Shut up you, you’re no Working Class Man

No posts from me for the next couple of days. I am deeply, deeply tired and sad over gender stuff.In a conversation in which I dared to suggest that gender privilege should be marked and monitored carefully in the same way as other forms of privilege it was declared by a critically engaged and culturally informed male friend that if I do not narrow the focus of my critique of masculinity I “am”

*just another man hater*

full stop. the end.

(the Phallus reserves the right to make such judgments and no correspondence will be entered into)

Not having a phallus myself I am deeply fucking exhausted by the experience of being told I was “just wrong”, of having my ability to define my take on a given situation for myself misinterpreted, used against me and taken away from me. I keep trying to write a new post, but the force has been stripped from my arguments by the disappointment and sadness I am feeling over the fact it’s just that easy. *I am a man, I don’t see it that way, you see it that way because you are a woman, ipso facto, you are wrong and if you think otherwise you are a man hater*

Fuck that. And fuck him for pulling that shit. And fuck misogyny. And fuck this stubborn idiocy of claiming that we don’t have to mark gender privilege. Fuck men assuming that their intention rules the reading of any given situation. Fuck masculine experience being designated ‘neutral’ and therefore having the veto power over female experiences. Fuck men within academia trumping gender with class, as if it’s a goddamned competition, as if we can’t consider both, and the connections between the two, proudly taking up the mantle of being ‘working class’ as if class doesn’t shift with time, experience, education and access to postgraduate studies and facilities, as if class issues don’t also impact unfairly on women. Fuck bowing to men’s take on the situation. Fuck being apologetic.

So I am off to spend an actual weekend in my house, with my child, with my friends, with my boyfriend – if my ability to critique the world around me is going to be neutralized by a few quick phrases then I’m not fucking playing this weekend. I’m going to eat, cook, clean, bum around the house and regroup. I’m also probably never going to receive an apology. After all, I’m only a woman, only a ‘man hater’ therefore aggression towards me, silencing me, misrepresenting my arguments, interrupting and refusing to allow me to speak for myself, reducing my views to being the result of my ‘minority’ status, and concluding ‘I’m wrong’ are totally fucking acceptable…it isn’t like I’ve really got anything to whinge about is it? I’m not a working class man 

The “shrew” is not yet tamed, I think

Well fuck me rigid masculinity pisses me off sometimes!!!

I’ve been in a bit of a grump about the state of the world all week, so it’s a kind of cumulative rage that possesses me today. But I do get very sick of living in a world that gets defined by men, for men. This morning I woke up, and for some self punishing reason, decided to see what Arsehole de Brito had to say about the world. WHY oh WHY do I do it to myself? Worse still I clicked on the comments section! MMMMMMfuckityfuckityfuckinfuckincunts!

Seriously, it’s such a self serving community of bigoted women-haters…they’d argue with that and say they *love* women. I’d counter that they love access to pussy on the condition it’s not too old, is perfectly groomed and comes attached to a conventionally gorgeous and compliant but perky young woman. Also, said pussy has to be available on demand, but not have too many demands of its own, else it gets labelled a “slut”. And in all of this, who makes the calls on defining women? Men. Men just stating ‘facts’, just ‘observing’ truths.

 What was the article about? About a bitch of an old woman having a go at her husband on the beach (oh if ONLY my job was to take one little glimpsed interaction and to spin it out into a full length sound off with no rules about how my article should actually be thoughtful/insightful/a genuine attempt to engage with the issues). The article then touched on male rape in prisons (oh so delightfully referred to as ‘man love’ – love/rape…one of these things is not like the other, right?), concluding that there was none of this happening in the particular prison setting as the guys are 18-21. Clearly then rape would never be an issue.

It was a bit of a diatribe on men needing to grow balls in the face of nagging, gnashing, petty high-strung women. NOW – let me go on the record to say I cannot stand watching two people nag/shout at each other or treat each other poorly in any way. Not defending this behaviour. But an isolated incident turned into a diatribe on Sam’s favourite topic – how men need to grow bigger kahunas in setting boundaries on their women, or their women will run all over them. It’s a bit of a theme for him. Women it appears are quite like children (which is possibly true of the women Sam likes to shag) – if you don’t show them where the limits are they will run riot on a grown up version of the sugar high, and before you know it, your life will be reduced to ruins by a full-scale, adult sized Veruca Salt. Put your foot down Sam, show em whose da boss.

 Anyway, whatever right? Just another fuckwit with a keyboard. But what happens every freaking time is that it becomes a hate fest over women and their maniacal, hysterical ways, the fact they’ll screw you within an inch of your lives if you let em, they’re shrews, harridans, they wanna trap you into marriage and babies, take your money and make you miserable. Poor, poor men. Generalisations are flying around so thick and fast that if you aren’t careful you’ll lose an eye. Now. I do not have a problem with someone observing the behaviour of people in public and then examining it. But in order to examine it, you would need to put some genuine thought into what’s going on. These articles are never truly about resolving these issues and making peoples lives happier, they are about tapping into deep seated bitterness and anger towards women, about reinforcing stereotypes in ways that make people feel good for “knowing” stuff about life. So when it results, every freaking time into a disgusting display of bigotry – then I have a problem with it.

 I’m so sick of being told not to worry about this – I mean I get it. On the one hand, blah blah, be the bigger person, he’s an idiot, not to worry…but, he has access to publication in a mainstream newspaper’s website, he preaches to the masses and the ‘masses’ lap it up. Bigotry towards women is everywhere in society, in its extreme forms, and in ‘jokes’ and song lyrics and leers and generalisations. Why is it that I should just say “water off a duck’s back”? I’m no duck, I’m a woman, and I live in a world where there is appalling levels of violence and hate directed at women, and I’m supposed to put up and shut up?

Well, no. I mean, yeah, I have my own blog. Big deal though, what twenty ppl read me a day? It’s hardly turning the tables on the Sam de Brito’s of the world. To say ‘ignore it’, to say ’start your own blog’ is all well and good, except it ignores the fact of the institutionalised nature of discrimination against women. It’s gonna take way more than a blog to redress that. But apparently it ain’t cool for me to say I’m a feminist, to be angry. I’m supposed to say I live in a “post-feminist” world. All cos of Ally McFuckinBeal. I’ll tell you what? You men who say I’ve got ‘no sense of humour’, I’m ‘too angry’, etc…go out and do something yourselves to ensure that women can walk the streets safely, that they will no longer be beaten, that they can choose if and how and when they would like to procreate, that they can make choices about how to support and care for their families, that they can define their desires and sexuality for themselves, that they can access equal incomes and high positions in the workplace. I’ll sit back and observe, and then I will happily talk about our post-feminist world and laugh at every shitty joke you tell me.

How much cynicism is too much?

I understand that not everyone reading this blog will be living in Australia, or necessarily familiar with Australian politics. But we are in the lead up to a very important Federal Election.  John Howard has held power since 1996 and in this time has managed to strip funding from all manner of institutions and organisations concerned with social justice, divide the nation along the lines of race, cast calls for equality and human rights as the esoteric investment of “special interest groups”, led us into a war based on lies, and been caught out in lies over the “children overboard” scandal and the Australian Wheatboard’s underhanded dealings with Iraq.

From a social justice perspective, his policies, particularly since having control of the Senate during this last term have done lasting damage to some of the most at-risk groups in our country, and the impact of these policies will be felt long after he is removed from power.

 So this election is massively important. And for the first time he has a capable opponent in Kevin Rudd. While not wanting to go into bat for Rudd and all his policies or beliefs, there is so much at stake here, that the first concern for anyone invested in social justics, surely has to be, remove Howard first, ask questions later. While I get that Rudd has not positioned himself as champion of the lefties, and I admit that he infuriated me by going along with the recent laws to allow interventions in Aboriginal communities, I do believe that there are fundamental differences between Howard and Rudd.

 Labor (the party Rudd leads) have long been positioned as lefties/unionists/beholden to special interest groups, and in the cultural and political environment that Howard has fostered in Australia Rudd has to walk a very careful line if he wants to be elected. Don’t get me wrong, I am not excusing that,  I do think it was an unforgivable betrayal to Indigenous Australians to not condemn the form of the interventions proposed by the  Liberal party as retrograde and racist. (This will need to be a future post as it’s a very complicated set of issues involved). I do think that Howard has fostered the latent (and vicious) racism in Australian society against Indigenous Australians, by casting the arguments in terms of ’special interests’ rather than human rights, of ‘neglect of parents’ rather than institutionalised oppression and discrimination, systematic lack of access to resources and assistance. And within this culture, tragically, anyone speaking out and shouting for justice and equality will be branded an irrelevant out of touch radical. It’s bullshit, it’s infuriating, it’s a disgusting topsy-turvy logic, but it’s there.

I do however think that Rudd and a labour government will do more to assist self governement and adequate funding in Indigenous communities and Indigenous support networks and facilities than a Howard government.  In fact it is hardly possible to do worse by Indigenous Australians than the Howard governement has. It truly makes my stomach turn, and makes me utterly ashamed to be Australian to review this governments policies. If I try to put it in my own words, I will cry and not finish. Instead, I will post a link of an excellent summary emailed to me last week by my good friend *U.N girl* While my ideal is a government that’*gets real*, says we are a racist country built on genocide and stolen land and it’s about time we addressed that with serious efforts, so deal with it all you whinging priviledged arseholes, that just aint gonna happen in politics is it?

So, seriously, look at Howards record. Then look at Rudds policies (and get off the too cool for school bandwagon of “Oh, his policies are just Howards” – they are not. There is an overlap that goes both ways, but there is promise of equity in Rudd’s, there is talk of respect in Rudd’s, there is the promise of an apology – knowing full well that an apology will finally open the government up to liability for financial redress, and rightfully so – in Rudd’s. While he isn’t perfect, while he’s done wrong, he does come off as a human being, with a heart and a concern for looking at equity and justice – tell me HOW that’s in any way similar to Howard).

Seriously people, what are we doing when the left is doing the right’s job for them in running Rudd into the ground. He’s not John Howard and right there, that’d be enough for me, even if he had nothing else. But he does. He stopped and said genuinely to Howard that an apology to Indigenous Australians was about respect. Right on. The laws are fucked, I know that, I’m hoping like hell that one of the first things he does when he gets in is review them. But there is more being levelled at Indigenous Australians than those laws, and I truly think that at least Rudd will listen, will think, will weigh and balance, and will stop pandering to big business and racists by casting Indigenous issues as ’special interest’ issues.

 Also, look at education, look at Iraq. I’m not claiming he’s perfect. But fuck, does he have to be? Is it not enough to get Howard the fuck away from our legal system and our budget and instead have in place a government that will at least enter into negotiations with various social groups? That has some good policies in place? That has some concern for being accountable to the United Nations? I mean, please – this is the system we’ve got. These are the choices we’ve got. Howard or Rudd. Stop jumping on the trendy bandwagon and pretending they’re the same, because I’m sorry but if you think that you are just plain wrong. Rudd is playing Howard’s game because he has to, but there are fundamental differences, and I swear to god, if your cynicism leads to apathy and Howard gets back in I will hunt down and kill every one of you because he’ll have another term in which to inflict his special brand of hurt more of the most vulnerable people in our country. I am suggesting that those who are saying there’s no difference perhaps have a little too much privelege if they really think that.

 Article as promised below

The PM and Aboriginal Australia — a timeline

>

> FRIDAY, 12 OCTOBER 2007

>

> Editor of The National Indigenous Times Chris Graham

> writes:

>

> John Howard’s brush with Aboriginal Australia — a

> timeline:

>

> March 1996: In John Howard’s first act as prime minister, he calls a

> press conference and announces his intention to appoint an

> administrator to take over the powers and functions of the ATSIC

> board. It requires a change in the Act, but is blocked in the Senate.

>

> April 1996: Howard announces he will appoint a special auditor to

> investigate allegations of widespread fraud within organisations

> funded by ATSIC. The special auditor finds no such widespread fraud,

> but the Federal Court soon thereafter deems the appointment of the

> special auditor illegal.

>

> May 1996: In his first budget as Prime Minister, Howard announces a

> cut of $470 million from the ATSIC budget, forcing ATSIC to close a

> raft of community and youth support programs, including women’s

> centres.

>

> May 1997: John Howard releases his Wik 10-Point Plan.

>

> May 1997: At the Reconciliation Convention in Melbourne, Howard bangs

> the lectern and shouts at the audience as he claims symbolism will

> deliver nothing, and unofficially launches the policy of ‘practical

> reconciliation’. He also defends his ‘Wik 10 Point Plan’ which

> proposes to amend the Native Title Act (which had come out of the Mabo

> victory).

> The plan was passed by parliament, but decried by the United Nations

> and the international community, which labelled it racist. Members of

> the audience famously turn their backs on Howard as he speaks.

>

> 4th September 1997: John Howard on The 7.30 Report alongside a map of

> Australia with sections coloured brown, “What has happened with Native

> title is that the pendulum has swung too far in one direction,

> particularly after the Wik decision. What I have done with this

> legislation is bring it back to the middle. Let me just show your

> viewers that this shows 78 per cent of the landmass of Australia

> coloured brown on this map. Now, the Labor Party and the Democrats are

> effectively saying that the Aboriginal people of Australia should have

> the potential right of veto over further development of

> 78 per cent of the landmass of Australia.”

>

> August 1999: Howard officially refuses a national apology for members

> of the Stolen Generations, with parliament instead issuing a statement

> of sincere and deep regret.

>

> October 1999: John Howard on the importance of voting yes to the

> preamble for reconciliation, “A preamble is a broad statement of

> values and principles which aim to reflect the spirit, traditions and

> sentiment which underpin our commitment to the Constitution. It would

> also provide Australians with an opportunity to highlight the

> aspirations we share as we enter the second century of our nationhood.

> The great value of the preamble is that it can unite republicans and

> anti-republicans behind commonly held Australian values. It is not

> conditional on whether the republic is supported or rejected. It can

> also make a contribution to the reconciliation process which is one of

> the most important issues we face as a nation as we enter the new

> century. The preamble honours “Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders,

> the nations first people, for their deep kinship with their lands and

> for their ancient and continuing cultures which enrich the life of our

> country”.

>

> 28th May 2000: Howard refuses to attend the Bridge Walks for

> reconciliation.

>

> 29th May 2000: John Howard as quoted on The 7.30

> Report: “I speak for the entire government on this and it’s a matter

> that’s been discussed at great length. We don’t think it’s appropriate

> for the current generation of Australians to apologise for the

> injustices committed by past generations.”

>

> November 2002: The Howard government announces a review into ATSIC.

> The review, which cost over $2 million, recommends reform of the body,

> and a strengthening of the regional council structure and the election

> of local officials. Howard proposes abolition instead.

>

> October 2004: Howard formally dumps ‘reconciliation’

> from the government agenda, axing the ‘Minister Assisting the Prime

> Minister on Reconciliation’

> portfolio during a post-election cabinet reshuffle.

>

> June 2005: Howard abolishes the

> democratically-elected ATSIC. He replaces it with a group of

> hand-picked Aboriginal ‘advisers’ (the National Indigenous Council).

> One of the first acts of the NIC is to recommend the compulsory

> acquisition of Aboriginal land in the Northern Territory.

>

> May 2006: During his visit to Canada, Howard successfully lobbies new

> conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper to reverse Canada’s support

> for the UN’s Draft Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

>

> September 2006: John Howard reacts to the Native Title Noongar win in

> Perth, saying the federal court decision was one of “considerable

> concern”, with the government falsely claiming a day later that even

> beaches in Sydney could be under threat.

>

> June 2007: Howard launches his ‘emergency intervention’ into the

> Northern Territory in response to the Little Children are Sacred

> report.

>

> August 2007: Six weeks after the announcement the Northern Territory

> Emergency Response Act is passed, giving the Government power to

> acquire Aboriginal land for five years and hold back 50% of all

> welfare payments for necessary items. The long standing permit system,

> enacted as part of the 1976 Aboriginal Land Rights Act (Northern

> Territory) is scrapped. The legislation includes exemptions from the

> Racial Discrimination Act.

>

> September 2007: Howard orders his delegates at the UN to vote against

> the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

>

> 11 October 2007: Howard delivers a speech to The Sydney Institute in

> which he introduces “new reconciliation” and a promise to amend the

> preamble to the Constitution to acknowledge Indigenous Australians

> should he be returned to Government at the looming election.

You just think that because you’re a ‘radical’

An interesting thing happened in my office the other day, which, given I work in a suburban law firm, is noteworthy in and of itself. But it isn’t, in fact the end of the story.

 So the wonderful ‘Dred Girl’, who wrote the second half of my ‘about’ section because my headache was so bad I could think of nothing worth saying about myself, and another good friend turned up to my office to pick me up to go to dinner on Friday night, as is our custom. Now these two friends are both passionately left-wing and social-justice oriented women. My boss is a self confessed conservative, and I have to say here, an absolutely lovely man despite our political differences. They have met previously and had good natured political debates and in the past, while I haven’t agreed with his arguments, they’ve stayed pretty ‘grounded’ rather than getting heated or personal. So when they turned up to pick me up I expected a bit of stirring, a bit of banter, then a quick (and long overdue) exit from the office.

While I was finishing up my work, they all began chatting about the upcoming Australian Federal Elections. I got a bit lost on the computer, and the next time I looked up, all three were engaged in a very…how shall I put it? -“energetic”- political debate. All I could think was “I’m really fucking hungry, could we do this another time?”…but evidently we could not. Tempers were beginning to rise in frustration.

 

What started out as a debate ended up with my wonderful, lovely human being of a boss dismissing the very informed opinions of Dred Girl with phrases like “Oh bullshit”, “That’s just not true”. I couldn’t quite fathom what I was seeing. I do believe that a part of him was looking at her dreds, marking her as a radical, and dismissing the idea that she could possibly have any evidence to back up her claims. However, she does. She’s been studying the Howard government’s responses to immigration and Indigenous rights for several years now, and was trying to communicate with him that she could name legislation and cases. But he wasn’t hearing her at all.

 Further to this he kept claiming that her opinion was ‘radical’, and ‘extreme’.  This feeds into my earlier post on just how left or right wing one has to be to be labeled as extreme. Whereas my friend had legislation, cases, dates, facts, empirical data to back up her claims, her use of language immediately put my boss’s back up and had him damning her as just as extreme as a white guy claiming all Aboriginal Australians are “no-hopers”.

How did someone being passionate about a well informed, factually reinforceable political view get conflated with a redneck’s knee jerk racism? Every ‘fact’ this imaginary figure could conjure to ‘prove’ his point could be quickly and easily countered with a mountain of empirical evidence which points to the systemic institutionalization of racism in this country. The best anyone could come up with to counter my friends factual, solid points is about as mature a response as “Oh yeah? I’m rubber; you’re glue, bounces of me and sticks to you”. Or, as actually happened in this office, out of the mouth of a professional adult who is normally exceedingly polite “OH bullshit”. Nothing at all to back that up, just the bald proclamation “bullshit”.

 

One of the things that comes out of this for me is that apparently only right wing people are allowed to use emotive language in this country. It’s fine to label anyone left wing as a ‘hippie’, ‘academic’, ‘bleeding heart’, ‘black armband historian’, ‘ignorant’ or ‘deluded’. But left wing people need to beg for the approval of others, must always keep their voice even, their language neutral, their body language calm. Anger and scorn is ok if you are on the ‘right’ side. Pun intended. If we as left wing people are to get our points across, apparently we have to babysit others through the logical steps in our argument, and mustn’t ever be human enough to get passionate about our beliefs. On the one hand, I often find myself doing this in an order to get my point across, but on the other, is it really our job?

 

Another is that DG was accused of having read “too much” left wing literature. At this point I couldn’t bear anymore and had to interject to point out that the mainstream media is right wing sympathetic. It is not always “extreme” right wing, (although often it is and it still has ‘mass appeal’ and gets deemed ‘common sense’ – think of John Laws and Alan Jones) but for instance, how many times have you read of the ‘fact’ that we’re being “tyrannized” by political correctness, that political correctness has “gone wrong”/ “gone mad”, that post-modernism is cultural relativism, that we live in a post-feminist world? So why is it that when someone reads anything “left wing”, ie critically engaged and questioning of conventional nationalistic narratives, they’re told they’ve read “too much” left wing literature, yet it’s perfectly acceptable for those of a right wing view, to never read any left wing literature, and still expect to be considered as having an informed and balanced opinion? Given the predominance and saturation of right wing information, all someone is doing when they read “left wing” literature, is redressing a serious imbalance and deficiency in information, yet this is cast as enough to ‘skew’ their reasoning and for them not to be taken seriously.

 Anyway, the argument ended, and today my boss apologised and said he got ’carried away’ – we had a chat over coffee and though I had to keep my voice even and soothing, like talking to a skittish horse, he was actually receptive to my points and seemed to have considered some of our points over the weekend. It’s no people’s revolution, but you know, it’s nice that he’s taking some stuff on board.  Anyway…I’ve ranted to the end of my lunch break. No concluding paragraph, just the end and a promise to crap on about this, or something vaguely related to it some time soon.  

“Keep it secret, keep it safe”

So for a long time now I’ve been thinking about doing this kind of blog, political rants and arguments, hopefully amusing.

One of the things that put me off (apart from my aforementioned laziness) was the issue of safety. A friend of a friend had a left wing blog/website, and was copping some pretty nasty death threats from Neo Nazi groups. There were a few stories in the media about arrests of Neo Nazis and death threats they’d made to left wing writers. 

Now on the one hand I don’t flatter myself that my writing is of any particular significance. On the other hand – these dudes appear to be crazy and I don’t think they weigh things up on a rational basis…before deciding you should die.  

So – anyway, one of my concerns was keeping my anonymity. Which I think I may already have blown. But this is beside the point. It got me to thinking…left wing people are always portrayed as radical and dangerous, and yet – and feel free to contradict me with some evidence – you so rarely hear of left wing death threats against right wing writings.

And also there’s something about how left or right wing the writings need to be before attracting threats of violence.  A left wing blog joking around and taking the piss out of current politics, and advocating zany ideas like “Hey kids, discrimination ain’t cool” garners significant numbers of scary loonies making nasty threats. A similar level of “right wing-ness” to me would be most mainstream news articles whereby anyone claiming that there has been a whitewash of history is derided as being a lunatic, as deluded…or am I crazy?

Actually, you know that’s even *more* right wing.  The left wing argument that everyone should have access to fundamental services and be treated with respect is, it would appear to me, rational, inoffensive and doesn’t harm anyone. The right wing news article slamming anyone who contests official history is offensive to those writers/academics who have challenged the dominant view (in that they are being called stupid/ignorant/deluded etc), and more importantly is massively disrespectful to the stories of those people challenging the dominant stories of history, who are asking to be heard, and for their experiences to be recognized. 

So…getting back to the point…take these two as equivalent (even thought they are not equivalent in their impact and offensiveness and the reach of their ideas, and that’s another point worthy of its own post)… there are death threats leveled at the left wing group. But when’s the last time you heard of one of the many, many right wing “opinions” columnists or “historians” (ahem) – who slag off those daring to challenge the dominant stories of national history – being bombarded with death threats by a left wing group?

Now I’m sure there are isolated incidences, but it seems that right wing groups are much more interested in menace as a tactic, than left wing groups. And yet everyone panics at a left wing protest. 

So to take a reasonable point and reduce it to a smart arse one liner – is this the evidence we’ve all been waiting for? That right wing=crazy fuckers?? Are they, as a group statistically more inclined to be a little bit ‘insane in the membrane’? Well, sorry kids, I’ve got no conclusion. Just like starting arguments. For that to happen I’d actually have to have a reader or two. Perhaps I should alert the nearest Neo Nazi group.  Anyway, on a completely unrelated and tangential note:(the LOTR reference in the title is the link) check out the link below if you’re interested. A vid of Legolas and Aragorn set to “Hungry Eyes” - so, so good. It’s a romance meant to be. Epic. Oh boy, now that would be a vid worth watching. Gonna go ponder that some more and leave you to check it out (or not) at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RbstkXowlAc Hope the link works, as previously mentioned, not great with tech stuff    

And now for the exchange

So. After getting riled about Sam in the City’s Oh-So-Insightful addition to the new, refreshing and utterly astonishing topic of Sluts v Studs, Is there a Double Standard in the House (forget the real title), I read Sam de Brito’s article on racial slurs.
So – if you wanna see it, you’ll have to check it out at:

*It’s VERY bad, and very offensive, so don’t say I didn’t warn you*

http://blogs.smh.com.au/lifestyle/allmenareliars/archives/2007/10/where_do_we_stand_with_racial.html

And then – at work, trying to keep on top of the things I was being paid to do, so I sit with pen and paper and write an alphabetical list of resonses to each of his ‘points’. Still riding high on the wave of my indignation, I hop online, type furiously, realise a few points are repetitive and (*oh no*, I hear you say…*oh yes!!!*) I delete some friggin points. And hit send. So. I reread it and my heart sinks. I’ve missed letters C, F, and L. Shit. Way to look like a fool. Anyway, we can always hope they don’t notice right:

So, here’s my response, and Sams little addendum:
Oh God. How boring!
Let’s see:
A/Why do you say Simmonds and the Indian crowd are of ’similar race’ – what do you mean here? “Non white”??
B/ with what authority to you proclaim it’s a It’s a Hollywood cliche that it’s fine for a black man to call another man “nigger” but a cause for physical violence if a white guy does the same? How would you know the thoughts and experiences of people who face discrimination, police harrasment etc and who know people have been hanged for being a ‘nigger’?
D/You say it’s ok to call someone a ‘wog’ – ok for whom? It’s still rude and racsist. With any words, if you are friends, and have an understanding about the use of certain words, that is one thing, but if not, just don’t
E/Why is the “question” of ppl of “similar” racial backgrounds “far worse” than the blatent racism described in your expample??
G/You pity the taunters and that’s your choice. It doesn’t excuse racism, doesn’t remove the harm done historically (think of lynchings, stolen generations etc – remember your experience is not that of everyones, and certain discriminations have been more violent than others)
H/Language is always being altered and redeployed but it doesn’t mean that words with a history of violence and bigotry get to ok for general use. Those oppressed by the words have the choice of how to respond to or redeploy those words, and what’s more, they don’t have to agree with each other just because they are of a “similar” race, and more than you and i have the same opinions
I/”Blackfella” is ok, according to you. According to who else? While Indigenous Australians have often redeployed terms used to oppress and wound as a source of defiance, humour and pride, that doesn’t mean it is ok for us, living off the profits of stolen land and wages to use that term.
J/Who exactly considers “Leb” and “Lebo” to be ‘neutral’ terms? Perhaps the thug chasing a guy screaming “Kill the lebs” in one of the attempted attacks at Cronulla agrees with you
K/Exactly why would any white person, knowing the use and context of the word ‘boy’ as used by whites against African Americans, say “my boy” to a person with dark skin ever?
M/The Irish do not currently face beatings/lynchings/systematic discrimination in Australia in the same way that other groups do. That’s the difference

Please never let me sit next to you at dinner. – Sam

I think about letting this slide…and come down in favour of letting fly – with

Oh Sam, I would never make the mistake of sitting next to you at a dinner table. You may think you are witty and funny, but you’re terribly, horribly boring.

To which HE then replies with

Sssssssssss. It’s like listening to a blank tape. – Sam

So. That’s enough, right? Wrong.

I get called boring in response by a dude who picks up the missing letter issue. Fine, fair call (on the latter). Then another dude calls me ‘too stupid for words’. I think on this, decide I don’t care…except…he didn’t bother to engage with the argument, just pointed out two, and two only of the missing letters as follows

Just for future reference, “c” comes between b and d, and “f” comes between e and g.

So, maybe if your so bored you could use the time learning the alphabet.

Today’s lesson was brought to you by the letter w for wanker and the number 2 for “you are just 2 stupid for words”.

(NOICE, huh?)
So I said
Hey ‘****’ [not sure about rules in naming names] – I know exactly where c and f are in the alphabet. I kept them aside to use on you.

You wanna call me stupid? How about addressing my arguments rather than critiquing my deployment of the alphabet? And if I’m too stupid for words, try looking up your/you’re and using the correct version next time. Also re-read it. I also missed l – you know, for loser??

Posted by: had enough on October 18, 2007 9:24 A

Sigh. So you know. After that all day yesterday and last night and this morning…my head HURTS!!!

A little disclaimer here – don’t give a shit about spelling when it comes to blogs. I type fast, I make typos, everyone does, arseface included…I wouldn’t have picked a fight over his grammatical error had he not been such a prick over the missing letters, and had he stuck to the issues at hand.

Gotta dash. This blogging thing is addictive, and I’m molding to the computer chair.

oooohhhhh help me. I’m a ranter not a techie

So. Having ‘popped a spaz’ over the shithouse content of mainstream news service blogs I typed the following last night (or maybe the night before…since the following shit attack over “Sam in the City” (LAME) on the SMH website, I got myself involved in an online sledge-off with Sam de Brito of “All Men Are Liars” fame (ahem) on the SMH site. Check the fucker out and bombard him with counterarguments). Figured I’d get me a blog and whack it on…but my head hurts, I can’t find my glasses, and I have NO idea what all these buttons are for. I’ll get better. Here goes:

Allright (cheers *Author Boy*, I know it’s not ‘a word’ but, you know, it’s common parlance).
I have officially had enough – here it comes. I am, I freely admit, a lazy bastard! I’m an ‘ideas man’, I get all excited over a new idea for a movie, a comedy skit, some new political agitation…and then time passes and nothing happens.

But today, the thing that’s really on my tits is that every time I look at a newspaper/magazine I am astonished by the fuckwits who get given the privilege of being published, and get PAID for their shithouse writing. This in itself hasn’t been enough motivation to do what I’ve been talking about for years and actually start my own blog, but today I had a little ‘snap’.

NOW – a little disclaimer. I am not a professional writer. I like to write, I get fired up and I think that I have some things to say (occasionally) worth saying…it is this I believe that will distinguish me from Sam de Brito, ‘Ask Sam’ and Miranda Devine (that’s right, hate em, if you don’t like it, feel free to stop reading here and I won’t give a shit). I am fiercely political and I will not sit down and shut up. According to my boss I have a pathological avoidance of using proper paragraphs, and as will become apparent, I have very little grasp of the rules of grammar. So if you’re tempted to write in and criticise me for this, don’t waste your time. These things are unlikely to ever change. You like right-wing bullshit? Go buy a newspaper.

Right, now that’s out of the way, let me tell you what FINALLY prompted me to do this (at the cost of cooking a proper dinner for my son, who is now enjoying a tuna, cheese and mayo melt instead of the planned meal).

An article on the stud/slut hypocrisy. Are your eyes rolling back into your head yet? (Take that, *Fabric Boy*, a masterfully spaced paragraph, no?)

Right, well, if you rolled your eyes cos you’re sick of ‘feminist ranting’ then, save your time and energy and fuck off now. There’s a billion ways to get your misogynist kicks out there, so you know, go away. As you may have been alerted to by the website title, I am not interested in politeness.

You wanna know why? I have to live in a world where rape is used as a tool of war. Where even in countries where civil unrest is not an issue, one in four women will report being raped, one in four women will be beaten by their partner. I have to live in a county in which we have systematically tried to extinguish the rightful owners, through genocide, incarceration, forced use of English, dispossession, slave labour, withheld wages and stolen children. Where laws which step up the attacks against Indigenous communities passed with barely a word of opposition. A world in which people can be beaten and killed for their sexuality, where the rule of law can be tossed out the window for ‘special cases’, where left-wing is equated with ‘radical lunacy’. So I am saying “Fuck Politeness” – I have to live in this world, in this country, in this society. But I don’t have to use ‘manners’ when I talk about it. It shits me off and right here I’m gonna say so as loud, as often, and with as many expletives as I please.

Now I’m tired and hungry so I’ll see you all later. (By the way – all for politeness in everyday life, I’m polite to everyone. What I’m talking about is refusing to be polite in the face of pressure to shut up, to swallow the lies I’m being fed, to not be angry, to ‘play nice’ – I’m pissed that when Bob Brown and Kerry Nettle stood up and asked Bush to answer questions about David Hicks, they were called ‘impolite’ – when people’s lives are at stake, the only acceptable response is “FUCK POLITENESS” (or “I believe I will bypass politeness in favour of speaking my mind” if you are really against swearing).

Sleep well!