August 2012
Politics. Media. Culture. The three words we print under the logo on our front cover so people know what the magazine is about; they’re a bit misleading now. There’s been plenty to write about under the media heading lately and culture is pretty much a catch — all for anything…
What really happens in the sex industry? How do the people who work in it feel about what they do? Who really has the power and what do they do with it? The bright side of the coin It’s the oldest profession for a reason. Men want sex. Some men…
Social media has transformed the way we communicate, but for every marketer who uses it well there are ten who do it very badly indeed, often seriously damaging the brand. Think #qantasluxury or, just last week, Gloria Jean’s #withheartlocal. The most famous case was Pepsi who in 2010 decided to…
The defining moment of recent politics in Australia was not the moment when John Howard lost government and his own seat in the 2007 general election. Nor was it the moment that Kevin Rudd lost the support of his party room and was removed from the leadership of the Labor…
What would happen if AnaÏs Nin had her brain removed and replaced with a clockwork vibrator? Fifty Shades of Grey, that’s what. Never heard of it? Oh. Don’t even begin to pretend that you are yet to be hit by this terrible juggernaut. The work by Erika Leonard, AKA EL…
I got my first mobile phone in 2000, the same year I finished high school. It was right around the time it was becoming common for school students to have mobiles. Of course, the phones in those days didn’t even have shitty cameras, so we had to let off steam…
I don’t care about whether we’re a monarchy or a republic because that won’t fix unemployment, mental illness or indigenous disadvantage. I believe in public transport because it’s efficient and social to move people in groups. I support gay marriage because it’s not my place not to support it and…
When your economy, crime rates and public health systems are all sorts of reasonable and you’re not wondering where your next meal is coming from, worrying that you’ll catch diphtheria, or trying to avoid being killed by your own government, the most important thing you can focus on in life…
It’s almost become a bit of a cliché to say that federal Labor’s biggest problem is not so much their policies but the fact that they couldn’t sell an ice cream on Bondi beach in January — or whatever other metaphor you choose to apply. One of their problems is…
The world today has many problems. In fact, at a conservative estimate I would say the world has at least ten problems – in no particular order: war; famine; disease; boat people; carbon tax; same-sex marriage; endangered koalas; the pornification of children’s television; the variable quality of modern knee reconstruction…
A few nights ago, I watched Gus Van Sant’s film Milk for the second time. On first viewing, I found it difficult to get past Sean Penn’s Best Actor turn and the personal stories. This time, I couldn’t shake the political message and the battle for and to protect, the…
I have begun to, as Agent Smith put it, Hate. This. Place. This… Zoo, this Reality, whatever you want to call it. Unlike Smith though, I do not feel infected by the smell; rather I am repulsed by the constant shifting of reality, the self-delusion that permeates public discourse. It’s…
The car in front of me has a bumper sticker which looks approximately like this: to which my immediate, almost reflexive response is: Once I recover my breath, dab at the moist corners of my eyes with a hanky and cry "Mercy!" a few times, I realise that the lights…
They’ve put TV screens at the top of the escalator. Not just there, but hanging from the ceiling in pretty much every thoroughfare in the shopping centre. Stupid loud flashing things that contribute absolutely nothing to the amenity of the place as they compete with the already hideous music that,…
There is a man looking in my study window from the back yard. I suddenly can’t remember where I keep the cricket bat. He’s swarthy and he’s tapping on the glass and saying something I can’t hear because I’m listening to some traditional Georgian choral music on my headphones and…
Paywall. It’s been the unspoken swear word of online media delivery for about 18 months, but it doesn’t have to be, nor should it be. Paying for content on news websites isn’t an unfamiliar concept globally, but the apparently dirty seven-letter word has been thrust into the spotlight in Australia…
My father, an impeccably coiffed businessman, sat me down one day to tell me about his recent excursion into personal improvement. It was 1987 and he was a self-made, self-educated man and enjoyed bringing home his wisdom, like some shiny grey-suited hunter gatherer, a Paleolithic Tony Robbins. Folding his impossibly…
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Recent Posts
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Getting over Kevin
The former PM's latest “look at me”; moment gave him just a few short hours in the sun. Is the media finally as tired of his manipulations as the rest... -
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