Why is everybody else so stupid

I often start a sentence with, this is just a poor man’s version of… or their old stuff shits on this.

 When I started a lecture (to nobody) about the rubbish on the radio the other day it prompted my loving wife to ask if I think I am smarter than everybody else. Despite painful and repeated failures to be brilliant, I do constantly suffer from a feeling of superiority.

If I critically look at the situation I know I am like Homer Simpson when he opined “Everybody is stupid except me”. Deep down I should know I must be missing something but for that brief second, yes I do feel smarter than everybody else.

I also get the same superior feeling when I don’t know something that, in my opinion, is stupid and irrelevant. That’s right, I think I am actually smarter by being ignorant of trashy mags, boy bands and reality TV.  If anybody cared to ask if I’ve heard the latest on Justin Beiber, the answer is no and I instantly downgrade my estimate of the questioners intelligence.

I am proud to have no knowledge about huge chunks of popular culture despite the huge gap it leaves in my polite socialising knowledge, a handicap I wear as a big arrogant badge of honour. I don’t watch My Kitchen Rules so lack one of the common topics to talk about at the water cooler not that I even know anybody that talks by a water cooler but you get the idea. Despite that fact that being able to quote a Cardashian is of more practical value in most circles than knowing Monster Magnet lyrics, I wear my lack of Caradshian exposure as a sign of my intelligence. I was proud to have been unaware of the Cardashian’s for a hell of a long time and am now mildly ashamed to not only be aware of their existence but the fact I know the chief Cardashian had a kid with Kanye West and called it North. So while I will hide the fact I have no working knowledge of Aristotle’s musings at the same time I pretend to be ignorant of the musings of Woman’s Weekly if they’ve somehow found a nest in my memory.

I’m sure referencing the Simpsons causes the same feeling of superiority in others that I get when somebody mentions the Beiber, but, I also have a perverse feeling of being better than people when they look down their nose at me. I do think I am right to sneer at Beiber fans but anyone looking down at me is a loser in my mind, dismissing the Simpsons and quoting Oscar Wilde or Shakespeare leaves me far from impressed, it just makes me think the non-Simpson fan is a king tosspot (or queen tosspot, I’m not a chauvinist). When people insist quinoa is pronounced kinwa when I’ve called it kwin-owa, I feel just like a midget with mad MMA skills being pushed by an unco oversized bully eg. I know they think they are looking down at me, but really I am looking down at them; metaphorically, we are not looking at each other shoes. 

Constantly referencing Seinfeld/Simpsons will have me viewed as a dinosaur in some circles and an object of scorn in others. Having no knowledge of the last two Hottest 100 winners would make me an out of touch fossil in certain circles eg. people like I was 10 years ago . The fact that I know everything about every artist in the ’95 Hot 100 is now largely irrelevant*. When somebody does want to be nostalgic about the 90’s my knowledge of the topic brings arrogance to the fore even more quickly eg. Limp Bizkit combined the worst rap styling with embarrassing metal to be a stain on a whole genre of music, Rage Against the Machine should sue the oversized pants off them. When I corner a flat cap wearing Gen Y’er or a pontificating Baby Boomer I’m not afraid to let them know about the genius of popular culture in my day.

So; you looking down on me makes you a tosser and; You liking the things I look down on makes you a tosser, and in both cases has me feeling smarter than you. Which means ultimately, excluding the wimps sooking it up, everybody is either in agreement with or feeling superior to everybody else which is a great recipe for self-esteem.

Why is everybody else so stupid? Because they have stuck their cultural markers in a different bit of sand to me, joined a different tribe and I need to stand up for mine. I have only recently realised I’m now getting left behind in popular culture trends so am increasingly harking back to the age old trick of the ageing by claiming that (undercuts aside) me and my tribe were and are awesome.

The truly supple minds can find depth and purpose in new movements, there is always crap but there is no doubt good stuff to find. I have slipped and find it easier to just not get it, happy in the fact I am smarter than everybody else. Providing I don’t think about it too much I am happily unaware that I am missing something, until now…thanks Julia, I did think I was smarter than everybody else at the start of this and now don’t; of course next time I turn on the radio that warm glow of being better will return. What is wrong with music these days?   

*Until retro rock quizzes catch up with me when I’m 40.

Not my fault fatty

No boring bits?

When an icecream company promotes  the fact it has no boring bits it does raise the question; Exactly how obese are we that it makes marketable sense to suggest we get bored eating an unadorned portion of a competitors icecream?

It is a modern western luxury to be capable of calorizing ourselves to death or become so weight obsessed we starve ourselves to death. I could look up the facts but we all know the gist without me boring myself studying; poor diet and a sedentary lifestyle cause a deep fried bucket load of health problems.

On the eating disorder scale I am far closer to obese than sickly skinny; unfortunately when anybody comments on my relatively lither appearance than their morbidly obese mental picture of me it is inevitably to do with a lower rate of socialising in the preceding weeks than a long term lifestyle change. I admit to not having a soap box worthy of carrying my girth on this topic but when has that ever stopped me?

Unless fat has clogged your ears and diabetes taken your eyesight*  you know how to eat well and move a bit so have no excuse for a paunch. We are free to eat what we want and exercise our arse off (literally) yet increasingly eat rubbish and live sedentarily. That said two recent attempts and shirt loads of other products and policies that make it harder to be fit really get my goat. One of the recent cases was the pressure applied to the World Health Organisation not to release clear recommendations on exactly how much your daily sugar intake should be and  instead make a bland statement about balanced diets. The second was a decision to take down a website with star ratings for the health of food (with alleged implications on the independence of our assistant health minister and her senior staff). Both cases, labelling laws, official dietary advice and government policies are rife with the whiff of junk food lobbying stopping campaigns that might make a difference from getting off the ground while supporting rubbish healthy living promotions (it was all covered on an ep of Hollowmen).

Smoking kills, and that was well known by tobacco companies when they were actively rubbishing the science, but Tobacco dealers continued to take healthy profits from their unhealthy products long after they stopped the charade and admitted the truth. Smokers of my generation have got into it knowing the facts, even if they got hooked when young and reckless. Likewise anyone living on icecream with no boring bits knows the consequences. As the makers of that ad know, we are a bunch of lazy fat bastards and the companies profiting should be happy with that. However it is a new level of bastardry for purveyors of cholesterol to hide the information for the rare times (or the fit few) who are trying to improve their diet. The promotion of bad food as health food, deliberately burying information to stop customers learning the implications and blocking policies that will help is worse than James Hardie’s  asbestos bastardry. James Hardie was also prepared to cross the bridge from blissful ignorance into wilful deception for profit but sugar/fat companies have seen the example of tobacco and asbestos and chosen the same evil route. I am a fat bastard, but let me choose to take my health in my own hands, there are enough of us round ones around to prop up bad food companies without needing to beat the path to hell and damnation tobacco and asbestos have trodden.

*I know you haven’t been living under a rock because your too fat.

Nobody has ever had a good idea they didn’t steal.

There are no good original ideas. There are crap weird ideas that are incrementally built upon that lead to great ideas, but a fresh thought in isolation being any good does not happen. That is why IP rights are very wrong.

The first person to milk a cow was shunned by the community and turned into an outcast, it was a silly idea, practiced by a weirdo that led to a huge global industry. This fictional-fact^tm demonstrates that it is impossible to have a good idea, far easier to copy an idea and make it better and easiest of all to ridicule any mug having a go.

This is why our system of broad scale patents for “new technology” to protect “research investment” is patently ridiculous. Research and development needs to be protected from pilfering so it can make a profit and make it worthwhile investing in. This does not mean innovators should be given the ability to block further development until they have wrung as much profit as humanly possible from a small innovation. The innovation inevitably only enjoys its lofty, marketable status because it is  standing on the shoulders of the entire history of invention. By allowing intellectual property rights to be so dominant we are stifling further development and providing a cash cow that innovators do not deserve to milk. I see it as being akin to a prospector that struck gold in the 1800’s being allowed to stake a claim over the entire district and chip away at his leisure for the next 50 years. 

For some reason Apple, Monsanto and their ilk can make an incremental increase in development using the entire history of development to work with and patent it barring any further innovation in that sphere until done with it. As a species it is in our best interest to encourage innovations but instead we have managed to invent a system aimed at protecting R&D that does the opposite unless you can afford the best IP lawyers. Some companies suckling from innovation cash cows are so big they can now ride roughshod over elected governments in pursuit of protecting their profits.

So what is the answer? Companies can’t restrict the use of their patents but can charge a fee for use of their IP for profit. So the guy who milked the first cow would not be the only cow milker allowed to operate, however that weirdo would have a right to claim .02% of every Big M sold for the next 50 years. The licence fee would be determined by an independent subject expert estimating the contribution any licenced  IP has made to the product. If it is a blatant rip off you lose most of your profits to the inventor, if it is a significant improvement then you make money and the poor schlup who invented the original concept also gets a cut. Yeah I know this bit of my idea does need more work but that is just confirming my point, people will come along and improve on my concept. Heading in this direction would allow for innovation, encourage R&D and of course make heaps of work for lawyers and everybody loves lawyers taking a cut of the action…maybe we need to work on that?

Letters to the Editor

As devoted readers of Barneyarns would know I like to stir the pot, so have been dissappointed by the lack of comeback to my stick poking letters to the editor:


Asylum seeker deterrents a way to persecute the desperate
Lachlan Barnes writes: Re. "'Genuine' refugees?" (yesterday). Is Tamas Calderwood suggesting that comfortable, cashed-up foreigners under no fear of persecution at home are posing as refugees? That people would decide to risk everything and embark on a dangerous journey in the remote hope they will reach Australia? Leaving so much behind and risking everything else so they can try and start all over again, alone, on the bottom rung of social advantage, but not because they are legitimate refugees but to go up to the next tax bracket?
The asylum seeker debate should be about discussing what to do with desperate people seeking refuge in Australia by arriving unannounced in numbers that we can easily absorb into our society. We do need to ensure any policy takes into account the best interest of Australia and what message our response will send. But somehow the debate has been hijacked and the starting point (in many minds) is what should happen with illegal arrivals, with dubious motives, rocking up in numbers that are threat to our way of life. This is a nonsense but has taken root to the extent that both major parties are now debating just how draconian we can make the deterrent.
How can we have shifted the goal posts so far that a debate about people seeking asylum now centres on how to send a big enough warning to stop other desperate people attempting to find refuge in Australia?
If you believe we should make it extremely tough on asylum seekers and ensure a clear message of deterrence is sent, at least have the moral fortitude to be honest with yourself and admit the policy is aimed at the persecution of the desperate.
‘Genuine’ refugees?
Tamas Calderwood writes: Re:  ”Why most of us want the boats to stop” (yesterday).  Your editorial attributes the majority opinion on boats to a “misinformation campaign”. However, perhaps Crikey isn’t as clued up as the public on this issue. Your credulous acceptance that being “stamped [as a] refugee” automatically makes you a genuine refugee is obviously rejected by a majority of Australians. The questions is, why? My guess: when 80% of these “refugees” destroy their documents to conceal their identities after paying $5000-$10,000 to people smugglers for an illegal passage to Australia, they lose the benefit of the doubt.

Lachlan Barnes writes: Re. "The so-called world food shortage" (yesterday). Just to make John Richardson despair some more, I was interested, maybe even excited, by the Tassie data project.

I am sorry I did not see it as being born out of "profound ignorance". I was smart enough to work out the "Saving the world headline" might have over cooked it a bit, but I thought absolute truth in headlines would not get many eye balls on articles, e.g. "World Bank invests in micro climate data collection project".

I couldn't see how the technology was going to hasten the destruction of productive areas. In fact, I thought the information the technology would provide might allow producers to avoid unwittingly mining their properties' potential by over-production or conversely impacting the environment (and bank balance) through over application of inputs. I also didn't see a situation where developing this technology would add to current system costs -- I though it would either pay for itself or wouldn't be adopted.

I must have missed the claim in the original article where it said we currently have a global food deficiency. I thought the problem being explored was the pressures of climate change, arable land going out of production and population growth combining to cause food shortage problems in the future. Even if that were not the case I thought exploring more efficient ways to do business was rarely a bad investment.

I thought we could supply food to any point on the globe now, but the problem was finding the right motivational drivers to make it happen. I thought it was producers making more money growing fodder for animals and the poor not being able to afford to compete in the marketplace for what we are willing pay to waste that meant food sources did not end up where they were needed.

I thought the project might not save the world, but it was a positive project; however, apparently improving supply chains is the only valid world-saving idea.

John Richardson writes: Re. "How a Tasmanian data project could save the world" (December 19). It’s hard not to despair at the profound ignorance that continues to fuel the commonly held but erroneous belief that the world is suffering from an acute food shortage, when the absolute opposite is the case.
Instead of lauding well-meaning but misguided programs like the Sense-T Project in Tasmania, which aim to increase agricultural productivity but which ultimately succeed in only quickening the rate at which the quality of our pastures are depleted while adding more unnecessary cost to the supply chain, Paddy Manning and the World Bank would do better to recognise that the real challenge in feeding the world’s population lies not in growing more food, but in building more effective supply chain solutions.
In its latest report published in September of this year, the Rome-based Food and Agriculture Organisation estimated that one-third of current world food production is wasted, costing the global economy more than US$800 billion annually.
Instead of parking more ambulances at the bottom of the cliff, surely it’s time to build a fence at the top?

How a Tasmanian data project could save the world

Paddy Manning | Dec 19, 2013 12:42PM | EMAIL | PRINT

New Australian-made sensor technology could have the potential to maximise food production around the world.

It’s the challenge: getting food enough for 9 billion people, from less land and water, and in a hotter climate. The World Bank is excited about the potential of a Tasmanian trial, dubbed the Sense-T project, to help farmers boost productivity by installing a network of solar-powered, wireless sensors providing real-time, open data on micro-climate variables like temperature, humidity and soil moisture.

Information from the Australian-made sensors — typically, some 35 above-ground and 15 below-ground sensors will suffice to cover 130 hectares — will be analysed using big data technology pioneered by Sydney-based SIRCA, originally the Securities Institute Research Centre of Asia-Pacific.

SIRCA is an Australian success story that manages the world’s biggest repository of financial data, taking in 2 million pieces of data per second from 300 stock exchanges globally. SIRCA sells data to major financial traders and the likes of Thomson Reuters, and funnels the revenue back into research.

Now SIRCA and Sense-T — a $43 million partnership between the University of Tasmania, CSIRO, the Tasmanian government and IBM — are looking at applying the big data technology to agriculture, eHealth and logistics.

In agriculture, SIRCA’s data analysis techniques could help farmers combine detailed historical, spatial and real-time data from their own property with Bureau of Meteorology and other data to not only improve crop yields, but also manage disease, prepare for frost, and verify provenance — increasingly important to marketing produce. The network of sensors also has applications in bushfire prevention and aquaculture such as oyster farming.

Sense-T director Ros Harvey (pictured below) says the breakthrough comes from the sensors made by Melbourne firm Grey Innovation, which can be installed at a tenth of the cost of previous technology. She is coy about the cost to farmers but says older technology used as a comparator on a viticulture crop cost about $50,000 to obtain triangulated data from three weather stations.

Eye of the tiger
Lachlan Barnes writes: Re. "Tigers don't change their stripes, even behind bars" (Thursday). I have several points to raise about the Des Bellamey article. Nobody was surprised or outraged by the tiger attack. Nobody on seeing a tiger in the flesh, even when they are performing tricks in an enclosure, thinks they are harmless. Zoos and other animal handling facilities have worked tirelessly in Australia to reduce stress and anxiety on animals. All animal handlers acknowledge the fact large animals even non-predators may attack or even seriously harm them in play. It was, in fact in play that the attack referred to in the article occurred -- if it was a genuine attempt to attack the trainer would have been killed instantly. Bellamy even managed to contend that the tiger attacked both because of the stress of captivity and as a natural instinct, perhaps separating this contradiction by at least one line may have made it less obvious.
Anthropomorphising the actions of one killer whale viewed in one unbalanced film as an argument to remove all animals from captivity is a curious line of reasoning. I could go on because literally every sentence contained an error or overstatement. A person doing a dangerous job was injured, that job has a large focus on conservation, and for some reason PETA went on the attack.
Seeing animals in the flesh and developing captive breeding programs undoubtedly raise awareness of endangered species and in a small way help to practically conserve species. Bellamy seems to hate the idea of people making any money from animals, even when it has a basis in conservation, and Bellamy is instead pinning all conservation hopes on a miraculous turn-around in habitat destruction.
I'm not surprised by the views expressed by the special projects co-ordinator of PETA -- it is a fringe organisations whose extreme views are well-documented. That PETA's simplistic, extreme and sensationalist views continue to be reported by respected media outlets does surprise me.

Tigers don’t change their stripes, even behind bars

PETA special projects co-ordinator Des Bellamy says that the blame for captive animal attacks lies squarely with those who cage them.

When a tiger mauled a handler at Australia Zoo this week, people were surprised and outraged. But tigers are apex predators and have few natural enemies, other than man — or woman. The Australia Zoo attack was just the latest in a long list of such incidents around the world — why are we so surprised when captive creatures act like, well, wild animals?

Keeping tigers in zoo cages gives people the warped idea that these animals are little more than cuddly kitties. But captivity does not extinguish all the genetic drives that tigers are meant to follow. Attacks by captive big cats on people — which occur with staggering regularity — illustrate the profound level of stress, anxiety and agitation these animals experience every day of their lives. Zoos cannot tame tigers, and captivity is a living hell for them. In captivity, they cannot engage in any of the activities that give their lives meaning. Is it any wonder that tigers seize opportunities to make their frustration and rage known?

No animal can thrive in such an artificial and stressful environment. The movie Blackfish tells the story of Tilikum, an orca torn from his family in the wild and imprisoned in a concrete bathtub at SeaWorld, where he made headlines after killing a trainer in 2010, after 30 years of captivity. The cynicism that condemns such magnificent animals to a life of misery is only matched by the greed evident in ordering employees to “perform” with clearly dangerous predators.

Perhaps Hugh Lofting, author of the iconic The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle, said it best: “If I had my way … there wouldn’t be a single lion or tiger in captivity anywhere in the world. They never take to it. They’re never happy. They never settle down. They are always thinking of the big countries they have left behind … what are they given … a bare cage with iron bars; an ugly piece of dead meat thrust to them once a day, and a crowd of fools to come and stare at them with open mouths!”

Tigers are in trouble in the wild, but why would anyone take their plight seriously when they see them performing in silly shows, posing for photos and jammed into zoo cages? These displays give the public the idea — overtly or not — that tigers are doing just fine. Unless habitat protection is taken seriously, coupled with aggressive action to stop poaching and canned hunting, all the zoos in the world won’t save this species.

Big cats living their lives on the African plains also need protection. “Trophy” (oh, what a ghastly term) killer Melissa Bachman gleefully posed with a menagerie of her victims recently, including a gorgeous adult male lion. Her ear-to-ear smile incited rage around the world from people who cannot comprehend how anyone could feel joy, much less pride, from deliberately snuffing out a life. But that’s little consolation to the dead lion and other animals living in constant danger of being blasted to bits with scopes, infrared sights and high-calibre weaponry.

Why can’t we just leave animals alone? Well into the 21st century, when presumably we’ve learned something about being civilised, why do we think we have the right to force animals to live behind bars for our fleeting diversion? What arrogance allows us to believe that we can go into their homes, stalk and kill them, and then brag about it by posing next to their lifeless bodies? Humans don’t own the planet, but we certainly act like we do.

More and more people have come to recognize that today’s zoos are little different from the days when circuses caged albino and hunchback human beings alongside pumas and primates for the public’s amusement. Both should be equally unthinkable today.

Lachlan Barnes writes: Re. "Barnaby Joyce and the infuriating success of Australian agriculture" (yesterday). Bernard Keane seemed happy to whack the xenophobic label on Barnaby Joyce and then on that backward, small-minded, minority known as rural folk. Small-minded thinking takes root when failing to grasp the reasoning behind the actions, struggles and perspectives of another group, then assuming they have acted from stupidity or fear; just read colonists' accounts of natives.
Barnaby Joyce may well be a small-minded isolationist, but based on this article I can't be sure if he is or Keane is being rural-ist. Keane’s free-market ideology is OK, but when he made a claim of xenophobia then spread the label to all rural Australia that was, well, rural-ist.
Keane’s line of thinking almost stumbled on why rural voters don't believe that companies whose profits minutely improve GDP but take people and money from the region is a benefit to them, but he stopped short. Is it surprising growers fear the company that handles the bulk of our export grain no longer lives or dies on the success of Australian growers but becomes a tentacle of a large conglomerate? Driven a Ford lately?
*I do see the irony of labelling Bernard Keane without knowing his perspective, sorry.

Barnaby Joyce and the infuriating success of Australian agriculture

Bernard Keane | Nov 18, 2013 12:51PM | EMAIL | PRINT

The opposition of Barnaby Joyce and the Nationals to the sale of Graincorp reflects a deep-seated frustration at the success of Australian agriculture.

How much economic damage will Agriculture Minister Barnaby Joyce be allowed to inflict during the course of this government? If successful, the efforts of the Nationals, led by Joyce, to block the sale of GrainCorp to Archer Daniels Midland will send a clear signal to foreign investors: Australia is closed for business if you fall on the wrong side of the government’s political calculus. Australia already has one of the most restrictive agricultural investment regimes in the developed world — the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development ranks us 10th in terms of restrictions on foreign direct investment in agriculture, ahead of most of Europe and the United States, countries not exactly known for their commitment to free trade in agriculture.  That’s one reason why the overall level of foreign investment in Australian agriculture is so low: 1% of Australian agricultural businesses are foreign-owned or part-foreign-owned, and they hold less than 12% of Australian agricultural land — and around half of that is held by companies that are majority Australian-owned. Joyce has long railed against foreign investment in mining and agriculture — indeed, foreign investment full stop. He was forced out of the opposition finance portfolio in 2010 after making a series of howlers about a looming Australian debt default, including conflating government and private foreign debt into a single “gross foreign debt” figure of over a trillion dollars that he said would bring on a biblical-sounding “day of reckoning”. For Joyce, it seems, borrowing from foreigners is always bad, no matter what the circumstances. So where should investment come from if we cut off foreign investment? Easy: taxpayers. That was Joyce’s alternative last year to allowing a Chinese-led consortium to acquire Cubbie Station, a failed confection of water licences whose interests Joyce has reflexively supported during his entire time in politics. He wanted the government to purchase the property and break it into smaller lots. What is it with the Nationals and foreign investment?

“Short of the development of technology that enables foreign owners to pick up Australian farms and fly them offshore, the only ‘food security’ policy needed is a free market.”

Xenophobia has been a recurring phenomenon in rural politics over the decades. The anti-Semitic League of Rights, which struggled for control of the Country Party in the 1970s, was intensely hostile to foreign investment. So too was One Nation, a primarily regional entity. And it was the Coalition that brought to an end Australia’s post-war open-door policy on foreign investment, with the Gorton and McMahon governments establishing foreign investment and ownership restrictions; the Whitlam government took that economic nationalism further after 1972, and it has never been substantially wound back except via selective free trade agreements. But the Nationals have been growing ever more hostile to foreign investment in agriculture in recent years, and the reason lies in the success of that industry. Success? Why, yes — agriculture has been one of the most successful industries in Australia in recent decades. The Productivity Commission notes that in the 40 years to 2004, total agricultural output has doubled in real terms. According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, in the 30 years up to 2011, our agricultural exports grew by 5% a year, nearly quadrupling in value. Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Sciences data shows that even during the appalling drought of the 2000s, we were still exporting significantly more agricultural products than in the 1990s. And this has been achieved while the industry has dramatically shrunk its workforce, mostly over the last decade. In 2001, the agricultural workforce stood at over 440,000; in August this year it was just over 300,000. That is, labour productivity has increased massively in the agriculture sector. And the average size of farms has increased significantly as well, further improving productivity. Deregulation has also helped, and has caused investment, including foreign investment, to lift in agribusiness companies, drawn by ever-increasing export levels. Much of that is bad news for the Nationals, because it means smaller rural workforces and further pressure on regional demographics, with people moving to larger regional centres and cities. There’s a reason why Joyce wanted not merely to use taxpayers’ money to buy up Cubbie but to split it up — the Nationals prefer smaller family farming over commercial farming. In attacking foreign investment in agriculture and agribusiness companies, the Nationals are targeting the symptoms of a “problem” rather than the cause — and that problem is the growth and success of Australian agriculture as a deregulated industry. This is also why the Nationals have fastened on “food security” as a reason for opposing foreign investment. “Food security” in the Australian context is an absurdity: short of the development of technology that enables foreign owners to pick up Australian farms and fly them offshore, the only “food security” policy needed is a free market. But for Joyce, the very existence of a free market for agriculture is a problem, because Australia is in danger, he claims, of becoming a “net food importer”. This myth also peddled by independent Mp Bob Katter and is easily debunked, but it is the basis for this “food security” nonsense that the Nationals, the Greens and even the previous government like to go on about. The challenge for Treasurer Joe Hockey is to see off this noxious, deeply damaging xenophobia and approve the Archer Daniels Midland bid — and not approve it with conditions that prevent it from proceeding, which you sense some in government see as a solution to the dilemma. The delay in approval of the bid was bad enough, and merely puts off a key moment in the history of this government. If the Nationals win, they will be emboldened to prosecute a deeply damaging agenda of economic obscurantism. All power to Hockey in his fight against them.

Skippy's Droppings

Skippy’s Droppings: When I first arrived at the Dookie United Footy Club I met a smart alec Kangaroo called Skippy. As a first year college student I copped a little bit of Skippy’s forked tongue from time to time but in general laughed at what he had to say about everybody else. Skippy’s main vehicle for comment was a newsletter produced for home games and purchased at the gate. Skippy generously donated the proceeds to the football trip, but, buying a copy was also brutally enforced by some of the older members of the club.

I had a few years away from Dookie and when I returned I noticed that Skippy had left leaving a gaping hole to fill with invective. Funnily enough so had a few of the players who seemed to think and write along similar lines to Skippy. With the funnier, original muses gone Skippy never reached the same heights as he had in the past. I did however manage to coax Skippy back for another season and he did pay for a few rounds on that years footy trip.

Looking back in the file I didn’t save too many, a case of burn after reading when the Roo gets going I guess.
*Some context in red has been added for the uninitiated

SKIPPY’S DROPPINGS

Following a long hiatus Skippy is back at Dooks to dish the dirt have some fun and hopefully shout a few drinks for the boys on the footy trip. Being a generous kind of Roo and despite being dropped from the clubs logo, all profits from this tome of wisdom will be donated to the boys getting on the fizz. Grass is scarce but free and with Mama Hedges keeping my pouch full of lollies don’t worry about old Skip going without to support the people he has offended.

First of all I’d like to quell any rumours about where I’ve been, truth is I’d moved to the big smoke to take my musings to a bigger audience, but after offending one too many people , well, you no doubt saw Skip with an arrow through the noggin on the news. So I’m back where I belong, and hoping Skippy is still the one marsupial the Dookie boys won’t shoot.

Last time your old chinaplate Skippy was at Dookie he did make some enemies with the sooky la la types. To avoid another crossbow attack I’d like to say if you are mentioned in this illustrious journal please take it in the manner it was meant, which is as good natured ribbing because your somebody Skippy feels deserves the honour of a mention.

*After a bloke wore tight shorts to training Skippy bounded on up to the Goldcoast last week to have a chat with an old cobber and 80’s icon the Whiz Capper. Capper wasn’t in his usual high spirits as a pair of shorts that he treasured had been stolen. Wocka said he never wore the shorts as they were a bit revealing even for him, (a man who has posed nude for playboy and flashed on T.V) but the Wiz treasured them as it was the only pair of red microscopic shorts ever made. Capper saw the suspect fleeing the scene in Malcom Young’s Bonds t-shirt circa ’75, the suspect apparently looked like TV’s Hotdogs. Skip showed Wocka a photo of Dooks beloved muckraker Chuck “captain cupcake” Edmonston, Capper said the suspect resembled a “poor mans” version of that bloke. On an unrelated topic why are people getting stuck into “pillows” Bullen about his training fashion, when Skip last attended a Dookie training the couple of brave blokes in tights were the object of ridicule, now it is the “Poor man” in the tight shorts, how times change.

*A couple of ordinary footballers liked to talk themselves up Skippy was interested to hear Muhammed Ali’s comments this week criticising Steve “Brucie’s mate” Lamb’s skiting, apparently the old slugger thought it was a bit much. On further questioning “Shakes” Ali did concede he is the second greatest behind “Socceroo” Lamb. Imagine if the slugger ever heard James Feeney in action after he troubled the stats-man.

*The chaser were in trouble for a bad taste joke, it was big news at the time -This joke about terminally ill children has been removed because the Chaser plagiarised it and this column only mentions fresh material-

*One bloke had too many beers Skip is not one to spread rumours, most stuff that Skip hears about is tucked safely in the pouch until confirmation, so there is no way I’ll repeat the mudslinging about Tom “Curly” Dickons“cider” pissing in a vase.

*A couple of the lads got in a punch up, one broke his hand Everybody’s favourite Roo is puzzling over everybody’s favourite blonde haired brothers whose last name rhymes with Splitto. How can two such mild mannered and polite boys continue to get in so much trouble when they head out for a night on the tiles. Skippy asked “my boy” Kitto who just smiled and said something about the incredible hulk effect of booze, while “other boy” Kitto said if old chalk hand drank more milk while growing up they would still be going now, Skippy is still confused.
*A young man had a month off drinking and then drank again The chairman of CUB has officially declared the economic crises to be over. After a month with plummeting profits and job layoffs a sharp sales spike on Saturday the 13th June has all brewers back in the black. In unrelated news Thomas “No handballs for” Dakis paid off his 20th aerial and could afford to get back on the jars at the presidents dinner. In true Caulfield style (where all great rum drinking ute driving barons come from) he celebrated mightily, although wasting good alcohol to water the garden via your stomach is frowned upon despite the drought.

*A fella had a wrestle with a bloke who had grey hair Johan “Zohan” Moylan is a favourite of Skippy’s and until Saturday he could do no wrong in Skippy’s beady black eyes. Skippy loves how YoYo plays football in fast forward- so he looks like he’s in a remake of the gods must be crazy, rocks up to play footy at any ground he likes whether the game is scheduled there or not, endlessly plugs his modelling website and hands out fashion tips (pink is the new black etc). But when he attacked an old pensioner “Silver Fox” at Katunga Skippy was shocked and disappointed. Maybe he caught a case of Kitsomotosis….get it Kitto’s got in a fight so Kitso ah forget it.

Another edition that was salvaged:
Welcome to Skippy’s abuse addition, It’s about time Skippy told it like it is. Finally a few home truths are going to be rammed home around here. If Skippy tells you to quit, it means you are too old or crap or both, if Skippy says your fat stop eating pudin’ If Skippy says nobody likes you, your mum doesn’t count. Rememebr if you get mentioned you have a right of reply, but if the reply is crap it won’t get printed. Deal with that.

*When a "footballer" announced he was going on a health kick following a photo in the newspaper. James “Blimp” Armstrong was disgusted at the sight of his double page, triple chinned spread in the News a couple of weeks back. While munching on a pie and drinking a stubby the “galloping gasomoter” told skip that he couldn’t understand how it got to this, he thought he was a strapping young lad prior to the photo. “Tuckshop Arms-trong” pointed out that he is always at training, even if sometimes a little late from working hard behind a computer all day and admittedly by the time the trainers get around his massive thighs training is usually over. “Jabba” Armstrong informed skip he was going to change his ways and a new slimmer version would soon be “rolled” out. Skip reckons if pies, beer and never shutting up were good ways to get fit James wouldn’t have got in this mess in the first place. Skip’d know ever seen a fat Roo?
*To get people off the scent Skippy has a go at himself Monster the waddling penguin is softer than AFL Dave. Since being made captain of the two’s ‘Farouk” has tried to lead from behind ala Freddie Mecury, do the club a favour and waddle in to retirement pug head.
*A bloke that played for us and happened to be Egyption started a lot of fights. Attacks on Egyptian footballers are on the rise. Dookie’s Marcus Oussa has joined Indian protesters in condemning the violence. The mild mannered Ouss just can’t understand why he is abused, punched and spat on weekly, “All I’m trying to do is play footy and get a couple of cheap shots away behind play but I just keep getting in strife.
*A man had to leave the field during a game to go to the toilet The sphincter is a muscle in the bum that controls the opening of your coit, or so Skippy has deducted from studying the real life social doco “Wayne’s World”. Unfortunately for Bruce last weekend he pulled a sphincter causing a major mudslide. Not even nappy san will save the away shorts and the less said about his Reg Grundies the better.

*Can't remember this Nathan Hauritz turning a ball? must have been halucinating It was a big week for blokes Skippy has been badmouthing with Hauritz finally turning one, Mark Webber not crashing, Steve Ludeman winning another game as coach, Nick Larry Emdur Boyd not being lynched for being hatless in public in a bad display of curls, Jezza “Bezza” Campbell making an umpiring decision, Oussa not getting punched, YOYo picking up, Sam Scott not dying of alcohol poisoning, Dale Heywood surviving a game of footy unscathed. If this keeps up droppings will be very short on material.

Good to see that Skippy’s spray about poor attendances at recent functions was heeded and the annual ball was once again a mammoth humdinger of a cracking good night. The girls all looked fantastic and the blokes proved that you can dress a goat in a suit but it will still act like a goat. There were some spectacular displays of blokes who shouldn’t drink, proof that it tastes better going down than coming back up and once again the GV hotel isn’t big enough to contain the Dookie boys on the tear. Would add more but Alcamahol doesn’t do much for a Roo’s memory.

*After somebody complained about not getting a mention….weird most people hated being in droppings. It takes a big Roo to apologise and to prove I am a bigger man than you lot I admit there was a gross error of judgment in a previous addition. It appears that the carnival was mentioned but the ringleader of the whole show was not. Sharon “I want an apology” Brown was quite rightly miffed about not making these illustrious pages. It was the biggest oversight since that film where they forget Mcauley Caulkin leaving him Home Alone. While Home Alone he maimed some robbers. I think the film was called ‘Take me on holidays you bastards’. Sorry readers I went off on a tangent there. Any way Skippy takes this opportunity to say I am truly sorry for not mentioning Sharon, and for going off on a tangent during the apology (if you’re counting that is three apologies). Skippy is however not sorry about misspelling Matttthew Kirrby, so while I am big enough to apologise I choose not to. If your name does not conform to the normal rules of grammar that is not my fault

. …And an edition with most of it deleted but this article survived:
Finchy (Mac daddy) on Saturday night, "I only get drunk when I drink" - What he meant to say was…actually who the hell knows what Macca is ever trying to say?
Suggestions for Look a likes, Beggsy - Billy Idol
Dicko - Mil Hanna
Monster - Furuk
Ryan Kearny - Browny (from Mallee)
Caulf - Richard Permewan

Another issue:
Skippy’s golden rule is the same as Gods, treat people and Roo’s as you would like to be treated. If Charles “What the Fks up chuck” Edmonston follows this rule he obviously hates himself.

Old Cupcake thought playing world cup soccer with Matt “Chinese Eyes” Thorpes and Ouss’ chandeliers in their new pad was a great way to get the party started. With glass shattered all across the floor Cupcake copped a fair old barrelling from his new housemates. Poor old “Cupcake” spent his first night at the new house whimpering with his tail between his legs curled up asleep in his car. Too scared to go back inside, Thorpey “feel the steel” is obviously one scary Eskimo.

*A comedian at a comedy day implied our captain really, really liked his own first cousins. Also, at the time this was written an insult at the club was your Mums your Dad, I still don’t know what it means. G’day Skipsters and welcome to what could be the very last Skippy’s ever. Like all good finales there is going to be some major bridge-burning in this edition. So strap yourselves in for some good old fashion piss-taking as your former mate and soon to be hopping crossbow target has a crack at all and sundry. Don’t worry if you think you, don’t think you, warrant a mention because everyone has a skeleton or ten in the closet. If you think you got away with something be reminded that this rampaging Roo can sniff a good story out. Very similar to how Lehmo can sniff out an inbreeding mountain man from an audience of sheep hasslers. Then Lehmo is from Adelaide so he might be able to sniff out his own kind?! It does go to show that anybody can hope to one day be the skipper at Dooks even if your Mums your Dad whatever, the hell that means.

*A bloke called Thorpey has funny eyes, but is Anglo Saxon, Skippy thought that was funny. True story: Garfield polished off his tenth cone for the morning so couldn’t open his eyes as wide as normal, Garfield put on his best thongs and went looking for some munchies but couldn’t go ten feet without being mistaken for Bang-bang Youdiono Thorpe. Garfield did get see through his squinty eyes what life as the only Aussie Eskimo was like and is not keen to go back.

*A bloke grew a goatee and it made him look like Chuck Chuck Norris is in Dookie starring as Woody Dookie Ranger. The man who beat the wall in tennis and counted to infinity twice is now stalking local fishermen to make sure they aren’t pulling fish out of the few puddles of water left in the district without a licence. Fisho’s are always seen as a heavy handed bunch but employing a bloke who the boogie man checks under his bed for is going a bit far.

*A lady used to bring a massive container of lollies to give the footballers, one week she rocked up in her husband’s semi and another week a bloke grabbed a handful of lollies after leaving the urinal. Due to popular demand Rosemary “Mumma” Hedges lolly-bucket has grown so huge that it now takes a prime-mover to get the bucket to the footy. The ever increasing popularity of the lollies is puzzling given “Pillows” Bullens urine soaked attempt to keep them all to himself.

More look alikes: Matty Walker looks like Tadhg Kennelly and Wallace of Wallace and Gromit fame.
Simon Berry with the new do looks like Adam Cooney and Bruce Willis.

*Bagging most of our players Skippy’s rhetorical quiz: Is Nathan “Benson” Hedges voice higher than “Soccer roo” Lambs? How many times will Lamby play on and pretend that he just doesn’t see (the leading forward and the opposition tackler)? What time does Gav Kitto go from mild mannered defender to bouncer punching nutcase? Is Weeman Morrison hungrier than Bezza Bewick Campbell in front of goal? Will they ever be as hungry as Chris “U turn” Ludeman? Will bat makers go broke if Sibs quits cricket and stops breaking bats? Why is Oussa less popular amongst PDFL rivals than Hitler? Does Doigy ever talk? Does Drunk Doigy ever shut up? When Rich puffs his cheeks is his face bigger than the Hindenberg airship pre explosion? Has a bigger man ever worn poofier shirts than Yao Ming? He succeded in cleaning the keyboard but did no handballs ever get the cream from his Green Daks? Just how hot are Beggsy’s cousins? Does Sam “Maxi” McKenna believe that you can’t drive on drugs because you fly? How many times has YoYo Boyter looked at himself on his modelling website? Is Rooster trying to clear the ball from the backline or send it into orbit? Does the brother of Rooster think he’ll turn into a pumpkin if he stays at the ground past the end of the seconds? Do the Geddessesss pick on brown headed cousins at Christmas? Just how early did Matty Walker have to get to Melbourne when he left the bench to have a shower? How come Farouk has a tiny head and six chins? Did Charlie cry when him and Wethers broke up and Wethers moved to Melbourne? Is YOYO Cupcakes rebound bloke? Is Jo of the YOJO couple jealous of Cupcake? Is Pillows jealous of Yoyo? Do you feel safer with Macca soon joining Eppsy in the armed forces for our protection? Are safety glasses redundant for Thorpey because he can’t open his eyes wide enough for anything to get in? Does Tuckshop know that training starts at 6? Will Sammy Scott lose his thumbs due to gambling debts or is kneecapping back in fashion for standover men?

Cup cake looks like Master Splinter of Ninja turtles,
Justin Is Chris off the Family Guy
Seamus is the sherminator,
Sibs is Casper

Quote of the week: Or should this be re-named stuff Macca said? After discovering that a horse and a donkey make a mule the fish dragon asked “What happens if a dog and a cat mate?” Skippy reckons that aside from a slightly miffed cat and a scratched up dog not much. It did make Skip wonder if you cross Larry Emdur with a black sheep do you get Boydy? no wonder he wears a hat.

That is all she wrote for Skippy! it has been a hectic year and Skippy was glad to see that despite being committed enough to have finally won a flag in ’07 some of the old shenanigans from the past continue to this day. Some people seemed to cop it regularly in Skippy’s little journal while others have escaped with more dignity than they deserve. But that is life folks, no one said it was fair. As this is the final act I will reveal Skips true identity for this season: Warrick Rainbird.

I deserve a better effort from you

I got my first request for a blog and unlike a successful rock band I can’t really afford not to do requests. The request came with a link to a Peter Fitzsimons article which to condense into half a sentence explained that Aussie international sporting teams are rubbish because Gen Y are a bunch of sooks.

I’m sure some of Simmos complaints are to do purely with things were better in my day nostalgia. Simmo even suggested players in his day wouldn’t have  gone out for hamburgers like the Wallabies or had a party like the swimmers because people in his day cared. With all due respect what a load of cobblers ya has-been. I’m sure if I trawled through the archives there would be an article by the same bandana wearing clown about how much better it was in his day when beer swilling characters added colour before everything was sanitized.

That one complaint aside the article did strike a chord with me, we (meaning Australia I’d never be good enough to mean me as part of an elite outfit even as orange cutter) seem to lack any spine in the international arena.  I was nodding my head in agreement as Simmmo laid bare our recent sporting incompetence and the metro sexual, self indulgent and petulant characters that brought us these shoddy displays. They are supposed to be representing the best to of us so how dare they be so rubbish? I deserve to sit on my couch and bask in the reflected glory.  

I don’t buy into the whole theory that certain generations are some how fundamentally different.  Much of what Gen Y are blamed for is a reflection of being young, but, to a degree there also has to be an effect that the current shape of society has on the natural bell curve personalities. That is why there were no hipsters when you had to work to feed your family from eight and went to war at eighteen, it was no good cracking it at your mum for taking the sticker off your flat cap back then.

So I’m not blaming gen Y for not breaking a leg in pursuit of a competent performance in a friendly against Brazil or for playing meaningless tournaments for the Delhi Donkeys rather than preparing for a friggin test match..well maybe a little spoilt brats. It is a reflection of a society where every kid wins, no one is made to work for praise and people are told they are the most important person in the world. It raises a society where these spoilt young talents chase a dollar rather than team glory, drop their bundle when things get tough and pursue selfish interests to the detriment of the greater good. If you had a choice of working in a coal mine or bowling for Australia you tended to be a bit more grateful for the opportunity, it seems people now arrive at the peak of sport in this country as if they have a birth right to be there. Don’t this generation owe it to me and all the other hopeless, lazy, cynics  to risk their health, push their limits (if illegally just don’t get caught) and sacrifice their earning potential so I can get that short lived joy of seeing Aussie victory.        

Somebody stop me

“I woke up Sunday morning trying to find a way to hold my head which didn’t hurt.”

It can be a rewarding experience when you discover a song that nails an emotion or feeling that perfectly resonates with your life experience. It knocks you for six when the combination of sound, conviction and lyrics combine and all you can think is right on brother* too true. The above lyrics are ones that get it pretty right but I’d be quite happy to still have them stored in my much larger category of songs that leave you thinking what the bloody hell are they on about eg. “Roll out the cannon boys, steal us some wine, puff Tijuana smalls shake hands with beef”. Or for those of you more classic hits than 90’s alternative “Aroooo werewolves of London”.

Recovering from a couple too many is definitely young man’s sport. These days the self-inflicted self-pity following an over indulgence is much like how I imagine an aging pugilist feels, after waking up from a brief lie down, having stepped into the ring for one pay day they probably would have been better skipping. I’m sure the much more regular trips I made in my youth down to the dreadful place on the corner of Morning-after-the-night-before St and No-one-to-blame-but-yourself Rd did not feel as bad as they do now. I thought I knew what Kris Kristoferson was on about 10 years ago, I think I know more about that feeling now**

Worse than headache and nausea though is the fuzzy recollections of, did I do that, did I say that, did I really provide fashion advice to a bouncer then steal the velvet rope when he didn’t like my shoes? Luckily my transgressions have generally stayed in the realms of self-inflicted stupidity and never strayed outside the (generous) boundaries of my peer group of the given time. Had I been in a more studious crowd perhaps my sheepishness would have found greater justification on the morning after, but even the most outrageous transgression on my part have generally been met with amused dismissiveness or even insignificance given the drunken competition. As I’ve aged and started a family however, there is no place for complete abandonment of sobriety even for a night and what was once an amusing anecdote for a degenerate peer group to laugh at becomes the type of offence it probably always should have been considered. An offence I’m sure will continue to be brought up for years to come. Given the judgment that awaits when you are older, got responsibilities and have no excuse for acting like your shoe size you better be telling yourself, never again, the morning after or you really need to be seeking professional help.  

They say alcohol does not change your personality just lowers your inhibitions but I don’t believe that is true. Lowering your inhibitions implies you do things you want to do but are too shy (or inhibited) to try. That is clearly not true, I don’t enjoy or secretly want to perform acrobatics, urinate in public or ring somebody I shouldn’t to tell them something they don’t want to hear. Drinking just affects your judgment, that is why you shouldn’t drive, talk to your boss or ring a celebrity whose number happens to be in a mates work phone for business reasons, fail to block said mates number and then ask the celebrity to tell a joke on air. It is not like I am too shy to climb a tree, test the tensile strength of a letter box using a mixture of explosive household chemicals or explain to a policemen how he could do his job better; these are just some of the million thoughts that go through your head all the time that get filtered out before even registering. Unfortunately a couple of sips and every idea becomes a good idea. Drinking ensures there is no judgment of speed, spatial awareness, centre of gravity or of thought. Rather than being a secret tonic to give you confidence it just means you lack the judgment to realise that every thought you have should not be instantly acted upon. What a combo, you impair yourself in physical ability but then act on every thought, how does that not end in disaster every time?  

It is purely good luck not good management that I haven’t had to face the full potential consequences myself but people close to me have; it should have had me swearing off benders for life. Even if I hadn’t been personally impacted, I should be smart enough to realise the risk versus reward equation is fairly and squarely on the side of teetotallers. The cost to public health, relationships, the justice system and my 3 day old carpet is patently absurd and there is no justification for it.  Setting people on fire, throwing explosives into fires, doing backflips off houseboats and answering rhetorical questions like, “What are you looking at” only add to the risks that ingesting a poison already have on your mind and body.

Unfortunately this not a redemption piece, because I can’t say I haven’t enjoyed a fair portion of my carousing. George Best summed up pretty well when saying words to the effect of, “I’ve spent a lot of money on booze, cars and women, the rest I wasted’. Knowing all the risks I still enjoy a good session with mates, a bit like walking my dog without a lead there is probably no way to defend my behaviour, I do it because I enjoy it. Unlike a politician claiming a friend’s wedding as legitimate business expense, I won’t try to rationalise my stupidity. All I can say is it is not good for me or anybody else, but it can be fun.

 It is however a young man’s game and despite my immaturity I have given up most other young men’s pursuits.  I’m not playing footy anymore (some would argue I never really did), I rarely listen to triple J and I’ve got no idea what anyone under 22 is talking about. I have even gone a step further and sound like an old man with points of view like; music was better in my day, people should bend their caps, pull your stupid pants up and enjoy the outdoors rather than constantly needing technological stimulation.  So fair play, if I’m going to enjoy the next phase of my life by pointing out how much better things were when I was a youth, I need to stop this last immature indulgence. Despite what the ads say 99% of the time it is funny when a young buck*** has too much to drink, but at a certain point, long since passed for me, it is just sad to keep on treading this path.

 I don’t drink to forget, I’m not that sad, I actually drink to get the party started, then keep it going. The opportunities to party down are fewer these days too, every weekend used to be an opportunity to lose friends and kill brain cells, now it seems to be in the annual category (maybe a touch more often). This means I am more excited when on the tear and I’m getting less practice at it, not generally a recipe for success. Perhaps the ads are right have a middy and stay a little bit longer. It sounds better than my occasional practice of crashing and burning in an acrobatic, clumsy, dribbling, obscenity riddled ball of colour and movement. I have hung it on mates for drinking girls beer but it wouldn’t be the first time I changed principle to suit myself, and I am damn sure it won’t be the last. So I apologise for saying we don’t need to switch to light beer we just need to wear flame proof suits, it has come time to abandon the reckless stupidity of youth and enjoy a more mature future.

I haven’t drunk since my last transgression but given it was only a couple of days ago and the injuries still haven’t healed that isn’t saying much. However, again I will say never again, again….until the next time.        

*or sister as the case may be don’t get all political correct just yet.  

**I still have no idea what or who the werewolves of London are though, Warren Zevon.  

***Somebody else’s young buck. As I’ve written in the past my offspring are going to be completely wrapped in cotton wool…and given my history perhaps a Muslim country or Mormon city will need to be found by the time my brood reach drinking age.