Why I hate Australian Rules

I hate AFL. I don't watch it, I'm not interested. 

One of the reasons I hate AFL is because it celebrates people like Jason Akermanis.  His article in today's Herald Sun made me want to smash my computer. 

How is it that this person, and people like him (I'm looking at you Sam Newman) have a public voice where they can spout their archaic, homophobic, misogynistic bullshit and the public lap it up like the archaic, homophobic, misogynistic lemmings that they are?

People like Jason Akermanis shouldn't have a public voice - because their opinions can't be backed up with anything even slightly tangible. Here is a supposedly heterosexual man  spouting some half-cocked idea about how he thinks gay people should lead their lives. He's not gay, he's not a psychologist, he's not a sociology major, he's not an expert in sexual health or in suicide prevention - he's a footballer, and that is all. He has no place to publicly comment on the issue of homosexuality in sport. He has no place commenting on anything other than football - the actual game - not whatever does or doesn't happen in the locker room.

Everyone has a right to their own opinion and everyone's opinions are more frequently heard thanks to new media. But Jason Akermanis' opinion is broadcast on commercial radio and printed in commercial newspapers. This gives him 'voice of God' status - meaning that to some people, his opinions are seen as fact. It also means that in the public sphere, other people who think his opinions are fantastic can stand up, pump their fist in the air and say "Yeah! I'm a homophobic asshole too and I say NO gays in sport!" - and they can feel that they are completely justified in saying this, because JASON AKERMANIS thinks so.

I've been trying to write this for a while now, but due to the fact that I am furious, disappointed and ... furious ... it is very difficult to be as articulate as I'd like to be. 

Jason Akermanis is a scared little man. Scared that a gay teammate might glance at him in the shower and he might feel a twinge in his nether regions - which would obviously make him gay. Scared that a group of people he has spent his life assuming were beneath him might actually stand up for themselves against him and people like him and prove that they collectively have more talent, intellect, guts and masculinity than he has in his little finger (or any other *little* appendage he might be compensating for).

I know that not all AFL players are idiots. This article by Adam Gooodes in The Age is excellent. Unlike Akermanis, Goodes actually can talk about Indigenous players because he actually has some experience being one.

I don't care how much Akermanis tries to defend his comments with "I don't hate the gays, some of my best friends are gay" type comments - he is a stupid little man with idiotic opinions that he should keep to himself. 

A fantastic response here from Jack Marx and Ian Roberts speaking on 2UE here. 

Here is the Western Bulldog's official response and I particularly like the photo advocate.com have chosen for their story.

The AFL Footy Show is, as I type, very formally backing away from Akermanis' comments - although Sam Newman's lisping pronunciation of 'homosexual' makes it quite clear what position he takes (- missionary, one would assume).

I want to hear informed, educated opinion from people who know what they're talking about - unfortunately the voices that we hear in Australian mainstream, commercial media are more often than not uneducated, uninformed, bigoted and downright idiotic. 

I'm off to watch Christopher Hitchens on Lateline. Thank Dog for Tony Jones. 

What Century is This?

There have been a few news items lately with a running theme - indulge me for a moment while I wax lyrical. 

First there was the Tony Abbott faux pas re his opinion of his daughters 'gift' giving. Many reactions to the story, including mine, have wondered at the archaic idea that a woman's sexuality should be either repressed, or traded as a commodity.  Many, many more though have called Tony "brave" for talking about an issue that is supposedly avoided by male public figures and defended his right to have an opinion about his daughter's sex life.

Then there was the banker-turned-meme David Kiely who was sprung ogling naked pictures of Miranda Kerr in the background of a live cross on the channel 7 news. Kiely became a hero overnight. The David Kiely Facebook group has almost 2000 fans. The video has been watched more than a million times on Youtube and comments on the News Ltd sites are very much in support of the "unlucky" banker. Yes, men look at pictures of naked women. Yes, banking is probably not the most exiting job in the world. But the reaction to the story irks me to say the least. Whichever way you look at it, he was objectifying women - and he has been made a hero as a result.

I wonder what the public reaction would have been had the live cross been to a government department and the employee was looking at naked pictures of Jenna Jameson (supposedly the world's most famous porn star)? I put it to you that there would have been outrage at the "tax payers dollar being wasted" and that the images would have been labeled as "smut" or "porn". But as long as he's wasting someone elses money (and who doesn't hate banks?) and as long as it's "Our Miranda" then go right ahead buddy! It would be unAustralian to punish him.

Then I saw this story about the recent bomb attack on a Darwin insurance company. It alleges that the reason there was no footage of the attack is that the CCTV cameras were disabled due to investigations into misuse by the NT police. Supposedly there had been one or more officers using the cameras to "perv" (sic) on schoolgirls.

And finally back to Tony Abbott who has put his foot in his mouth again today by referring to "the housewives of Australia" doing their ironing - like the good little wifeys they are. As I've said in a previous post, I don't expect much more from Abbott, but an article in today's The Age reports a strong gain by Abbott in opinion polls. Seemingly he is growing on the Australian public.

So let's see. We have a society it seems that glorifies men objectifying women. Where a police officer thinks it's acceptable behavior to use CCTV cameras to sexualise young girls. Where looking at naked women in a corporate workplace is excused as a form of National Pride. Where a man who could one day (I can barely even type the sentence) lead the nation thinks women should be at home ironing shirts, cooking roast dinners and making themselves pretty for when hubby comes home to receive his "gift".

Rapid technological development and globalisation has moved sexualised images of women from behind the counter at the drug store to our television screens, our street corners, our soft drink bottles, our car windows, our buses - basically everywhere you look. Feminism has become a dirty word to young women who aspire to a cameo on Girls Gone Wild and a new advertising target group called "Tween" has been invented so that big companies can make squillions of dollars selling 12-year-olds bondage wear.

I'm not saying that a woman's sexuality should be shut up behind closed doors or that David Kiely is the devil - it's not necessarily what he did that bothers me, it's the public reaction. Women are used as objects to sell products. How can they be taken seriously? When Julia Gillard was made Deputy Prime Minister it was her hair and outfit choices that were scrutinised, not her political comments.

What I'm trying to say is that I'm disappointed. I'm disappointed that the extraordinary power of new media to give the 'common man' a voice has shoved a microphone into the face of a public that has evolved very little over the last century in its opinion of women and their place in society.    

Devine Intervention for Abbott

The Sydney Morning Herald columnist Miranda Devine today has a piece about Tony Abbott's female supporters. She suggests that he is, in fact, beloved by the 'normal' female population, it's just a small proportion of women who find him to be a misogynist bible-bashing ignoramus - she describes these women as;

... the aggressively secular, paleo-feminist, emasculating Australian broad, for whom unabashed red-blooded blokeishness is an affront of biblical proportions.

Really? Biblical proportions? Well she would know about that - being the staunch conservative that she is. But it's the next paragraph that I particularly like;

They are unrepresentative of women, and disproportionately influential, because they either work in the media or politics or have high-profile, heavily networked careers which mean they are quoted in the media, and their opinions sought after.

Why do I like it? Because she's clearly picking a fight with loud and proud feminist and atheist, writer for The Age, Catherine Deveny. I would really like to see these two women have a war of words (or fisticuffs, whichever's easier).

Tony Abbott is a dinosaur. His archaic Christian ideas about women, abortion, divorce and climate change are so far removed from the mainstream mindset that he makes Andrew Bolt look like a reasonable fellow.

I'm waiting patiently for Ms Deveny to put Lady Devine in her place ... please? 

Mr and Mrs Edelsten

Unless you've been living in a cave you will have heard about the abomination that is the Goeffrey Edelsten and Brynne Gordon wedding. Supposedly it was the "social event of the year" for Melbourne - suggesting that the rest of the year must have been filled entirely with letter openings and high-school formals.

The Herald Sun has a front page pic above the banner today and the write-up made page 5. The Age put some pics on the back page in the Melbourne Life section and the commercial news programs are obviously having a field day with it.

So who the hell cares if some old gheezer with loads of cash marries his "work in progress" little lady in a lavish affair at the Crown casino? Few people had even heard of Mr Edelsten before the Brownlow ceremony this year, and those that had wished they could forget. And no one would ever have heard of Brynne Gordon if she hadn't stumbled across a horny old man and decided that sleeping with him was worth the millions of dollars he'd leave to her when he kicked the bucket in the not-too-distant-future.

Am I being nasty? Oh, they're getting their guests to give money to charity in lieu of gifts you say? Well going by the B-grade celeb guest list I'm not sure they'll be making anywhere near the 3 million it cost them to put on the bourgeois affair. I doubt that ex-Big-Brother-contestants and Neighbours stars will be emptying their pockets for charity - the donation basket was probably filled with autographed, glossy 8x10s rather than $100 bills.

When events like this become news I'm reminded of something a lecturer told me once; If all of the world were annihilated and just one newspaper/news program was recovered by aliens, what would they think of us as a human race?

An even more scary thought occured to me after seeing the new "disaster film to end all disaster films" 2010 - if you haven't seen it, there are ships that have been built to survive the end of the world and a ticket on the ship costs 1 billion dollars. It's scary because it's people like Mr and Mrs Edelsten that would be boarding that Contiki World-End Tour and *shudder* re-populating the world.

You want more evidence that the Edelsten couple should de-throne Bec and Lleyton Hewitt as King and Queen of the Bogans on the brilliant Things Bogans Like blog? Geoff is planning on opening a luxury "nip/tuck clinic" in ... wait for it ... Caroline Springs.

There, I said it. Bogans. Grade-A, sell-their-mother-for-a-bundy-and-coke Bogans. Should Bogans not celebrate their nuptuals in any way they please? I hear you ask. Well, yes, I suppose they can - but I DON'T WANT TO HEAR ABOUT IT AND IT ISN'T NEWS.

Enough. Now what's all this about a shit-fight in the Liberal Party and Tony Abbott wearing rocket-poppers?

(My apologies in advance for that last link - do not open if you have a weak stomach.)

Myf's Coming up Roses

Myf Warhurst has been writing a great column for The Age on Fridays. Correct me if I'm wrong though, but I have noticed a theme.

Myf is a wonderfully down-to-earth woman who is much more attractive than the majority of mindless bimbos we see in the media today - but she seems to be consistently writing columns steeped in self-loathing.

On October 9 she talked about celebrity food-critic and author Matt Preston insinuating that she was 'dumpy' by naming a cravat after her and describing it as "short and slightly wide". The first few sentences were heartbreaking;

I've had a few challenging moments this year. I got sacked from my job on commercial radio, nominated by a tabloid paper as worst dressed at the Logies, yelled at by a 12-year-old at the footy, "Hey, you're that fat slut from the telly", and told by a comedian that "a treadmill's not gonna save you, luv". He wasn't joking either. As you can imagine, my confidence hasn't been at an all-time high.

In her October 15 column she talked about baring all for art where she berated herself for being stupid enough to think getting naked in public wouldn't come back to bite her on the bum - so to speak.

Last weeks column was a lovely piece about becoming a crazy old cat-lady and today's describes her constant inadequacy when dressing for the races. Again, she has sold herself well short;

Hats look great on others but I feel stupid in them and they look stupid on me. We have nothing in common.
The compromise was a hair band decorated with what looked like peacock-coloured chook feathers. My intention was old world glamour. The result? More like dead pigeon stapled to a tiara.

The cravat column received 87 comments on the National Times website - the majority of which were reassuring Myf that she was, in actual fact, a deadset fox.

There's something so honest in Myf's telling tales of self-doubt. Few women could say that they're happy with the way they look - their weight, height, bra size or eye-colour. Not many would be happy to share those feelings with the world.

Good on her for being brave but hopefully future columns will see her shine like the star she is. She has certainly had some knocks this year as she stated, but I'm tired of the self-deprecating Myf - I want the confident, self-assured Myf back.

Fev's Big Night Out

Carlton footballer Brendan Fevola has been suspended from channel 9's The Footy Show grand final special and fined $10,000 by the AFL after his 'drunken antics' at the Brownlow Medal count on Monday.

The Herald Sun gave a blow by blow account of his entire night here.

I think The Age columnist and Triple J presenter Marieke Hardy might have hit the nail on the head though with this Twitter update;
As Media Watch reported on Monday night, Sam Newman made racial slurs on The Footy Show (September 17th), first against a Malaysian man, and later, tennis star Serena Williams.

Host, Jonathan Holmes stated;

In a week when another ugly attack on Indian students has again put the international spotlight on racism in Australia, surely we can do without garbage like that?

I'm not saying that being a rude, drunken idiot is acceptable behavior but I wonder if Newman will be suspended from the grand final special?

2Day FM - what price?

The Kyle and Jackie O breakfast show this morning hooked a 14-year-old girl up to a lie detector test and let her mother ask her questions about school, drugs and sex. The girl admitted on air (in some of the most excruciating radio ever heard) that she had been raped at the age of 12. Whilst Kyle's idiotic response was "Right ... And is that the only experience you have had?", Jackie O did try to save face with the offer of counseling and by quickly pulling the plug on the segment.

The segment can be heard here (without names).

Commercial radio is well known for its 'do anything, try anything' approach to win the ratings - Judith Lucy wrote an excellent article a few years ago for The Age about her short stint on Today FM in Sydney and the ludicrous ideas thrown around for competitions and segments;

The idea was 'celebrity sperm' and the concept was that you would get a celebrity to donate their sperm (the example they used was Guy Sebastian, because we all know how much self-proclaimed virgins like chucking their semen around), and the woman who won the competition would get to impregnate herself. I am not making this up.

The thing is, this child is not being properly cared for by her parent/guardian. Her mother stated on air that the girl had not received counseling and that the mother herself only became aware of the 'incident' a few months ago - this also insinuates that the alleged rape had not been reported and that there has so far been no follow up.

What kind of mother signs a disclaimer to hook her daughter up to a lie detector and talk about sex and drugs on the radio? What kind of radio station pays money - and surely there was money involved - to a woman of clearly low intelligence who has an obvious dysfunctional relationship with her child to basically fight with her daughter on air?

It all comes down to the issue of popular culture and the lower classes. The only people (besides self-obsessed egomaniacs) willing to lose their dignity on television or radio are low income earners or people who can't fully understand the consequences of their actions. Look at Big Brother - the house was basically full of bogans and half-wits, the people we see on Today Tonight and A Current Affair are always from low socio-economic areas - and therefore more willing to 'sell their story' for a quick buck.

So here we have a bogan mother selling her 14-year-old daughter to a commercial station to be humiliated on the airwaves. Do we expect much more?

The station (including Kyle and Jackie O) is at fault - under no circumstances should a minor have been put on air to talk about participating in illegal behaviour (drugs and underage drinking/sex). The mother is a complete f#cking idiot - but ultimately the fault lies with the station who should know better.

On the issue of the alleged rape and the child not being properly cared for - DOCS can figure that one out.


* Thanks to Jess McGuire at Defamer for a great post about the incident.