can’t I be a total asshole and have no one get mad?”