Three short years ago, Mark Zuckerberg was a Harvard psychology dropout who’d invented a quirky little social networking site called Facebook in his dorm room. Today he's worth $3 billion on paper! This week the 23 year old sold a 1.6% stake in the wildly popular web 2.0 utility to Microsoft for $15 billion after that other former geek, Bill Gates, won a bidding war with Google.

Facebook is a Generation Y phenomenon which is spreading faster than a Californian wildfire but maintains super-cool status among its 50 million international adherents. Rupert Murdoch’s My Space is just so 'yesterday'! In fact, with a weekly membership growth rate of approximately 3.5 % Facebook looks set to surpass its News Corporation competitor in official popularity inside nine months. And Australia has one of the fastest growing membership rates in the world.

So, what’s so special about Facebook? Well, at this point I should declare an interest in this story. I’m an undiagnosed FB addict! A couple of years ago I was randomly poked in the arm by one of my ex-students and when I asked “What was that for?” she answered excitedly “I’m poking you…you know, like on Facebook!” No, I didn’t know. She explained that FB was a social networking site where you effectively had your own webpage which worked like a public diary, photo album and email facility all of which was bundled together with loads of fun, time-wasting applications…like the poking thing. More on that later. Anyway, I dismissed the phenomenon with a wave of my hand back then but fast forward to this August and I was finally persuaded to sign-up by the same ex-student, now a practising lawyer. And, guess what? I was immediately hooked.

Within 24 hours of signing up, I’d scoured FB for every person I could ever remember meeting and asked them all to be my Facebook friends. This is part of the strange appeal of FB – people collect ‘friends’ like trophies. It reminds me of a High School popularity contest and it’s got a competitive edge that appeals to my inner journalist. In fact, I’m currently engaged in an FB friends race with another former student and I’m beating the pants off her. Rebecca has 14 friends…I have 56. The fact I feel like poking out my tongue at her at this moment demonstrates both how whimsically appealing Facebook is and how much I need serious psychological help to get over this addiction!

So what's a 37 year old academic doing on Facebook? One of my young FB friends rudely wrote on my 'wall' (the graffiti-like space that you use to communicate with your network) that he didn’t think FB allowed people born before 1980 to join. But I’m not the only oldie swimming around in FB land. I have Facebook friend who’s a 51 year old journalism professor (I won’t out him here…but he knows who he is). He initially ridiculed my interest in FB, arguing he had no time for it. But who’s cross promoting his blogs, column and research site on FB now, eh? And I’ve also claimed my 53 year old Vice Chancellor (the rather hip Prof. Stephen Parker) as an FB friend after convincing him to sign-up. Mind you, I was laughed at the other night by a high-flying Chief Financial Officer when I espoused the professional networking merits and academic usefulness of FB to him. I bet him it would outstrip My Space’s value and who’s laughing now, David?

So, who’s still wondering about the ‘poking’ thing? I mentioned this double entendre in an earlier post (Techno Vibes) but to re-cap – it’s an innuendo rich action which involves you clicking on the image of a pointing finger to attract your friends’ attention or just let them know you’re thinking of them. Actually, ‘Superpoking’ has now superceded ‘poking’. With ‘Superpoke’ you can send flowers, throw a chicken or even trout-slap your mates. And just moments ago I was hugged via yet another variation on the poking applications. Trust me, it’s really a lot more fun than it sounds. (Looking for that psychologist’s number as I type)

On a more serious note, I do find Facebook to be a great tool for communicating with students and keeping track of ex-charges – an important facet of professional journalism training and mentoring. And I also make use of my FB page to incite debate about politics, promote discussion about journalism issues and research topics, and link to this blog. So, while I admit it can be a big time-wasting distraction, it really does have broader merit than the initial appearance of a bunch of loosely connected high-school cliques.

It’s also a great tool for cross-cultural communication; journalists are using it to aid research and as an adjunct to their contact books; and politicians are exploiting it as a campaign tool. Federal Labor leader, Kevin Rudd has his page open to all comers and he’s notched up 4,960 friends to date. Prime Minister John Howard also has an FB page - he isn’t showing and telling, though (I’ll let you do the political analysis on this one). And, importantly, given the criticisms levelled at Gen Y regarding their capacity to build meaningful relationships, FB is also a space where I’ve watched friendships grow and care and affection publicly expressed – that can’t be a bad thing in a world torn apart by injustice, war and terror, can it? Of course, this is a particularly Western, middle class phenomenon – poverty and poor access to 21st century communications limit the availability of FB to the developing world, where access to food, health care and fresh drinking water take priority over online social networking.

But while columns and columns are being dedicated to analyses of the FB phenomenon, and the critics emerge from the woodwork, Mark Zuckerberg can afford to sit back and count his FB friends and watch his business and his profits grow…ca-ching, ca-ching, ca-ching. Half his luck and talent.

Ps I wonder if Mark would be interested in issuing shares on a time-wasted-on-FB-basis. I know one journalism academic who could become an instant billionaire!    [read more]

Australia’s Foreign Minister, Alexander Downer, sounded like a posh private school boy exasperated at being walloped in a debate by some working class upstart when he appeared on radio today. This is because he was.

Former pig-shooter and Guantanamo Bay inmate, David Hicks, continues to haunt the Howard Government on the election campaign trail despite being behind bars in Adelaide’s Yatala prison and subject to a gag order.

For five years, while Hicks languished in the notorious US military prison without charge but under suspicion of involvement in terrorism connected to his Taliban activities, the Howard government demonised him and refused to intercede on his behalf. That was until the eventual public backlash against his (mis)treatment threatened to turn the Hicks case into an election issue.

Within weeks of the government changing its tune and calling on the Americans to charge or release Hicks, a plea deal was struck at the highest level which resulted in the Adelaide father of two entering a guilty plea to one charge of ‘providing material support for terrorism’ in exchange for his repatriation to Australia. Hicks was ultimately sentenced to nine months jail in Adelaide’s Yatala prison and he’s due for release on December 30th.

At the time, the government denied it had done a political deal to secure Hicks’ release before the election and ensure he was behind bars on polling day. But revelations from US military sources this week appear to put the lie to that claim. The respected magazine Harpers carried an article from a US Civil Rights lawyer who quoted an unnamed military officer saying “Vice President Dick Cheney interfered directly to get Hicks’ plea bargain deal… He did it apparently as part of a deal cut with Howard.”

The Chief Prosecutor in the Hicks case, Colonel Mo Davis, today lent weight to those claims, telling ABC Radio he resigned his post in response to high level meddling with the judicial process in the Hicks case. “Unfortunately in my opinion, politics has inserted itself in the process so it’s, in my view, no longer a military commission, it’s become political,” he said. Colonel Davis says he was taken by surprise when the plea bargain was announced to the court after a deal was struck at levels above his head, disconnected from the judicial process. And he claims Hicks got off lightly.

Alexander Downer was clearly angry about these claims when he appeared today on another ABC radio program. “I mean honestly and truly,” he said, urging listeners to trust him. “I was exasperated by the amount of time it took and I thought that the public criticism of…no, and a lot of people were not supporters of David Hicks but they thought it was taking too long.” Not a particularly convincing performance and he was clearly rattled by the line of questioning from Virginia Trioli: “You’re just blackening our names. That’s all you want to do," he protested. I wonder what David Hicks would have to say in response to that complaint?

John Howard, who earlier in the year denied intervening in the case, was today telling a different story. “Of course I plead guilty to having asked both the President and the Vice President, within whatever power they had, to accelerate resolution of the matter,”he told another ABC presenter. His argument, though, was that this intervention was good and proper.

Meantime, Hicks’ father, Terry, who campaigned tirelessly for his release from Guantanamo, is once again a thorn in the side of the Howard government. He is raising questions about separate ABC reports that the Australian Federal Police are considering slapping a control order on Hicks when he’s released from jail. According to the ABC his movements and communications would be restricted and he’d be required to report to the police for up to a year if the order is applied. Terry Hicks is calling for a meeting with the AFP, saying such an order could destroy his son’s life.

And, with echoes of the Hicks matter, the Dr Mohamed Haneef case is also continuing to plague the government with the AFP Commissioner, Mick Keelty, admitting to the Bulletin magazine today that he advised the Director of Public Prosecutions not to lay charges against the Gold Coast Hospital registrar who was falsely accused of involvement in the June terror attacks in Edinburgh. The Immigration Minister, Kevin Andrews, cancelled Dr Haneef’s visa on the grounds he was of bad character after the charges against him were dropped. The decision was overturned by the Federal Court but the Federal Government is appealing the decision and the matter is set down for hearing on November 15th – ten days before polling day.

Dr Haneef’s lawyer says he’s astounded at the AFP Chief’s admission which will be inadmissible at the appeal due to the rules of evidence precluding the tendering of new information.

It’s almost surreal watching the government stumble on its back foot on these issues of ‘national security’ during an election campaign. It was just six years ago, during the 2001 election that the ‘Children Overboard’ and ‘Tampa’ scandals underlined the electorate's racist response to the fear of terror whipped up by Howard’s ‘dog whistle’ politics. This time around, though, the Howard Government appears to be unraveling on similar issues. Could it be that the electorate will no longer be bluffed by the race card and has finally had enough of the so-called ‘War on Terror’?    [read more]

OK blokes, have you ever wondered what goes on behind the doors of those sweet-smelling vessels of female indulgence and escapism known as day-spas? Let me enlighten you.

During a much-needed retreat to Noosa with my best friend last weekend (see Long Division post below) we booked in for the ‘Ultimate Indulgence Package’ at the Aqua Day Spa in search of beautification and relaxation. I was admittedly a little nervous about the experience – particularly when I read that I’d be the subject of a ‘full body kelp wrap’. I pictured myself, dignity stripped, being served as gourmet sushi at a Japanese restaurant.

So, what was the full body wrap experience like? Well it was a little embarrassing – a feeling I suspect had something to do with the disposable paper g-string I was required to wear throughout!! I know I don’t ‘get out’ much but I honestly thought that thing was a shower cap until I joined the dots and my friend found me staring at it, perplexed, in the salubrious surrounds of the change room. “What am I supposed to do with this?” I asked her. I mean, I’m all for sexy underwear but there was something really off-putting about this little number! The fact that she (approaching two metres in height with a body to rival Nicole Kidman’s) looked so amazing in her paper g-string didn’t help! But I got brave and donned the flimsy thing and just hoped the kelp-wielding beauty therapists wouldn’t laugh at me.

On a bench in the elegant waiting area were oatmeal cookies and herbal tea…I wondered if these constituted the products with which we’d be ‘buffed and polished’. We had to fill in wordy forms describing our expectations and health status before proceeding and there were questions like “do you want your breasts massaged?” and “would you prefer a male or female therapist?” Alarm bells were ringing at this point but I just kept breathing deeply and chanting “I’m not a prude” and “there’s no need to be ashamed of my body” unconvincingly under my breath.

Shortly thereafter, I was ushered into something called a ‘Vichy spa room’ (which conjured up thoughts of complicity with Nazism rather than relaxation) by a smiling American (“Thank God, she’s a woman!”) therapist and asked to lie down on a vinyl-covered bed resting in a bathtub which was flanked by high pressure hose units. “Weird”, I thought. Then, I was cleansed and exfoliated all over with earthy smelling products that left my skin tingling and engendered an unexpected sense of mind-numbing relaxation. Next, I was asked to sit up while she spread something on the foil blanket beneath me. It smelled foully of rotten ocean debris but I wasn’t prepared for the sensation of lying in this stuff. “Eeeeeooooowww - what is this sludge?”, I asked, recoiling. She explained that it was a kelp-based gel designed to purify and dexotify the skin while helping to combat cellulite (no doubt it's also useful for achieving world peace and combating poverty). It felt like warm pureed seaweed mixed with rock salt and that sticky green viscous substance kids play with. So, I’m lying in this stuff and then she spreads another layer all over the top of me – no crevice missed – before I’m literally wrapped up in the crinkly foil layer and left to 'cook' for 20 minutes.

Despite the way it sounds, it was a surprisingly pleasant experience. I was toasty warm and felt secure, enveloped as I was, while I enjoyed a hair treatment and head massage. Bliss arrived in the form of total relaxation and mental oblivion by the time I was ‘unwrapped’ and I didn’t even flinch at being hosed down, under high pressure, like a vehicle in a car wash. “What election? What PhD? What stress? What turmoil?” I asked myself as the layers of muck were washed away.

Next came the full-body aromatherapy massage – more relaxation and much sweeter smelling. At some point during this hour I fell asleep and when I tried to open my mouth to speak I realised my tongue was so relaxed I couldn’t form vowel sounds! It was at this stage I suggested the players in the next round of Middle East peace talks sign up for the ‘Ultimate Indulgence Package’ before opening their mouths.

But the relaxation didn’t stop there. There was a deluxe facial and some overdue grooming before a pedicure complete with paraffin wax treatment – an extraordinary sensation which involves your feet being coated in hot liquefied wax and wrapped in plastic bags before the substance sets and is wiped clean, revealing the feet of a 14 year old.

Five hours later we stumbled back to our room, smelling heavenly and feeling as soft as silk. I, for one, felt like I’d just enjoyed the best sex of my life (without any of the hassles ;o) 'adminstered' in combination with mind-clearing psychotherapy (OK, so maybe that description equals a slight exaggeration - I'm not ready to replace men with a day-spa just yet - but you get the picture, right?). Later that night we ‘went to bed’ with George (Clooney), Brad (Pitt) and Matt (Damon) in ‘Oceans 13’ and I slept like a baby… Pure oblivious bliss.

So, what’s the moral to this insider’s tale of day-spa indulgence? Paper g-strings aside, gals get yourself to a day spa stat. and blokes join them if you dare.    [read more]

My best friend’s 11 year old daughter announced at dinner the other night that she simply didn’t get the concept of long division… “What’s the point of long division when you can do short division?” she sensibly asked. I just about knocked over my wine glass in furious agreement with her “I know – that’s so true!!” I said, thinking this would make a good motto for my life.

I am notoriously impatient – a character flaw which at times threatens to become fatal. I blame it on a deadline driven career - hurry, hurry, race, race, pace, pace – but it’s the story of my life. In the past few days I’ve been reminded(again), though, of the benefits of letting time stop and sucking in fresh air...

I’ve just spent three days ‘chilling’ in the Queensland resort town of Noosa with the woman who’s been my best friend for 23 years. We never got to do the end of school party-travel thing…we already had the weight of the world on our shoulders at eighteen thanks to personal tragedy and responsibility beyond our years. But this past weekend we paused and laughed and indulged and took stock and counselled one another and remembered why we’re still stuck together after all these years.

In many ways we couldn’t be more different – I’m a passionate, outspoken career-driven political animal with social activism embedded in my pores. She’s a reserved, sensitive, nurturing physiotherapist who now works full time as a mother of four and she’s not much interested in politics or current affairs. We’ve drifted apart for periods over the years and spent nearly a decade on separate continents. But what binds us together is unbreakable – an historic connection borne of times of trial and a sisterly love that cares without variation, with the power to revive friendship, bridging space and time in an instant. And it’s a friendship that thrives on laughter as well as shared tears.

We knew this trip would be a good one as soon as the Virgin air hostess opened her mouth on the flight out of Sydney. “Your devastatingly handsome pilot and the equally dashing steward join me in welcoming you on board this flight to Maroochydore” she quipped, deadpan. We giggled while most of the other passengers looked straight ahead. “You’ll find life-jackets in this season’s colours under your seat…” More laughter from our row. “And I must warn you that there is strictly no smoking on this flight. The toilets are equipped with smoke detectors and security guards”. The woman was on fire and she thoroughly deserved the applause she got from us.

Isn’t it amazing how humour can cut through the tension? It’s so stressful just boarding a flight to anywhere these days you often feel like assaulting, rather than thanking, the flight attendants when you disembark at your destination. I mean, in this post-September 11th world, there are actually signs at some airports warning passengers that “airline travel is not a laughing matter.” But on this flight, laughter was delightfully unavoidable.

The long taxi ride from the ‘Sunshine Coast’ airport to Noosa was also amusing. The father and daughter taxi-driving duo were thoroughly entertaining - she was a law student and he was a ‘kite-surfing addict’. The conversation was quick and engaging. He talked with such passion about kite-surfing (a sport which involves you being catapulted above the waves at the whim of the wind) he almost convinced me to give it a try. And I couldn’t suppress my laughter when he said “Oh yeah, it’s so addictive it breaks up marriages. People hear the wind in the trees and they can’t stop themselves.” Really? I’ve heard drug-addiction, gambling and infidelity cited as causes of marriage collapse but never ‘kite-surfing’. Perhaps I’d better give it a miss after all...

By the time we arrived at our hotel, I already felt lighter of heart and clearer of head. Further relief came in the form of a long lunch in an open air restaurant, where wild bush turkeys blended in with the décor and my friend listened while I poured out my heart and blinked back tears in between gulps of wine. Catharsis. “God, I needed this!” I said repeatedly.

After that conversation time slowed and we reminisced and projected into the future and celebrated our friendship…increasingly carefree. One hour blended into another. We wandered along the Noosa beach boardwalk and sat and sighed and laughed and just watched the waves pound the beach, sucking in all the beauty with every breath.

When we returned to the beach for dinner that night there was a sand castle built to an exacting plan - lit by tea lights, it mesmerised passers by. We came back the next night, after a day of indulgent spa pampering and a great bottle of red, threw off our shoes and lay on the beach in our fancy gear. We laughed like school girls, taking photos of each other…daring the tide to reach us and not giving a damn what anyone thought.

It’s times like these we rarely find time to value. But it’s these times – time standing still times – that keep us going when the going gets too crazy. We’re going to make this an annual pilgrimage to celebrate life and our friendship and to help us remember how to laugh out loud.

Meantime, I’m going to try to remember how to do long division and force myself to take the scenic route more often. Life is short and it threatens to race you to the finish line which is why, sometimes, you just need to push the pause button.    [read more]

John Howard’s deathbed conversion to Aboriginal reconciliation is as transparent as cling wrap. It’s been hailed a ‘road to Damascus’ style conversion and an important, visionary move by some doyens of the mainstream media commentariat, but to me it’s nothing short of a man without empathy, seeking to re-define his legacy as he stares political annihilation in the face.

As is evidenced by his fascination with 1950’s Australian values, his obsession with faded sporting icons and his determination to white-wash Australian school history courses, he is a man who lives both in and for the past. He is a man who is also very prickly, stubborn and grudge-prone as history tells us. I’ve observed that his 12 years as Prime Minister have been like watching a schoolboy who was teased mercilessly in the playground seeking to even the score with his detractors. Aboriginal Australians who labelled him a racist were no exception.

Perhaps this analysis helps us understand why within weeks of coming to office, he tried to limit the inquiry into Australia’s ‘Stolen Generations’ of Aboriginal children and swore blind that he’d never utter a personal or collective apology to Indigenous Australians in recognition of two centuries of trauma inflicted by white Australia. In the subsequent 12 years, he’s burned so many bridges to Aboriginal Australia and alienated so many long-suffering people, history looked likely to record him as a divisive, xenophobic force.

Howard’s rejection of the findings of the Stolen Generations Inquiry, his derision of modern perspectives on Aboriginal history as ‘black arm-band views’ and the myriad other insults he heaped on Indigenous Australians saw a convention hall of prominent Aborigines stand and turn their backs on him during a speech he delivered a decade ago. In the intervening period, the reconciliation process - which looked so inspired and promising under Paul Keating’s leadership in the early 90’s - stagnated so badly, that Howard’s own hand-picked National Indigenous Council recently considered resigning in protest at the hopelessness of the situation.

Then, last week, on the eve of the federal election being called, he made a bid for a different legacy. Without any ministerial consultation, he announced plans for the inclusion of a new statement of reconciliation in the preamble of the Australian Constitution. He told the conservative think-tank, the Sydney Institute: “I will (if elected) put to the Australian people within 18 months a referendum to formally recognise indigenous Australians in our Constitution – their history as the first inhabitants of our country, their unique heritage of culture and languages, and their special (though not separate) place within a reconciled, indivisible nation.” This from the man, who in 2000, chose to stay at home when his deputy, the Treasuer, Peter Costello, joined 10's of thousands of Australians who marched across the Sydney Harbour Bridge in support of reconciliation and a national apology.

In an effort to explain such a radical shift in position, Howard went so far as to say he was willing to accept his share of the blame for the deterioration in white-black relations under his leadership (big of him). He certainly tried to sound genuine:

I recognise now that, though emotionally committed to the goal, I was mistaken in believing that it could be achieved in a form I truly believed in. The old paradigm’s emphasis on shame, guilt and apologies made it impossible to reconcile the goal with the path I was required to tread…The challenge I have faced around indigenous identity politics is in part an artefact of who I am and the time in which I grew up.

But struggle as I might, I just can’t accept that this man’s conversion is genuine. I just don’t believe him. Why not? Because in any relationship breakdown there is one word that’s crucial to mending wounds and rebuilding bridges – the very essence of reconciliation. That word is sorry and as the song says it is often the hardest word to say, but it is also the straightest path to genuine forgiveness, in turn, the healing power of relationship reconstruction. It's a word Aboriginal Australians and supporters of the reconciliation movement want to hear - in recognition of two centuries of massacre, abuse, disenfranchisement, discrimination and ongoing disadvantage. It's a word that's been uttered by many in public life - including the Federal Opposition - and it's been recommended as a course of action by countless committees and inquiries. But it’s a word the Prime Minister is still refusing to say. There may be a referendum, but there will be no personal or official apology on behalf of the Australian Government from John Howard if he's re-elected. He argues that this is because too many Australians would disagree with such a move.

I suspect the real reason is that he can’t bring himself to utter the word because he refuses to accept responsibility on behalf of our forebears for the devastation they wreaked upon Aboriginal Australia. This is not about guilt, Aboriginal Australia doesn’t want white Australia to feel guilty (although as a friend suggested to me recently, politically speaking, guilt may be the basis of social caring) but Indigenous Australians do want the past acknowledged and they need the healing that could flow from the utterance of that small word we all insist our children learn in their first grasp of language.

And, in Howard’s case, he has inflicted so many personal wounds on individual Aboriginal activists, nothing short of ‘sorry’ will convince them his apparent change of heart is any more than political trickery. One of them is Lowitja 'Lois' O'Donoghue, herself a member of the Stolen Generations and the former head of ATSIC. "Big deal," Ms O'Donoghue told The Australian. "Another bloody election promise. It's not before time, it's what we've fought for, but who believes him? I don't.” The first Aboriginal politician in the NSW parliament,Labor vice-president Linda Burney, was similarly skeptical "It's interesting he is talking about that in the preamble but if he is really on about rights then why was the Racial Discrimination Act suspended so that they could bring in the NT intervention? I welcome it, but looking at his record I'm suspicious." Relevantly, Howard actually cited the controversial Northern Territory intervention (which involved sending the military into Aboriginal communities and rescinding land rights under the guise of protecting abused children) as the very motivation for his about turn – but not for the reasons Burney may surmise. He believes the move "overturned 30 years of attitudes and thinking on indigenous policy" and paved the way for a groundswell of support for Aboriginal reconciliation within mainstream Australia. More re-writing history before the ink is even dry.

Noel Pearson, Aboriginal lawyer and activist, whose intelligent, post-modern pitch for Aborginal revival has been embraced by the Conservatives for reasons of political expediency, agrees with me: it’s about history. “History soon forgets budget surpluses and property booms, tax cuts and sky-rocketing share markets. History will not forget reconciliation,” he wrote in the Sydney Morning Herald. But he’s calling for full support for Howard’s proposed referendum, saying it’s an important step forward for the reconciliation process. Other Aboriginal leaders have echoed this call. But the one who’s words most resonate and inspire is Pat Dodson - Aboriginal priest and activist, Australia’s answer to Desmond Tutu. With extraordinary grace and powers of forgiveness I’m ashamed to admit I don’t possess, Dodson told the ABC he was surprised by Howard’s change of heart but had no reason to doubt his sincerity “I think it's a positive contribution to the process of national reconciliation…I think that it's a big shift for him, but this is about the nation's reconciliation, it's not about John Howard's reconciliation ... this is something quite different.” I just hope Pat Dodson’s heart won’t be broken again by this government.

For its part, the Labor Party may be suspicious and cynical of Howard’s motivation but it will support the proposed referendum without too much criticism - partly because Kevin Rudd’s team knows it’s unlikely to translate to many votes on polling day. This is because the Aboriginal vote largely exists in safe National Party seats and Howard’s well and truly done his dash with the socially progressive political vacillators in marginal urban seats.

Effecting change to the constitution through a referendum is notoriously difficult and the Prime Minister argues he’s the only one who can bring mainstream (i.e. ignorant white)Australia onboard. Some commentators have bought this argument, saying 'mainstream' opposition to Aboriginal reconciliation is based on economic jealousy –of ‘special treatment’ welfare offered to Indigenous people - and Howard’s conservative approach can get them past this indifference. I think that’s a bogus argument. The same Australians don’t refuse to attend ANZAC marches because they aren’t beneficiaries of the War Veterans’ Pension do they? This argument is just an attempt to veneer over deeply ingrained racism. And, if these 'mainstream' Australian voters do come on board it will because they know the Prime Minister feels the same way they do.

As much as the thought of Howard being eulogised as a champion of Aboriginal reconciliation makes me feel physically ill, I sincerely hope his referendum proposal does get up – for all Australians. But it will be a hollow victory without these letters S-O-R-R-Y.

And, I’ve said it before, but once more for the record: I am deeply sorry for the suffering inflicted on Aboriginal Australia by my colonial ancestors. I don’t feel personally responsible for what they did, but I am appalled and ashamed of their actions and I do accept personal responsibility to help repair the damage they inflicted in whatever small way I can. I also accept that I am a white beneficiary of historic and continuing racism against Indigenous Australians. Mine is a heartfelt apology.    [read more]

John Howard is seeking to re-write history – and not just by defying predictions at the polling booth. He’s trying to re-write our children’s history books.

I wrote in an academic journal last year that it was my high school history teachers who politicised me. They taught me to think independently and interrogate the themes of history - to analyse the causes and consequences of events, not just reiterate dates. These are the skills that form my journalistic scaffolding and the lessons that inform my moral compass, socially activating me.

I suspect the transformation my history teachers effected within me is precisely the sort of outcome the Howard government is seeking to prevent through its new national, compulsory history curriculum.

The controversial plan takes a good idea – increasing high school students’ exposure to Australian history – and prostitutes it for political purposes. The Howard agenda is about white-washing Australian history. This shouldn’t come as a shock to long term observers of his ‘cultural revolution’. In the late 90’s he railed against what he described as the ‘black-armband’ view of Australian history – this was a deliberately offensive way of critiquing contemporary perspectives on the history of Aboriginal Australia since European invasion (a term he detests…it was settlement or colonisation in his view despite the bloody battles, massacres and genocide).

He’s also criticised what he perceives as Leftist interpretations of Australia’s involvement in the Vietnam war in some history curricula along with representations of the dismissal of the Whitlam government – Australia’s most significant political crisis and one in which he played a part. Howard’s focus is on celebrating Australian achievements…particularly on the cricket pitch.

Monash University's National Centre for History Education was originally commissioned by the Federal Government to produce the curriculum and its output was approved by the Federal Education Minister but Howard was unhappy with its direction and instead, referred it to a panel of experts. Read for: hand-picked, right leaning experts like the conservative historian Geoffrey Blainey and former Howard staffer and columnist, Gerard Henderson.

Howard released the end result last week on Federal election eve, in a carefully managed publicity stunt which involved the student captains and principal of a western Sydney school being brought back early from school holidays to accommodate the PM’s need for a classroom photo opportunity. But the curriculum, the implementation of which will be tied to federal education funding, has been criticised by the academics responsible for the first draft, the state education ministers, and history teachers themselves.

The concern of the Monash academics is that the curriculum is now too cumbersome and will be difficult to implement. The state’s say it represents inappropriate federal intervention in school curricula – and NSW points out that it already has a compulsory history course for years 9 and 10 and doesn’t need another layer of lesson plans. The history teachers themselves say it’s a politicised curriculum, a point reiterated by ACT Education Minister, Andew Barr who told the ABC "What we are effectively being asked to adopt here is ... John Howard's version of Australian history.”

There’s certainly evidence of Howard’s hand on the curriculum – date driven, rather than theme-informed, it is overcrowded with so called milestones and characters but key events and people seem to be missing. Why, for example, is the rural entrepreneur RM Williams featured, but the living political legend, Gough Whitlam ignored? And, what do we make of this: according to the ‘Howard-ised’ curriculum Aboriginal history is taught from 60,000 years BC to 15,000 years BC; the ‘Early Encounters’ end with Captain Cook scouring the Australian coast in 1770 and the period from 1788 to 1840 is titled ‘British Settlement’. As a student of history, my analysis is this: Howard is whiting out the most tumultuous period in modern Australian history – the wars, massacres and genocide that characterised white-black relations from 1788.

This is a dangerous and dastardly act. I support the compulsory study of history in secondary school and I wish more journalism students would study it at university. As long as the content is engaging and well taught, history studies can produce well-informed citizens and journalists who can understand the present and potentially predict the future in the context of the past.

It is history which teaches us to avoid repeating the mistakes of our forbears. But jingoistic history has no place in our schools and a nation which is so far from repairing the damage inflicted on Aboriginal Australia has no business erasing the harrowing history the Indigenous people of this country have endured since white invasion.

How can we even hope to reach a state of true reconciliation without confronting our black history?    [read more]

Sick of the election already? OK, here’s some light relief from my subconscious to entertain you.

About a week ago I had a very weird dream.

There I was – resplendently dressed, of course – in a medieval crypt beneath the Danish Royal Palace preparing for some sort of royal soiree. Who knows what a staunch republican was even doing inside the Danish palace in an ‘official’ capacity but there you go…

Anyway, cut to the next scene and Princess Mary (of Fred and Mary fame) wanders into the opulently decorated crypt (music, laughter & the clinking of glasses stop suddenly) with the royal entourage and breaks free of the line to hug moi! Nope, don’t know her from a bar of soap (have you ever wondered what the derivation of that saying is?) but apparently, in my dreams, we’re very close.

So, we sit down at a table for two and then a friend of mine appears with a silver platter to wait at our table. Mary and I launch immediately into deep conversation and my friend, who’s recently been at the other end of my own emotional outpourings, smiles knowingly. It turns out that Mary is deeply unhappy in her marriage…she’s feeling trapped and stifled and doesn’t know what to do. Being the helpful, empathetic gal pal I am, I offered this advice: “Mary, you can’t start a blog to express your feelings because that would be way too public and risky. But why don’t you start a diary? You really need to download all this and give yourself a chance to escape – at least in your mind - while you work out what to do”.

Weird, huh? Weirder still is the fact that I read in this weekend’s Sydney Morning Herald (read more) that Mary is reportedly – wait for it – unhappy in her marriage which has come under strain as a result of pressures of Royal life and dealing with Fred’s dysfunctional family!! Apparently royal watchers fear she’s locked herself inside the palace and thrown away the key – literally and metaphorically.

I have the most curious, vivid dreams sometimes…if only I knew what they meant! And, apparently my subconscious now also has a direct line to the Danish palace… Hey, is that the phone? Maybe it’s one of those tabloid women’s mags looking for an anonymous quote from a ‘palace insider’.

Mary, if you’re reading this: you know what to do.    [read more]

It’s one to nil to Kevin Rudd in the opening hours of the Australian Federal election campaign.

Flanked by a banner plastered with the campaign phrase ‘New Leadership’, the Labor Opposition leader certainly looked like the fresh alternative to John Howard, presenting big picture ideas and forcefully attempting to outline the differences between himself and the Prime Minister.

His address to the Brisbane media this afternoon was composed and confident, appearing scripted in parts, but suited to the needs of campaign reporters…brevity, clarity, thumping key messages. He appeared to lose confidence – adjusting glasses, licking lips momentarily and shrinking slightly at the podium – when the journos began firing questions. But his composure grew as the press conference continued and the end result was impressive. He certainly looks like the young, inspired but safe alternative voters say they’re looking for. Particularly in contrast to Howard’s ‘yesterday’s man’ performance earlier today.

But was there real substance? In my assessment, yes. While there was scant specific detail – as expected given the nature of political campaign management – the themes were rich and clearly discernable. The old promise of an ‘Education Revolution’ was joined by commitments to withdraw Australia’s combat troops from Iraq, sign the (now outdated) Kyoto Agreement on greenhouse gas emissions, deliver high speed broadband to regional and remote Australia as well as the big cities (long overdue), prohibit nuclear reactors, repeal ‘Workchoices’, end the blame game between the states and the Commonwealth on hospital funding (easier said than done). That’s the stuff of potential campaign meat.

But it’s a long road ahead and, as Rudd acknowledged, Labor is going to have to make history to win this election – the party has only crossed the line twice from Opposition since World War 2. “This is going to be the fight of our lives…we have 16 seats to win and we’re up against a really clever politician…I believe this will go down to the wire,” he told reporters. He’s right - despite being consistently ahead in the polls, it’s going to take more than fresh ideas and ‘youthful’ appeal to pull off the win on polling day. History is likely to judge John Howard as the most cunning politician ever to live in the Lodge and he will be a tough act to beat, especially from the back-foot – he is the dogged “Lazarus with a triple by-pass” after all.

That’s why Rudd will need to engage with the negative campaign launched by Howard today. And, he’s off to a good start on that front, saying he’s prepared for the "mother of all fear campaigns" and putting defensive tactics in play. He’s hit back over the false claim that the Coalition Government is the one to trust on interest rates, pointing to the five interest-rate rises on Howard’s watch since the last election. And he’s answered Howard’s criticism of him as inexperienced, highlighting his career achievements in the public service, the diplomatic corps and his decade of service as a Labor MP. He's also re-iterated his claim to be economically conservative and fiscally responsible. But he'll have to point to his achievements in the shadow Foreign Affairs portfolio and his fluency in Mandarin, among other strengths, if he’s going to convince those prone to hesitating in the voting booths, that he can be trusted for the top job. But he’s off to a good start with this strategy: pre-empt the attacks, confront them head-on and return fire. That’s the only way to win the battle.

Meantime, this is the anti-Howard message you can expect Kevin Rudd to ram home “…he (Howard) has no plan for our future. Australia can’t afford another three years of a government gone stale without fresh ideas…I refuse to stand idly by and watch this happen” That and "Who's afraid of Peter Costello?"    [read more]

It’s on! Australians will go to the polls on November 24th. At stake – John Howard’s legacy; voters’ integrity and the country’s future.

As Howard fronted the Press Gallery in Canberra this morning – my old journalistic stomping ground – I watched his performance with interest on my screen. The rhetoric was more negative than expected…clearly he’s planning a campaign of opposition against Labor's Kevin Rudd – a dangerous and curious strategy for an incumbent.

Predictably, Australia's most conservative Prime Minister in a century, hammered the fact that 70% of Labor’s candidates are trade union affiliates – that’s supposed to scare us. But here’s a scarier statistic for him – the latest newspaper poll published in today’s Sun Herald show’s more than 70% of voters aged 18-25 intend to vote for Labor at the next election. They represent those who’ve paid the highest price in terms of loss of pay and conditions under Howard’s ‘Workchoices’ industrial revolution.

But more interesting than what he said, was his body language and general demeanour. From my notes as I watched: “eyes shifting in sockets from side to side” (a classic Howard indicator for unease and dishonesty); “licking lips” (nerves, indecision); “sounds bored…tired…flat”; “clears throat nervously”; “unenthusiastic…hesitant”. This was a man who looked and sounded old and out of ideas…lacking verve and inspiration…backed into a corner.

So, what did he actually say? Not a lot really – predictably. That said, you don’t expect candidates to outline their policies in any detail on day one…that’s the stuff of careful media management…slow-drip release of ideas.

But the main theme was “love me or loathe me”, I’m you’re man. He’s clearly rattled by the latest opinion polls which show his government is still trailing Labor by 18% on day one of the campaign, but he’s banking on his experience in the job and the longevity of key cabinet ministers, to win over the electorate for the fifth time. Spruiking on behalf of his Liberal-National ministers is key because he’s announced he’ll be leaving office before the next election if he gets over the line again, handing the reigns to the unpopular Federal Treasurer, Peter Costello.

Other themes included the infuriatingly misleading old message “you can trust us to keep interest rates lower”. What he fails to tell us of course is that when he was Treasurer in the early 80's, interest rates reached a whopping 21% - far higher than they’ve ever gone under Labor. Who can you trust? Other highlights (or lowlights?)from his address this morning included the goals of full employment (pipedream!), increasing national prosperity, good old fashioned family values. Same old same old.

There were the subtle dog-whistle messages too – “We’ll govern for all Australians, not narrow sections of the community” (i.e. on behalf of the masses, not the marginalised, down-trodden, poor, the social activists, the fair-minded). He also said: “I’m a believer in one Australia..we share a common loyalty and common citizenship”. Hmmm…I can see the campaign ads now: “Howard for One Australia”. Interesting…the doyen of Australian racist politics, Pauline Hanson (again running for the Senate this election) was of course the founder of the “One Nation” Party. Same-same?

Rudd’s about to front the podium – stay tuned for my assessment of his performance. Meantime, strap in for the long ride to polling day. I’ll try to help you pass the time.    [read more]

Kevin Andrews, Australia’s controversial Immigration Minister, has been at it again this week. Blowing the ‘dog whistle’ and playing the ‘race card’ (see earlier post “Out of Africa” for background) on federal election-eve.

And, again, it was the country’s most marginalised and obviously racially distinct residents who were his targets. Following the funeral of a young Sudanese man who’d been bashed in a racially motivated assault which Andrews’ initially tried to cite as an example of the failure of Africans to adequately integrate into Australian society, a Victorian police officer was assaulted by an alcohol affected Sudanese youth. So, Kev did what any right-wing politician campaigning on race, chasing the votes of bigots and xenophobes would do – he cited this isolated incident as yet another example of the failure of Sudanese refugees to embrace ‘Australian Values’.

"Violence is not a part of the peacefulness and the tolerance which has been very much a value of the Australian way of life," he told journalists. Yes, we hear you loud and clear, Kev – those black folk are just plain ‘un-Australian’.Of course anyone with half a brain and a sceric of integrity would counter with the logical argument that police are assaulted in the course of their work on a daily basis – by people of all colours, cultures and creeds. The Victoria police themselves acknowledge this fact and that’s why, when they released details of the alleged assault they made no mention of the alleged assailant’s race nor did they seek to suggest it was racially motivated.

Victoria’s Labor Premier, John Brumby went further, telling the Sydney Morning Herald (SMH) “…I don't think it's at all helpful to put a racial characteristic to this. The principle problem that we're dealing with here is alcohol." But a small group of protesters stalking the minister made the point more cogently. Among them was a Sudanese refugee who whited out his face with zinc cream and waved a Vegemite sandwich at Kev.

Meantime, there are increasing reports of the racial vilification of African refugees around Australia in the aftermath of the Minister’s assault. But he’s refusing to apologise, saying he’s just voicing the concerns of many Australians. Yes, interesting approach – manage race relations on the basis of ill-informed popular opinion. It’s a strategy that’s been used with great effect in the past, of course...notably in South Africa and Germany. The Minister’s paternalistic excuse for his patently racist stance is that he is trying to do the Sudanese refugees a favour "I am not seeking to demonise them. I am seeking to help them," he said.

Having marketed himself as a staunch Catholic concerned with ethics and the ‘rights of the unborn’ Kevin Andrews’ stance on African immigration has shocked and appalled many friends and colleagues who believed he had a conscience. One of them, the ethicist, Dr Nick Tonti-Filippini, told the SMH "I must admit I am just flummoxed by it and very disappointed… Not only does it not fit in a Christian tradition but it does not fit in a human rights tradition."

Perhaps not, but it definitely fits the Howard Government tradition of playing the race card to win votes. As the director of the Catholic social justice group, the Edmund Rice Centre told the SMH, “The bottom line is that the Government sees itself in political difficulty approaching the election and is deliberately targeting one of the world's most vulnerable communities for some sort of political gain…This is lowest common denominator politics at its worst…”

Postscript: "In matters of conscience, the law of majority has no place." Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (1869-1948)    [read more]

I recently lost a baby as regular readers of this blog will know (see Baby Lost) and I’ve been talking publicly about the grief that follows miscarriage in an effort to help normalise the experience and raise awareness about the trauma involved.

But as much as I’ve exposed myself emotionally and processed my feelings, I wasn’t really ready for the news I got this week when I visited my obstetrician/gynaecologist.

It hadn’t been a fabulous week, but on my way to the doctor's I had a mesmerising experience: a concentrated storm hit and passed in almost an instant leaving a heavy mist which filtered the sun’s warm glow and not one, but two, rainbows. These rainbows seemed somehow meant for me…I was driving on a quiet road and they passed directly overhead – parallel to one another, like bridges over the Seine.

Mostly when you see rainbows, one end seems visible but the other will be elusive to the eye – not these rainbows. They were both only just long enough to reach from the paddock on one side of the road to the field on the other. It was such a strange experience driving beneath them…calming and time-stopping…like a heavenly-derived pause. It stole my concentration and I took a couple of wrong turns, adding several kilometres to the trip, but I wasn’t bothered in the least.

I was still feeling that strange sense of peace inspired by the rainbows when I walked into the doctor’s surgery. Maybe this was some protective spell…I knew I’d be finding out inside the doctor’s room what the medical tests on my baby had revealed. I’d been told to expect that they’d confirm the most common diagnosis – that a chromosomal abnormality had caused the miscarriage. So, I wasn’t really prepared for the news I received and it had an unexpected impact.

The tests had revealed that my baby was a boy with no genetic or other observable abnormalities. I can’t adequately explain what my immediate reaction was to hearing that news from my unusually empathetic doctor. Heart swelled…eyes filled…breath paused. I guess I’d grown comfortable with the expectation that his was a life not destined to be lived beyond the womb because of the likelihood of gross deformity. Learning that he was essentially a healthy baby until he died, inexplicably, inside me has made this loss more real…and more painful. But knowing that he was a baby boy gives him an identity – I can picture him and give him a name in my mind...imagine what he would have been like to know. Grieve properly.

My doctor told me I should embrace this knowledge of him and let him live in my heart. Others, she said, may find this strange…consider him just pre-life tissue. But to me he was a baby with whom I’d bonded and I had a right to remember him that way. I think her advice was heartfelt and wise. It has been hard for me to break down the protective barriers and allow myself to feel – the grief and loss - at this level but it’s prevented me from just locking destructive feelings in a box deep inside.

So, now he lives and the heavenly believer in me feels sure I’ll see him over the rainbow.

This post is for him    [read more]

They say animals are much more instinct driven than humans – and therefore less influenced by socialisation. In other words nature usually wins over nurture. But I have ample evidence to the contrary right under my own roof!

At my farm, on Canberra’s outskirts, there’s a mini-mouse plague (i.e. small in scale, not ‘Mickey's’ girlfriend :) and I just found my cat, Tom, teaching my dog, Dodson, how to catch, tease and make a meal of a mouse! No kidding!

Dodson, named for the Aboriginal activist-priest, Pat Dodson, is a little black guy, boofy-haired with a white beard, tender-hearted but possessed of a ferocious bark. He’s quite unhappy with the world at the moment, thanks to veterinary interventions following a recent allergic reaction – trigger unknown – and complicated double ear infections. Poor little dude has been subjected to shame and starvation – shaved back to skin, ears tied back in a bandage to stop him scratching; he looks ridiculous and he’s constantly shivering from the unfamiliar cold. And while used to meals of fresh chicken and tasty bickies, he’s been forced to endure a staple diet of supposedly low-allergy biscuits that smell of nothing and presumably taste like cardboard. Problem is, he is as stubborn as the neighbour’s mules and he’s refused to eat for five days. Today when I took him to the vet for a check-up, the scales revealed he’d lost 25% of his body-weight in a week!! No wonder he was angry enough with me to destroy his bed and eat one of my gloves – he was starving! Which is why I suppose he was willing to undergo socialisation by his feline ‘sibling’ and resort to eating mice. His luck is about to change, though – alarmed at his sudden weight loss, his vet has now prescribed a home-cooked diet of $17.99/kilo kangaroo fillet cooked risotto-style with rice. Well, he is half poodle.

Tom is actually a Serbian refugee cat – quite seriously. He was abandoned by Serbian ‘diplomats’ who left for Belgrade without him. He came to live with me…but it was not an easy transition. Tom was overwhelmed by my, now sadly departed, St Bernards and went bush for two months…he was lost for dead. But in a great tale of feline endurance, Tom learned to live like a bush-ranger and was eventually discovered at the back of my garage, under the debris of renovation. Poor Tom had been locked-in for days without food or water and he was in a bad way – averse to human contact. But, with careful, tender encouragement on my part, aided by multiple food bribes, placed strategically closer and closer to my house, Tom eventually crossed over. One day, while he ate, I seized a moment to touch him, sensing he was ready. He could barely contain his delight, rubbed himself all over me in response and followed me inside. He slept under the covers with me that night (after a very thorough wash!) and has rarely left the house since. That was nearly eight years ago and Tom is now an elderly gentleman…quite mad and very fond of sleeping on my head, but a great little bloke to have around.

In my backyard dwells not another dog, but a goose called Bruce. Bruce moved into the house-garden six months ago, after a fiendish fox invaded his enclosure and ate his entire family. Recently, he’s started knocking on the back door with his beak and squawking whenever any of the 'insiders' show their faces in the vicinity...I swear he wants to come inside! I guess he thinks he's a dog - he lives in the backyard after all.

Bruce isn’t the first of my farm animals to suffer from an identity crisis, I used to have a sheep (named Becky by some friends’ children) who used to knock on the front door with her hoof and actually did burst into the house one day! The local farmers were amazed at the way she followed me around and came when she was called. Meanwhile, I have a Scottish Highland Cow called Wallace (after the great highland warrior, William Wallace) who thinks he’s equine, not bovine. He follows the horse(who answers to Dancer) around like a lovesick puppy and, despite having deadly weapons for horns, he’s completely down-trodden by Dancer.

I’m sure there are loads of analogies to be drawn from these stories and applied to human behaviour, but I’ll leave those to your imagination.

But let this be the lesson of the yarn: you can absolutely teach an old dog new tricks!    [read more]

I know I’m not the first to ask this question, but do you ever wonder what technology and cyberspace have done to intimacy?

A week ago I received a raunchy text message on my mobile from somebody called Jason and he referred to me, “the hottest chick (he’d) ever known”, as Moni. Problem is, I don’t know a Jason and I don’t go by the pseudonym ‘Moni’. Evidently, he was really going to miss ‘Moni’ (wherever she was going) and he wanted to “get with her”. The rest is too raunchy for j-scribe’s censors, but it was a tender love story if ever I heard one (not!).

Anyway, I was tempted to text back “Sorry Jason, I don’t know who you were trying to contact but my name’s John” but I resisted. Instead, I chided him and said that while I was flattered, I wasn’t ‘Moni’. Jason wasn’t perturbed, though…he just asked me who I was and expressed interest in obtaining my (silent) home number! Perhaps he’s a friend of Shane Warne’s? Suffice it to say, I didn’t reply.

Then there’s Facebook…I’m a recent convert and a huge fan of this Web 2:0 phenomenon which bills itself as a “social utility that connects you with the people around you”. Critics diss it as a set of loosely connected high-school style cliques…a time-wasting device worthy of banning in the workplace. OK, so they have a point about the time-wasting effect, but it’s much more than a bunch of cliques. On this US-based site with universal appeal, hundreds of thousands of people (most of them admittedly much younger than me) link themselves to one another across cultures, time zones and continents; debate the world around them – from their backyards to far off international conflicts; send each other gifts and share their histories in diary entries, sound, vision and still photography.

There’s real intimacy in this phenomenon…people caring and sharing across the barriers that divide us. I've watched the lovers among my students exchange poorly disguised, intimate messages with one another and smiled knowingly. But there’s also a degree of voyeurism that gives rise to some concern. People visit each other’s ‘Facebooks’ and watch and wait and explore the lives of those who seem to expose almost as much of themselves as they would in a secret diary (me included!). Sure, the same sort of watching-from-a-distance has always been a feature of old-fashioned ‘courting’ but there’s something perverse about the knowledge that someone could be lurking in your photo album – even though some lurkers may be very welcome! The safeguards are there – you can lock out anyone but your approved friends from private sections of your ‘Facebook’ - but I still wonder if I’ve revealed too much of me and hear my mother's voice in my head "You know on A Current Affair the other night there was a story about Facebook stalkers..."

There’s also the ‘poking’ craze on Facebook. 'Poking' involves the user clicking on a pointed finger which sends an alert to the recipient with the effect of letting them know they're being thought of. I expressed disinterest and confusion about the significance of ‘poking’ other ‘Facebookers’ but then went ‘poking mad’…until an ex student explained that it was innuendo rich. “Oh, I get it, a double entendre!” I said. It was too late though…I’d already poked everyone I could find on Facebook with whom I had any kind of tenuous connection! Apparently, I’ve been quite the promiscuous ‘Facebooker’. Did you know you can also ‘Superpoke’ someone? This could involve all manner of raunchy acts or, alternatively, such silly, but strangely rewarding, actions as throwing a cartoon chicken or sheep at your Facebook buddy!

Of course, there’s also that antiquated medium – email. There was a mid-90’s Meg Ryan film titled ‘You’ve Got Mail’ which explored the notion of online intimacy as a springboard for meaningful relationships (in that shallow Hollywood way, of course). But critics hailed email as the end of letter writing and real passion in written communication. I beg to differ. For me it has the air of Regency romanticism and I reckon Jane Austen would have used the device to great effect. I can visualise it now… .Instead of Lizzie Bennett taking a walk in the woods to try to conquer her passion for the delectable Darcy with his latest servant-delivered note in hand, she’d be at the kitchen table with her laptop (in between writing her PhD thesis and taking calls on her mobile) face-flushed and breathless every time her ‘inbox’ lit up. In the hands of good communicators, email has all the potential power of the most candid and intimate written expression of desire…but with instantaneous impact! Jane would have surely loved it.

Which brings me to blogging…I see ‘blogdom’ as a forum for interactive journalism…kind of like a written version of live broadcasting. And, speaking as a broadcaster, I’ve always found that kind of communication very intimate and seductive. I’m yet to receive any raunchy user comments at j-scribe, though. Jason, are you out there?    [read more]

Warning: ‘Rant Alert’ rating = extreme. I’ve been ‘hot under the collar’ all week and I’ve chanted to myself "don’t blog angry, don't blog angry" but this story has pushed me over the edge!

Can you hear the dog whistle? You know, the subliminal call to racists, bigots and xenophobes the Howard government has practised to perfection. It’s there in the subtext - the ‘accidental’, ‘unintended’ racism. And, as the federal election approaches the whistle is becoming louder and clearer…as audible as a starting gun.

In the government’s sights this week were people who’ve endured unspeakable suffering in the Darfur conflict – refugees from Sudan.

Their need for refuge is undeniable – they’ve survived a six year conflict which has killed nearly half a million people and displaced just as many. They have languished in refugee camps in appalling conditions - traumatised and denied the basic human rights we take for granted: sufficient nutrition, housing, safety and education.

Seventy percent of refugees accepted into Australia in 2004-5 were African but the Howard Government limited the quota for 2007-8 to 30% and with that target already reached, it has closed the door to African refugees until at least mid-2008. There is some logic to this decision – the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees has called for a redistribution of refugee intake to favour those fleeing Burma and Iraq. But this is not the reasoning being applied by the Australian Immigration Minister, Kevin Andrews. Instead, he’s blaming the allegedly anti-social behaviour of Sudanese refugees and their failure to adequately ‘assimilate’ or ‘integrate’ as reasons for the crackdown. It’s rhetoric with the ring of 'early Goebbels'.

In vintage Howard Government style, Andrews has played the race card within coo-ee of polling day, demonising these African refugees and highlighting difference as a means of arousing latent racism and unifying overt prejudice. This tactic has worked very well for the government in the past. At the 1996 election, in which they were swept to power in a landslide victory, they had the dis-endorsed Liberal, Pauline Hanson, doing their bidding on anti-Aboriginal racism. Ahead of the 2001 election it was the Prime Minister and senior ministers denying entry to a boat-load of shipwrecked refugees (the Tampa incident) and falsley accusing Middle Eastern Muslims of throwing their children overboard from a sinking vessel, which rallied the racists and xenophobes (a word which Pauline Hanson famously asked a reporter to “please explain?”). This election, with the deportation of Dr Mohamed Haneef backfiring badly thanks to a reinvigorated media and the backlash over the David Hicks scandal, Kevin Andrews has resorted to ‘blowing the whistle’ on the most vulnerable and obviously physically different members of our society.

Tall and slender, with skin the colour and texture of dark Lindt chocolate and a haunted expression, the Sudanese among us are strikingly beautiful but unmistakably distinctive. Andrews' targeting of white Australians’ fear of physical difference is pure racist politics. That’s a fact underlined by Pauline Hanson’s celebration of the Minister’s strategy yesterday "You can't bring people into the country who are incompatible with our way of life and culture," she told reporters.

The Minister attempted to justify his claims by relying on what he admitted to journalists was "anecdotal evidence" about gang violence, alcohol consumption in parks and threatening behaviour involving imposing young Sudanese men in the vicinity of suburban shopping malls. He linked the Sudanese refugees directly to criminal activity in Victoria with references to the recent bashing death of a young man near a suburban Victorian railway station. This was the point at which I really lost it – the victim was a Sudanese refugee…the alleged perpetrators were three white men! How is being a victim of crime evidence of an ethnic group’s unsuitability for refugee status, Minister? Moreover, as Victoria’s Police Commissioner, Christine Nixon, pointed out, Sudanese refugees are actually under-represented in that state’s crime statistics. The Minister’s response to this statement, as reported in the Sydney Morning Herald (SMH), was deeply ironic: “"You can use data in all sorts of ways," he said. Yes, Kevin, you would know all about distorting the facts for political gain wouldn’t you? Especially when your government is fighting to win two marginal seats with significant Sudanese populations.

Wannabe Senator, Pauline Hanson, of the aptly bogan-ishly named ‘Pauline’s United Australia Party’, has merrily joined in the racist chorus with despicable claims that African refugees are the cause of an increase in Victorian AIDS infections and that they’re importing TB and leprosy into the country. Pauline’s never been big on evidence…neither was Adolf Hitler.

Kevin Andrews also pointed to the poor English skills and low levels of education among Sudanese refugees as evidence of their unsuitability for ‘integration’ into Australian society. Hell-ooo Kevin, they’re not skilled migrants, they’re traumatised refugees from a torrid warzone!! (See Bill Leak’s cartoon in the Australian today for further analysis on this point). What the absence of education and English skills within this group does highlight of course, though, is not the need to restrict or ban the intake of African refugees, but the requirement for further and better support services to assist with settlement and recovery.

This is a view supported by the Federation of African Communities Council, which is considering legal action against the Minister for racial vilification; the Queensland Premier Anna Bligh, who has called Kevin Andrews a racist who would have been at home in the deep south of the USA in the 1950's; several Liberal and National Party backbenchers who’ve broken ranks with Andrews; and even his Deputy, the Assistant Minister for Immigration, Teresa Gambaro, who oversees the refugee settlement program. She said she regretted the Minister’s approach and highlighted the need for the government to take responsibility for the integration of Sudanese refugees. “We have to support our humanitarian settlement program. They are no different to migrants of the past. They want a job, a future for their children and their children to be educated," Ms Gambaro told the SMH. She may well have been playing 'good cop' to Kevin Andrew’s 'bad cop' (another classic Howard strategy) but at least she was speaking sense.

The other point, of course, is the threat to racial harmony posed by this debate in the Australian communities which Sudanese refugees have made their new homes. And, the Minister's stance has no doubt exacerbated the pain and difficulty associated with their settlement in Australia - they're already recovering from trauma and trying to re-start a life from scratch in a country on the other side of the world with a different language and culture. Now they're also likely to feel alienated, ostracised and unwelcome. That is a real recipe for disaffection and the manifestation of anti-social behaviour and it will be on your head, Kevin Andrews.

I could write for hours about my abhoration of the Howard government’s race-politics but thinking about it for too long does my head in, turns my stomach and makes my heart bleed. So, here ends this rant...for now.

Postscript 9/10/07 Evidence the 'dog whistle' is being heard loud and clear from Wagga Wagga (NSW) where there are reports of African refugees being racially vilified in the streets following Kevin Andrew's racist outburst. The African community in Wagga Wagga has called a public meeting to try to address the problem. (Read more)    [read more]

When I moved from the ABC to academia I found one of the measurable pluses was the apparent freedom to express opinions and publish independent research without the threat of political interference from the Federal Government.

The Howard Government nobbled, harassed, intimidated, threatened and demonised the ABC and its journalists in an effort to limit damaging critique and analysis. Compliance was tied to funding and complaints procedures were abused as the ABC was bashed with the ‘Left-wing bias’ stick which damaged the National Broadcaster’s editorial independence. (See Posetti 2002; Posetti 2005) But the longer I spend in academia the more I realise it’s become just as big a target for Howard’s cultural revolution as the ABC.

The attack launched by the government this week on respected researchers from the University of Sydney’s Workplace Research Centre (WRC) provides an interesting case study on political interference in academia. The research team lead by Dr John Buchanan is undertaking a five-year study on the impact of Australian Workplace Agreements (AWA’s) on the earning capacity of individuals. AWA’s were introduced in 1996 by the Howard Government as a foundational pillar of industrial reform designed to marginalise trade unions. Under the government’s controversial ‘Workchoices’ policy, AWA’s have become ubiquitous as collective bargaining has been further undermined. And, according to the WRC research, the poorest workers have been the worst affected with a ‘take it or leave it’ approach to minimum wages and conditions characterising ‘negotiations’ between employers and individuals.

The research is part of a five year study 'Australia@Work' funded to the tune of 50% by the Federal Government through the Australian Research Council (ARC) - the country’s top and most competitive academic research fund. The project was signed off by Federal Education Minister, Julie Bishop but Mr Hockey has sought to undermine the the ARC's credibility in relation to the study's approval "I'm not sure that this institution is known for academic rigour but even occasionally the Government gets it wrong on where it spends its money...", he told the Sydney Morning Herald. The other half of the funding came from Unions NSW (Aside: how did that collaboration slip through the Federal Government filter? No wonder they’re p’d off!)

Findings from phase one of the study reveal that individuals on AWA’s in the new system earn on average $106 less per week than their counterparts on collective agreements. With a federal election only weeks away and polling suggesting the government’s (mis)management of the industrial relations system will be a key determinant, Howard and co. were less than amused with this revelation and immediately employed ‘Plan B’ – discredit the message and demonise the messengers.

Workplace Relations Minister Joe Hockey led the attack, accusing Dr Buchanan and his co-researcher, Dr Van Wonrooy of being "former trade union officials who are parading as academics". The Prime Minister joined the attack, as did his Deputy and wannabe PM, Peter Costello, who described the research as ‘contaminated’. Such attacks go to the heart of academic credibility and professional standing so it’s no surprise the researchers are now threatening to sue Mr Hockey for defamation.

The government’s attack is founded on the false premise that the academics have prematurely released the findings in an effort to influence the outcoime of the federal election. "You have to look at their motives and sure enough you can identify what their real intentions are", Mr Hockey told reporters. But as any academic knows, progressive reporting and publishing of findings are standard procedures in long-running research projects.

Similarly dodgy is the claim that the researchers are former trade union officials. In his 25 year academic career, Dr Buchanan has only ever spent four weeks in the employ of a trade union - during a secondment. And, Dr Wonrooy who has ‘admitted’ to undertaking research as part of an ACTU (Australian Council of Trade Unions)study, actually began her career working for the Howard Government’s Department of Industrial Relations. Ah, the irony.

The other big furphy is the government’s insistence that the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) figures prove that workers on AWA’s are actually better off. Wrong. The ABS has confirmed that it hasn’t undertaken any research on the impact of AWA’s under ‘Workchoices’. Nevertheless, the Minister’s spokesman told the Sydney Morning Herald “We think the ABS figures are a more reliable guide than a study cooked up by John Buchanan and his cronies”.

Hockey admitted under tough questioning from the 730 Report’s Kerry O’Brien that the government may have been seeking to cherry-pick the study but today he was recalcitrant, insisting the research was a politically motivated beat-up. So, it looks like Mr Hockey can look forward to a date with the academics in court.

This case of academic interference highlights the growing problem of political intervention in research. For example, Mark Wooden from the Melbourne Institute told the SMH that government departments often try to tie funding to favourable research outcomes. "Working for the government, they don't always let you say what you want to say," he said. "They edit and direct your reports all the time and if you don't toe the line you don't get paid."

I am also aware of another case of departmental interference in academic research which resulted in a line of inquiry potentially damaging to a federal minister being blocked by a bureaucrat because “you can’t expect to take money from the department and be critical of the minister”. So much for academic independence.    [read more]

Do you know when gold was first discovered in Australia? Do you know (or care) who Donald Bradman was? And can you answer this question correctly: “Which one of these is a responsibility of every Australian citizen? 1) Renounce their citizenship of any other country 2) Serve in Australian diplomatic missions overseas 3) Join with Australians and defend Australia and its way of life if the need arises?" These are supposedly questions of Australian values offered as a sample of the new citizenship quiz that came into effect this week. This test is designed to weed out those would-be citizens who fail to appreciate ‘traditional Australian values’ as defined by the most conservative federal government we’ve endured in a century.

This is a test I may well fail if I sat it today – despite being an intelligent, educated, born-and-bred Australian with history qualifications! I can’t remember the date gold was first ‘discovered’ by white men on Australian soil, although I could contribute a more meaningful analysis of the causes and consequences of the ‘Gold Rush’. I’ve been unable to escape the knowledge that Donald Bradman was a celebrated cricketer (thanks to constant reminders from our cricket-obsessed PM) but I couldn’t be less enthusiastic about his contribution to Australian ‘values’. And as for the question of responsibility posed above – it’s misleading, confusing and pointless. Answer one would be a fair guess if you’re familiar with other countries’ immigration laws, two is a prospect, but three seems improbable because – if you were a student of Australian history and politics as I have been – you’d be well aware that conscription isn’t current policy. But, according to the government’s Citizenship Test handbook, three is the correct answer. Dun dunnnn...goes my buzzer.

In her Youtube rant about the test, Australian Democrats leader Lynn Allison asked whether this question hinted at the government’s intention to reintroduce conscription or just reflected Howard’s skill at capitalising politically on fear. On the brink of political annihilation her party may be, but she has a point.

This controversial new test claimed its first victim this week – a publicly humiliated Philippines-born candidate for Australian Citizenship. 25 others beat the test which requires only 60% for a pass mark but demands 100% accuracy in the three so-called ‘Australian values’ questions. The test is supposed to draw randomly on a database of 200 questions pertaining to Australian history, culture, government and values. But the government has admitted the database is currently much limited because many of the questions weren’t ‘ready’ yet. I guess that’s one way to avoid them being scrutinized by critics in parliament and the media!

The ‘retro-form’ evidenced by this citizenship test reflects the cultural cringe regenerated by the Howard Government. For a start, it’s administered by the recently re-named Department of Immigration and Citizenship…DIC for short. But it was only ‘DIC’ for a day because the government, realising the faux pas, decided (unconventionally) to include the ‘and’ so the acronym became DIaC. The department was previously known as the Department of Immigration, Multiculturalism and Indigenous Affairs and the name change reflects the official replacement of the long standing policy of ‘Multiculturalism’ with the contentious idea of ‘Integration’ with its attendant ‘White Australia’ policy overtones.

The bland, retrogressive, stultifyingly dull cultural identity this government is trying to manufacture for Australia was on display for me today at the National Museum in Canberra. I took my seven year old niece to visit this landmark institution, curious about how it may have changed since Howard stacked the board with revisionist historians and took the curators to task for their ignorance of our sporting achievements and a so-called ‘black armband’ view of history (read for: accurately reflecting the impact of white invasion on Indigenous Australia).

The Aboriginal galleries remain the Museum's largest but they are relegated to disunified and less than prominent locations. Australia’s proud history of political activism has been brushed over and the language is sanitized and politically-correct in the Howard sense. In between the fun techno-displays that engage children like my niece, I was assaulted by exhibits including a 1950’s kitchen replete with frocked, iron-wielding housewife; an old FJ Holden – the same model Howard is often pictured driving by cartoonists; a large display celebrating our sporting achievements (a guide told me this was curated at the special request of our sports-loving PM); and a giant display commemorating a royal visit (yawn). The big themes were the ‘Aussie backyard’ (complete with Hills Hoist and BBQ), mateship (in its masculine form) and paternalism.

My niece had loads of fun – it’s undeniably a great tourist attraction – but I came away feeling diminished as an Australian. And that’s the sort of Australia the new Citizenship test is aiming to produce – shallow, mono-cultural, one-dimensional, masculinist, patriotic and bordering on the dangerously nationalistic…diminished and devalued.

There was,however, one exhibition space that reminded me of what Australian identity once aspired to be. It's called 'Eternity' and reflects our emotional heart. It celebrates passion, joy, hope, devotion, chance, thrill, fear, loneliness, separation and mystery. That's the stuff of my Australian identity.

Postscript: This resonant quote from Canberra writer and my UC colleague, Francesca Rendle-Short, is featured in the exhibition "Passion, like love, attracts and is attractive. Full of longing and desire, a passion for someone or something - an intense love or an outburst of anger - can become so strong it's barely controllable... Once aroused in its fervent keenness, passion can be something to relish". Now, that's the stuff of being alive and belongong - forget cricket and fossicking, test my passion!    [read more]