Sunday 24 February 2013

The cultural desert

That Griffin Longley bloke sure hit the nail on the bloody head. No cultural density in Perth. Too bloody right.

Perth is almost as bad as those bloody European places. I mean, what a bloody shallow lot they are.

We were in Barcelona last year. What a bloody cultural backwater! Talk about same, same, bloody same. Fish soup, paella, ham, cheese. Not a bloody pie and sauce anywhere. All tiny little bars, tiny little snack foods, not a pie warmer in sight.  Lucky for us there was a KFC across the bloody road.

And the buildings! All the bloody same! Not a straight square box to be seem. Just this bloody twisty, turny, tiled rubbish. Like some bloody art gallery display.

We thought we'd take in a bit of culture. Could we find a decent bit of cultural diversity? A Slim Dusty cover band? No bloody way! All bloody guitars. Not even rock guitars. All bloody Spanish classical guitars. Bloody hell.

What do these bloody foreigners do for a bit of cultural density?! Have ta go to some bloody foreign place for a bit of a change, I bet. Come to bloody Perth, I reckon.

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Problems ? Solved

Sunday 17 February 2013

Senator sorts out iggerant savages

South Australian senator Nick Xenophon apparently doesn't have enough to do in Australia. Perhaps no-one bothers to listen to him when he's at home. He seems to think that he is big enough for the world stage.

How embarrassing.

Now he's been kicked out of Malaysia ("Deported MP due home", Brad Couch, The Sunday Times (WA), 17 Feb 2013).

Seems that Xenophon and a bunch of mates wrote a report. The report was "critical of gerrymanders" in the Malaysian electoral system. Nothing wrong with that. Everyone is entitled to an opinion. The opinion may well have been absolutely correct.

The report also "called for significant electoral reform." Xenophon was in Malaysia to push that view.

Senator -- it's not your country.

In Australia you can push for electoral reform as much as you like -- it's your own country.

You can push for voting only by landowners, or only by lunatics, or only by people whose name begins with X. You can demand electoral reform that does away with elections entirely. You can do all this in Australia -- because Australia is your country.

As a democracy, we reserve the right to politely ignore you.

And you can comment as much as you like, on the electoral gerrymanders of Malaysia. But you do not have the right to tell Malaysia that they should change their own laws.

Their country, their laws.

Come home to Australia and straighten out our own electoral laws. Set up a system so that every Australian is happy (ha ha). Then hold Australia up as an example.

Don't just prance into another country and tell the iggerant savages that they have to change... just because you don't like to see something different.

Make some effort to improve Australia. That's what you're paid to do. Look at other countries and learn, the lessons may be good or bad. You may even find that those foreigners are neither as iggerant nor as savage as you thought.

Come home and cause trouble in your own country. Other countries have enough problems of their own, without you and your embarrassing attempts to tell them what to do.


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Problems ? Solved