Wow Hugh Mackay, nice sermon

So Hugh Mackay is in the SMH today banging on about forgiveness and how forgiveness is the only authentic signal of acceptance of an apology.

Yes, he *is* talking about the apology to Indigenous Australians regarding the Stolen Generations.

He counsels that the remarkable Amish have unconditionally forgiven a guy who killed five little Amish girls – so what’s doing Indigenous Australia? Hugh tells us we’ve all been wronged, so buck up emo kids! I mean it’s not like it was systematic, institutionalised, routine and racist, it’s not like you were left powerless when the government decided to swoop in ‘for your own good’, it’s not like we all know that it was far more than five little girls, and it’s not like the apology changed nothing, left racism oppression and violence in place and the government refuses to consider the compensation we KNOW would be demanded if it had happened to white kids…oh…wait. It is.

Essentially Hugh Mackay’s article boils down to ‘I once had a pen stolen from this guy at work, and I was SO angry with him, but he apologised to me, and I forgave him…yes, after my pen was returned undamaged. How’s that relevant?’

I have no beef with forgiveness – you know, there are times when it can be liberating. But an apology is not a ‘get out of jail free’ card, it’s not something that means you don’t have to make amends properly, it’s not something that means what you did wrong never gets discussed again, or gets forgotten. I’m a little tired of this happy clappy christian take on forgiveness – you just *do* it, because it’s right, because it’s freeing, because it’s What Jesus Would Do. I think we all remember that before God decided that his son could mystically take on the sin of the world, get the shit beaten out of him and get nailed to a tree as the cost of His Unconditional Forgiveness, that God’s ‘justice’ demanded plagues and the slaughter of innocent babies in reparation/retribution for the enslavement of His People right? No one is advocating the slaughter of babies in retribution here, but let’s all stop and remember what God’s justice looked like, and how the newer form came about before we get all giddy on the joy horse of pushing unconditional God-like forgiveness shall we?

So I have no problem with forgiveness of itself, except that it leaves no place, if you dig your heels in and insist on this forgiveness as a right concomitant with a delivered apology, for real respect for other beings and their hurt, for justice, for reparation, for ensuring history doesn’t repeat itself. It’s not something you can petulantly demand. You’re only really in a position to ask for it when you’ve done everything in your power to make things right.

Hugh Mackay’s little missive might have come off a little better if the current government had halted the intervention and made real inroads into support for Indigenous communities, if Aboriginal deaths in custody were taken seriously, if magistrates weren’t referring to Indigenous women as having ‘faces like squashed tomatoes’.

It might have come off a lot better if it weren’t in the same edition of the SMH as a story about how an Indigenous kid is in court facing charges for having recieved a stolen fucking Freddo frog.

You think we’re past it Hugh Mackay? When the days where a whitey could go to jail for stealing a loaf of bread are over, but an Aboriginal kid steals a packet of Tim Tams and the mandatory sentencing laws kick in? And someone who EATS a fucking Freddo that someone else flogged (hands up who HASN’T eaten a stolen chocolate bar before? I have, I also flogged a small bottle of perfume and $20 from a collection plate as a teenager…summon the police!) gets hauled away to languish at a cop shop for hours on a school morning?

Hugh Mackay? You’re definitely a strong contendor for the Friday Fuckwit.

[More on the 'It's all about me and my experience of forgiveness': Steve Fielding says he was sexually abused as a child and:

"I was sexually abused as a child by a scoutmaster for years," he told reporters in Canberra today, adding his heart went out to anyone with a similar experience.

"I have very strong emotions and feelings on this issue."

But providing victims with compensation was a separate issue to the apology, he said.

Firstly, I'm sorry that happened Mr Fielding, really I am. However, it's not the same - it's not the government systematically tearing children away from their families after condoning massacres etc. Second, compensation to sexual assault victims *is* in fact possible through the courts. Third, you seem to be implying it would be morally 'wrong' of you to pursue compensation via the Scouts. Fuck that shit. They're responsible for the actions of their organisation and its agents, and if they didn't take enough care to ensure this didn't happen, I'm a-ok with them being required to provide compensation. Them and the church. Fourth, if compensation and apologies are so different, why did you decide to raise them together (though admittedly it's probably a bit of a hot topic today)? Fifth, newsflash hairdo, not all about you. I was beaten by a man - does that mean that I can stand in the shoes of Indigenous Australians who were stolen from their families by government actions aimed at eradicating aboriginality? That I can 'know their pain'? That I can say 'Well I don't want compensation therefore you shouldn't get it/that I 'forgive' so you should too? No. The fact that you were sexually abused has got NOTHING to do with systemic and institutionalised governmental wrongdoings - when the government fucks it up they should fix it up. Also, fuck it, I don't forgive the guy. He didn't make amends, he can get fucked. I've released it, it has nothing to do with my life now, but fucked if I should extend forgiveness to a self involved partner-beater even if he says the 'magic word']

Charles and Camilla

Well tigtog from over yonder at Hoyden About Town has a post up about how the anti-Camilla crap gets her riled.

I really hadn’t thought about it you know – I grew up in a bit of a working class area and anti-Camilla jokes were a dime a dozen. I’m sure I was guilty of some teenaged bitchy comments about Charles cheating on Diana with Camilla and what the heck was that about? (Being young and snotty and assuming no one over 30 was worth looking twice at) I had no idea of the back story of them being madly in love but him being forced into marriage with Diana, or honestly any idea of anything at that age being busy being a snotty know it all.

But reading tigtog’s articulation of just why the anti-Camilla campaign bothered her, it hit me like a ton of bricks how wrong it is that this woman is lambasted simply for appearing her (and his) age, and considered ‘ugly’ for that. I really think it’s the first time I’ve genuinely looked at Camilla.

The photos included are really rather sweet – they clearly enjoy each other’s company immensely, and in a comment Rachel WA linked to another photo stream in which their obvious mirth made me laugh out loud and maybe fall a little bit in love with them as a couple.

Who knows what they’re like as people, but as a couple, well honestly, if you’ve known each other that long and give each other that much joy and delight? I think that’s pretty frackin awesome.

!!

!!

This might strike you as odd from someone calling themselves ‘Fuckpoliteness’ but that picture makes me squeamish.

I’m really not a big ‘prude’, you know? My son knows about sex/bodies etc, we laugh over double entendres, I swear like a trooper and he swears at appropriate moments and in appropriate places. He’s twelve. He’ll jokingly say ‘Shut up’ or ‘Oh bugger off’, or flip me the bird when we’re arsing around. So I’m not Captain of the OHMYGOD but he’s a KID brigade.

But there is something kinda depressing about this pic. I really hope it’s a digital manipulation thing…please?

I mean look at those pudgy dimply hands…and then that look on his face…total macho aggro ‘Fuck YOU Ref!’ and then the baby teeth? Gyyeeeeaaaragh! He’s like some British soccer hoodlum’s Mini-Me.

I laughed my arse off at that baby pic from ages ago with a baby pulling a random crazy-face that someone had typed over to say ‘I’ll stab you cunts’…but because it was such a juxtaposition. The baby was just caught pulling a random face, and the interpretation was funny cos it looked accurate, but couldn’t be/wasn’t…but this? Not so much funny to me.

“Oh Fuckpoliteness, WHY are feminists ruining our fun?”

“I mean really!?? WHY must you consistently work at deluding yourself into a belief that women are not afforded equal respect in this society? Get with the times! Look at all those female school teachers (feminazis seizing control of the education system and raising stunted children bound and muzzled by the ludicrous restraints of political correctness)! You got the vote, you get to work (getting paid less than men for the same roles and having the social pressure to be the primary carer for kids and having your employees milk you for all the extra hours they can even when your kids are sick, and if you look half broken asking if it’s ‘that time of the month’…but you GET to work! Why it’s been a while now since universities controversially decided that humans with vaginas are still humans and could therefore possibly be allowed a university education! Sure the first chick at Sydney Uni faced so much fucking hostility she bailed and went to Scotland to finish her studies, but FARK…that’s all OVER! And sure, okay, there are those Islamic countries where women are disrespected, and okay, sometimes some uneducated redneck (or footballer) might beat or rape a woman, but REALLY – that hardly ever happens, and women are equal (and liars about rape) and viewed as equal so if you want to think otherwise you’re just playing the victim – why don’t you get empowered with a pole dancing class?”

Well dear (fabricated) arsehole reader: let’s discuss St Paul’s college at Sydney University shall we? These wonderfully educated, privleged and pampered little tossers wear formal wear to dinner every night, that’s JUST how much wankery goes into ‘Did you get the message? You are Very Important People’.

Their parents have already paid more than most of us will earn in a lifetime so they can brag about their kids fluency in Latin, or deftness with a ball made from pigskin. These fine upstanding pillars of our society are the boys/men we should allegedly look up to/hope for our kids to be like – they should be a decent barometer of where it’s ‘really’ at, or where it’s going, shouldn’t they? I mean no ’school of hard knocks, grew up on the farm, had me ears clipped if I slept in, harden-the-fuck-up’ upbringing to blame for outbursts of uncouth aggression. These aren’t those ’scarifying Muslims’ from out West preying on our girls! These are the landed gentry, the diligent and respectable future of our country, the professionals-cum-politicians, the leaders in waiting. So what, pray tell do these wealthy respectable erudite leaders-in-waiting have to say on gender equity, the role of women in society and the way forward for society?

‘They can’t say no with a c–k in their mouth” read the hand-drawn graffiti in the Salisbury Bar, part of St Paul’s residential college on the University of Sydney campus.

Just for anyone confused, that would be COCK, not cookie, chicken or cook.

Here’s hoping that anyone these little fuckers (and their oh-so-precious cocks) come into contact with have razor sharp incisors and jaws like a bear trap. But happy-daydream-scenarios of a couple of torn off cocks stapled to the wall in the same spot as the graffiti with a handwritten message of “I think they can” aside – we know this is not the reality of how this will play out.

These students are men – they are eighteen, entitled to vote, drive a car and drink (I’d say hopefully not at the same time, but why the hell not, Daddy knows someone who could smooth it all over if they did). They have the best education considerable piles of money can buy, from the ‘finest’ institutions. They *allegedly* have the finest moral upbringing one could ask for, what with their shelter from the ‘uncouth’ ways of the poor and rough and their religious schools instilling their lessons in strict morality and proper conduct. They have every chance in life and no ‘excuses’. And they *know full well* that not only can they hold these attitudes towards women but they can fucking flaunt them, scream them from the roof tops, rub women’s noses in them. They didn’t just ‘not know’ it was ‘wrong’ to talk about/treat women this way, they *learned* the lesson that women are objects and they are the only real subjects, the only people who matter, they *learned* the ‘boys club’ lessons. They learned they’ll get away with it. And then they’ll settle down and marry and no one will be any the wiser.

The girls/women they rape will unfortunately NOT be physically able to bite their trouble making cocks off. They will be raped, presumably by someone laughing at their trauma. And they will be shamed. They will be blamed. Their sense of control over their bodies and what should happen to them will be torn from them by a bunch of entitled little misogynists. Their sense of safety can be destroyed in an instant because these boys have *learned* that it’s safe and acceptable to carry these attitudes towards women. And these guys are the guys with the very best chances of getting away with it permanently…with no blemish on their records. And to go on to positions of power safe and smug in the knowledge that they are invincible – they can do anything and get away with it.

So if you happen to be the next person to ask me why I’m a feminist…or to tell me that women ‘are so too’ equal? Just be forewarned that I’m likely to be slightly LOUD and unpleasant in my response okay?

[E.T.A Please go read Mary's much more thoughtful and insightful post on the matter @ Hoyden About Town

Also, I'd really love it if people could be clear that rape and condoning rape is the problem, not being drunk. While I understand that alcohol and violence have a complex and enmeshed relationship, it keeps appearing to me as though people are like 'Rape, yes, bad - oh to stop binge drinking'. I hope like HELL they mean the drinking of the men is the issue, and not that women were drunk, but even then...they did not rape because they were drunk, and they did not think rape was fucking HILARIOUS stuff to post about because they were drunk. RAPE is the issue. I'm all for alcohol being seen as dangerous, but let's not act as though it's a Jekyll/Hyde thing where but for that last malted beverage no one would have been raped.

And another thing - in the article discussing the college there's a quote re the St Paul's experience:

''All the facilities of the college are designed to ensure that men have the greatest possible amenity and can spend as little of their life as possible dwelling on mundane, domestic arrangements."

While I'm not suggesting that if they had to fold their own sheets they wouldn't rape, I'm a bit taken aback by that being seen as a social good/social service...ah more fully grown men thinking the house cleans itself, and that dinner will present itself as the Just Rewards for Manliness, and when they realise it doesn't they'll just get a wife - a 'nice' wife and look fondly back on the days where the Universe provided and they could rape whomever they wanted. I'm afraid I *do* think there's a link with handing all of the 'Fun Bits' of life to 'men' on a platter and making them believe that life is like that, that 'mundane domestic arrangements' just take care of themselves or that is what a woman or servant is for (or indeed that the domestic is mundane etc), and the sense of entitlement and superiority they carry in all areas to such devastating effect in this area]

 

[E.T.A more links rounded up at H.A.T here including links to Penguin Unearthed and News With Nipples posts which I've been meaning to add links to]

HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEELP!!!!!!!!!

I don’t suppose anyone happens to know someone who lives on the Central Coast of NSW and who would like to get away for Christmas?

I have a lovely shiny little apartment in a nice area in Sydney with a barbeque on the balcony which sleep three easily, and four or five at a stetch, and pretty much I’m hoping someone up there likes the idea of coming down to Sydney for a week around Christmas so we can swap.

There are plenty of cafes and restaurants nearby and the city is a fifteen minute bus trip away.

So if you know anyone who’s keen to ‘get away’ and wouldn’t mind a bit of a house swap please let me know. Potentially they could take my place for up to three weeks, and I really only need theirs for a week.

I have *that* option, or paying for a hotel, or paying (literally hundreds of dollars) for a cleaner for Mum’s place. Frankly swapping with someone would be less stressful, and far cheaper, particularly given Christmas is always expensive and I’m planning holidays around then.