Apparently all it takes to get our noted conservative keyboardists at certain media outlets gooey enough to celebrate you as a role model for plain speaking is a pretty face, accented English and the word wog. Fame and conservatism just ain’t what it used to be. Or maybe this is all it ever was.
Update: Mumbrella posts something interesting here and here. Is Clare a PR stunt?
Update two: Chk Chk Boom! is bogus!
Well there you have it. An untouched specimen of a long fabled species flourishing in the heart of the city. What a find. If only Britain’s got Talent got to her before Blair did. We must protect her at all costs.
And then there’s this – http://www.news.com.au/story/0,27574,25520685-5007133,00.html
__._,_.___
Of course the conservatives have the perfect comeback to this. “Why are lefties so threatened by women who don’t run with leftist groupthink?”
Oh. (Having checked out one of the links) I thought you meant someone who had actually done something.
Being “politically incorrect” is always assumed by people like the ones you linked to to be a sign of enormous creativity and edginess rather than just being a rude bogan. Why, I have no idea.
Perfect comeback? Sounds more like a perfect load of crap to me, but I’m obviously captured by ‘leftist groupthink’.
Ahhh, help me Adrien, impartial white knight of the blogsphere who can detect groupthink of whatever flavour with his eyes closed.
@tssk not threatened, her manner of speech and language are not at all unusual, we know it exists in Australian society and culture, I’m just bemused at the keyboard kolumnists response to it.
What I want to know is if it was some mullet sporting, wife beater wearing white male (dare I say bogan?)saying the same thing would it have garnered as much or any attention or would it have been regarded as just another violent night at the cross?
I wonder whether Imre Salusinszky shares his colleagues’ enthusiasm for the young woman and her plain speaking talents.
I just clicked through a read a few comments. It’s amazing that there’s so many people still around who think it’s OK to use terms like “wog”. I’m in my 40s and I can remember when it was very common parlance to use terms like that, “boong” (never sure of the spelling) was another that people just used in the course of conversation. That was over 20 years ago. To use racial slurs like these in general conversation these days is a marker of low intelligence or bad education, unsophisticated at the very least, that’s been the effect of those who are villified taking umbrage and doing something about it. It makes you wonder why those who celebrate the use of the terms by the woman in the interview are so enthusiastic to align themselves with crude, outmoded and unintelligent language.
She also has impeccable manners, apart from being hot and saying it how it is.
Was she trying to do a Kiwi accent at the start there?
As a counterpoint heaven help you if you don’t look like a model and are of a left wing bent. I’m sure we can all think of examples where such have had their physical flaws highlighted in ‘jest’.
I prefer the Club Mix personally
The point isn’t its ‘political incorrectness’, its that they were ‘wogs’ – not ‘coons’ or ‘bikies’. Those events wouldn’t support the great race/culture war narrative.
Ps. What Clare really saw: http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=2340038&id=83005575753
The argument seems to be that her ‘plain speaking’ will help the cops find the perpetrators. But how? How does ‘fat wog’ and ‘skinny wog’ help identify anyone? And she does sound like a Kiwi to me.
“Skip Chick Disses Wogs!!11111!!!!!!!!!!”
Can’t be long until Howard is re-elected by popular acclaim.
Not.
I love the smell of RWDB desperation and denial at any time of the day. It smells like the future.
PatrickB @ 8, no, no, no. You have got it Rong and are showing your elitist, Eastern-seaboard, latte-sipping political correctness. She was speaking up with refreshing honesty™ and telling it like it is without recourse to the shackles of political correctness!!
Get with the program!
Helen
Listen bro, us West Coast bros can be fully sick elitists as well, like you Eastern Skateboard elitists totally get elitism – NOT.
Jeesus – front page of the Australian! So much for capitalising on its ‘comparative advantage at the top end of the market‘
Skip Girl reports on other great moments in history:
—–
“There was this fat wog and this skinny wog, and the skinny one turned to the fat one and said…
…et tu, Brute?
After he fully sticked him with his blade. Yeah.”
——-
“There was this fat wog and this skinny wog, and this short wog, and the fat one turned to the skinny one and fully, like, sung at him
All’alba vincerò! Vincerò! Vinceeeeeeeeeeeeeerò!
Like in the New Zealand Tourism ads. Then there was this orchestra, and everyone, like, applauded.”
——-
“There was this fat wog, and this skinny wog, and the fat one turned to the skinny one and said,
I’m gonna make him an offer he can’t refuse.
Then he fully kissed him. Fag.”
—–
“There was this fat wog, and all these skinny wogs, and they invaded Sudan.”
—–
Also: moronic crap like this is, or ought to be, an embarrassment to anyone who calls herself or himself a scientist. (Apologies to any morons reading if my choice of words causes offence)
I’m very sorry, that last comment of mine was intended for an entirely different thread. Although it does kind of fit with dk’s observation of the ridiculous principles of journalism operating at the Aus.
“(Apologies to any morons reading if my choice of words causes offence)”
Apologies greatfully excepted.
FAT WOG: That skinny wog has a lean and hungry look. William Shakespeare, Julius Wog, Act I, scene 2.
I must be missing something. The lady in the video clip makes no political statements or connotations or anything.
She gives a simple witness report.
There is nothing left-wing, right-wing, conservative or anything else about what she says.
Which of the following are specific political statements:
Being a good looking sort?
Being well spoken?
Having good manners?
Using an Americanism?
Being concise & to the point?
Good grooming?
Mimicking accents?
Repeating foul language?
Saying “wog” when alternatives such as “swarthy type” are available?
(To my ear her accent is 120% ozzi, with no trace whatsoever of Kiwi)
@Steve at the Pub it not about her, it’s about the keyboard komedians at News Ltd, it’s they who champion the young lady as some sort of poster child for non-pc language and plain speaking.
Since this is Friday, I think I’ll start a drinking game once I get home and switch on the news / ACA. Here are some keywords to get started:
“Refreshing”
“Pee cee”
“the real Australia / real Australians”
“Thought police”
“totalitarian”
“sanctimonious”
Feel free to add to the list – I think I’ll be out like a light by 9.:-)
The Murdoch Muppets remind me of Beavis & Butthead:
“She said ‘wog’”
“Huh. uh-huh. Huh-huh huh huh.”
“Yeah, ‘wog’!”
“Fnur, fnur, fnur.”
In other news, thanks to that helpful, factual, plain-speaking, tell-it-like-it-is witness report, police are now looking for a fat wog and a skinny wog of woggish appearence to help them with their enquiries.
So folks, if you see a fat wog, or skinny wog, they dun’ it!
LP readers should be asking why the skinny wog was so skinny. Was he malnourished, a victim of HoWARDs policies towards the poor? Or was he a Meth Addict, a victim of HoWARDs backwards attitudes towards drug rehabilitation?
And why was the fat wog so fat? Multinational corporations force-feeding him battery-raised chicken burgers?
You guys aren’t even trying any more. There’s much more to this story than a pretty face.
Update: Mumbrella posts something interesting here and here. Is Clare a PR stunt?
Grow up folks….
Sometimes its not left or right, political correct or politically incorrect (or politically anything), not feminist or misogynist, not racist or elitist, not…
Sometimes its just plain funny (the girl, not the event).
Oh and by the way…someone was shot in one of our busiest thoroughfares. Someone was strolling the streets with a gun in his back pocket and a chip on his shoulder. But by all means let’s get stuck into the girl who just told it as it was.
Fat wog? Skinny Wog?
As a representative of the first wog nations of this white nation which has nothing to do with the first Aboriginal nations of this nation, I would like to deeply protest to anyone who will listen that the word wog has been appropriated inappropriately. Once the racist slur of choice for the migrant Greek and Italian communities of white Australia, it now means “the rest of the migrant populatons and their descendents with olive skin who came here some time in the past 20 years that do not look like us and sound very very stupid”. And that just sucks. There is seniority and there are degrees you know. There has to be some nuance in the wogification of the other other other. There has to be some recognition of the first wog nations of white Australia . I mean, where is the love bitches? We brought you Tiramisu. Damn the homogeneity of racism that turns us into one big mass of otherness based on weight.
Hazy, did you take your extra-stength obtuse pills this morning? As was pointed out in the original post, and several times down the thread, it is the pathetic over-reaction of the Murdoch KKKolumnists that we’re getting “stuck into”. Since they don’t have anything else, they are holding her up as some sort of anti-PC pin-up girl.
Really, she’s all they’ve got. Their movement has gone from William F. Buckley Jr. through P.J.O’Rourke and Chris Hitchens, to idolising some chick ‘cos she said ‘wog’ (cue Beavis & Butthead chortles)…
Way to miss the point, Hazy.
Sometimes its not left or right, political correct or politically incorrect …
*Drinks*
Geez, wish I wasn’t at work. *thinks drinks*
Hey that sounds like the opening lines to a song…next line: ‘Sometimes it’s just lerve’
Yobbo, to satisfy you:
“The fat-and-skinny discourse of ethnic stereotypy is part of an historical dialectic underlying all embodied relations of Australian post-colonial ideology. The interplay, in this case gunplay, between the ideal archetypes of the “fat wog” and “skinny wog” stands as substitute in the place of real, material, race relations. Notably, however, qualities of fatness and skinniness within (wog)dom are in this case themselves lumped together as part of an Eastern Suburbs ethnic subalternality in the discourse of crude, gutter racism”.
Mercurius, it’s “fnarr! fnarr!”
Sorry Liam, my Kike ears don’t pick up the inflection right, hence my erroneous phonological representation.
Helen, just watch any reality TV show (but especially Biggest Loser) and do a shot every time someone says “journey”. I came up with this drinking game but haven’t been game to try it. You’ll be dead of liver disease within the week.
Miss Clare seems funny and of course, given that it was 3 AM, she may have been on the truth serum. The short post at the Australian (linked to above) gets the tone right for mine. After all someone was shot, which is newsworthy. Clare is “photogenic”. Wry amusement follows “her giving the reporter a compelling account of what happened, all the while completely oblivious to the sensitivities involved”. The non-racial obliviousness is also funny – she’s doing her stand up routine whilst a dude has just been shot, in an age when we’re used to people being DEVESTATED BY TEH TRAUMA if you drop your hat on them.
Champagne comedy all round. Of course Bolt can’t just enjoy it for what it is, cause he’s a tool, but whatevs as the kids say.
SATP and Yobbo are correct.
News happens and then slides itself onto the pages of newspapers. Editors and editorial choices play no part in what is news and what isn’t news.
Why can’t TEH LEFT “get it”?
The report also mentions she is from the northern beaches. At least she has made it across the Spit and all the way to the city .
The debate about whether she is a bogan or not is out of place – there aren’t many thereabouts – just a paler and more refined version of the Shire.
Insular peninsula for shure….
And she sure wasn’t affected by too much alcohol.Very chatty really what with all the stress .
What is it with teh right and CAPS LOCK?
Wake Up Australia!
Oh, Sean, surely there’s a phD in there somewhere for someone on the burgeoning popularity of “Journey” as a word applied to absolutely anything and everything. I almost quietly head-pewed when I heard a teenager use the word when she’d stood up to eulogise her gran at the gran’s funeral. (But hey, that was sincerely meant, and it’d be a mean thing to quibble at someone’s usage at such a time.)
Helen, were there any fat wogs or skinny wogs at the funeral? The cops might want a word with them…
Oh, she said,
Any way you want it
Thats the way you need it
Any way you want it
She said, any way you want it
Thats the way you need it
Any way you want it
I was alone
I never knew
What good love could do
Ooh, then we touched
Then we sang
About the lovin things
Ooh, all night, all night
Oh, every night
So hold tight, hold tight
Ooh baby, hold tight
Oh, she said,
Any way you want it
Thats the way you need it
Any way you want it
She said, any way you want it
Thats the way you need it
Any way you want it
Mercurius,
The very title of the piece sets it up as a right/left ‘thing’. Remind me – where does O’Rourke sit in the political spectrum?
Then of course we have the assertion that the right wing bloggers are building her up a “model for plain speaking”.
Now we have the rapid retreat. Good-o.
If you actually look at what the conservative keyboardists are saying (instead of just assuming that whatever they say is invalid) you’ll see that they are merely commenting on her 15 seconds of fame as a result of the quirky interview.
DEPARTMENT OF UTOPIA
Standing Committee on Eliminating Social Prejudice
DOC #12 964 121
.
Notice of Colloquial Ethnic Nomenclature Licensing Authority Implementation.
.
From July the 14th, 2009 citizens will be required to obtain a license from the Office of Mandatory Niceness in order to make use of ethnospecific terminology.
.
1. In order to qualify for a license citizens must be in possession of a specified percentage of genetic material known to’ve spent a number of centuries in some place. This shall be known as the genetic identity essentialist determining factor quotient
.
2. To use the word ‘wog’ the genetic identity essentialist determining factor quotient must be 67%. If between 39 and 67% use of the word is permissable but the quota of allowable utterances is reduced to 50% of the standard.
.
3. Ditto: nip, chink, mick, pommy, limey, gringo, hongky, honkey, seppho, spic, greaser, gook and kraut.
.
4. Use of the words yid, kike and heeb are allowable only if:
-
a. Your dad married a nice Jewish girl
b. The license bearer wear a yellow star at all times marked ’self-hating Jew’.
.
5. Da Man says my niggaz get da license but mothafock that boo’shee’. Homes! You tells I cain says yo’ nigga da ma niggaz and I bust a cap! Gee. We’s a gonna gonna party and boo’shee’ and party and boo’shee and party….
.
6. White people are ineligible for licenses because they aren’t ethnic. They don’t need to wear stars on their peacoats because we know they are and that they’re to blame.
.
7. It’s open season on the French.
.
Thank you.
Oh sure, Hazy, and Gough Whitlam on the steps of Parliament House was “merely commenting” on the metaphysical status of the governor-general’s soul.
Why don’t we let Helen’s drinking game be the final arbiter of who and what set this up as a left/right and ‘plain-speaking’ thing, hmmm? Odds are we’ll all be under the table before Stateline starts tonight.
Her face doesn’t move very much. But I think she appreciates the shock value of her language (even if she can’t manage a frown).
I’m a boomer. Born and bred in Wollongong.
F-F-S!!! Please do not try and sell me some fluff about “wog” not being a racist term. It is as derogatory as you want it to be. And there are a bucket of bogans out there who insist on making it VERY derogatory.
Of course I use the term “bogan” with a great deal of affection….
nd Grgrwll y n’t, y sntt lttlprg.
prig??? prig!!! “prig”
Good grief… Would bounder be an appropriate (non PC) retort?
Blackguard!
“Blackguard”
Are you sure?
Oh dear…
Wouldn’t it be wonderful if the words “knave” and “varlet” became fashionable again? Zounds!
mars08 “And there are a bucket of bogans out there who insist on making it VERY derogatory.”
you people crack me up.
You get yourselves worked up into a lather about one derogatory word – “wog” but throw around another derogatory word – “bogan” – like confetti.
Supposedly a site where people stick up for the working class but you despise them, as betrayed by your words.
Plenty of rich and/or successful bogans out there.
You might care to read for comprehension and discover the difference between discrimination on the basis of race, nationality or religion, versus their behaviour.
This is troll night isn’t it?
Excuse me, dd?
You seem to the only one here associating the bogan epithet with working class Australians. And then you generalise again by accusing EVERYONE on this site of despising the working class.
Disappointing, dave.
Took me a while to figure out all the passionate tut-tutting about the word ‘wog’, really isn’t about her or the use of the word, it’s just an excuse to have a shot at Blair and Bolt.
Must be a slow blog day.
I first came across this story on The Age website where it featured three times on the front page, and then on LP – written by a male obviously. I have to say the treatment of Clare has been incredibly offensive in how classist and misogynist it has been. Hardly progressive at all.
Good for you, Sylvia
“…written by a male obviously” AND “incredibly offensive” in the same post!!!
Ironic much?
You seem to the only one here associating the bogan epithet with working class Australians.
nice slide. rather than admitting that you’re a bunch of urbanite snobs, “bogan” is quickly stripped of the meaning it has in common parlance, and we enter an alternate universe at LP where it simply means “someone who uses the word wog.”
by the way, she did not use the word in a derogatory context, it was purely descriptive.
And then you generalise again by accusing EVERYONE on this site of despising the working class.
no, only those who use the word “bogan”.
Good for you, Sylvia
“…written by a male obviously” AND “incredibly offensive” in the same post!!!
Ironic much?
No. Not when discussing male sexism. The two terms could easily and justifiably be used in a feminist critique of sexist workplace practices, for example.
“…she did not use the word in a derogatory context, it was purely descriptive”
Read my post again, dd.
I don’t give a pigs-arse how SHE used the epithet. It’s about how the bogans choose to use it.
“Not when discussing male sexism”
Noice. How very PC of you, dd.
Now, in what way is the op sexist?
Now, in what way is the op sexist?
.
I personally didn’t think it was sexist, but the person who used those terms together in the same sentence obviously did. As such, it was a legitimate combination of phrases. In other words, that comment wasn’t “ironic” in the sense intended, ie self-contradictory.
.
It’s about how the bogans choose to use it.
.
Wow, you’re a hate-filled, nasty piece of work, aren’t you? Do you use the n word too? and are lesbians “lesbos” to you?
.
I don’t give a pigs-arse how SHE used the epithet.
.
That’s the only thing on the table.
.
By the way, we’re talking about a member of the public who witnessed a horrific incident. Her judgement (such as what words to use, or whether to talk to a guy with a camera) may understandably have been awry.
Don’t form a lynch mob for a private citizen.
Please. Surely this site is not that tawdry.
(Surely?)
There are quite a number of comments on this thread that made me laugh so much I nearly choked to death.
that’s a great comeback, Paul, when you don’t have a comeback. I must use it myself sometime. same goes for Mercurious. When you’re in a morally indefensible position, it’s time to lower the portcullis. and stop feeding the trolls!
Ok folks, lets pull this back into some semblance of order from here on in.
For those new to my posts you should understand that I follow my own comments policy and do as I please when it comes to moderation.
If I don’t like you your comments will be deleted with no questions answered.
Daddy Dave, and the other trolls you’ve hit your quota. That’s all for you.
“Sylvia Fowler”, FFS. Here is the original post in its entirety, because it was only one sentence after all:
As a feminist ozblogger I fail to see the sexism there. Now go over to the two linked outlets, the Tele and the Herald Sun, and look up all the reader comments about the other “Clare”, relative to the NRL footballers. Then come back and tell me who’s sexist.
“…rather than admitting that you’re a bunch of urbanite snobs…”
This generalisation. After I’ve explained that I’m born and bred in Wollongong. Hardly a hotbed of Chardonnay-sipping, metrosexual, inner-city go-gooders. We’ve got boatloads of “wogs” but.
So I’ve heard the military-grade, fully-loaded version of the word being used more times than I can remember.
dd @ 68,
??? It wasn’t a comeback to anything. I was just expressing my appreciation of the humour of some of the commenters – y’know, riffs on fat/skinny wogs etc.
And I thought Clare was fine. That’s the way some Aussies talk, orright? (A lot of us, actually -)
Huh.
Seems like somewhere out there, there’s an awful lot of people who haven’t listened to enuf Lou Reed records.
(goes back to sleep)
I,m not a RWDB like some on here, but the rest decrying this should get out more,the Wog,Coon,boong and the N word and a few others may not be in use at your particular social occasions,but trust me they are used quite freely by at large percentage of the population at theirs.
Its just the way it is,not all of us have been to Uni,or had what is called higher education.
From an evidentiary point of view, her testimony is excellent, because it’s so obviously not given with any second thoughts, elaboration, fabrication or the like. So there’s a good chance that if the shooter is caught, he’ll be convicted and spend a long time in prison.
As you should for shooting someone for bonking your cousin.
The girl is pretty bloody funny in her naivete, and morons like Andrew Bolt et al are bound to have little spontaneous orgasms about it all, but we’ve bigger things to worry about.
Call me old-fashioned, but I am less concerned about someone saying “wog” and more concerned about someone putting bullets into his mate.
I mean, saying “wog” is racist, yes. But on its own it’s nothing to worry about. Whereas some Indian student being bashed by half a dozen stupid young blokes, with Indian students apparently deliberately targeted by young thugs is a kind of racism to worry about.
Mars 08 – Please do not try and sell me some fluff about “wog” not being a racist term. It is as derogatory as you want it to be. And there are a bucket of bogans out there who insist on making it VERY derogatory.
.
In the early 90s the Qld Gay and Lesbian Pride collective organized their first march and festival. They promoted the event with posters that used words like dyke and fag. They did this because, so they said, if the words are used to siply denote a lesbian or a gay man then it would take the nasty connotation out of them. It could no longer be a term of abuse.
.
It worked.
.
In Victoria the word wog is used in casual conversation. Sometimes it’s derogatory but most often it simply means someone’s who’s ethnicity hails back to Greece or Italy etc. And of course sometimes the word Aussie is used in a derogatory fashion. Like my (Italian) ex-girlfriend who was talking about times when she’s dressed in a really daggy fashion, she said: I look like such an Aussie!
.
Being Celtic I could be offended. But unfortunately it’s true. Celts are dags generally. It’s not hate, just expression. And you won’t eliminate hatred by putting a word in word jail.
Well said, Kiashu.
The “fat wog” broke the rules by shooting someone, but the Indian student’s offence was purely genetic.
So, if the police do manage to catch either the fat wog or the skinny wog, will they have to go on sick-leave after having caught said wogs?
So, if the police do manage to catch either the fat wog or the skinny wog, will they have to go on sick-leave after having caught said wogs?
“They did this because, so they said, if the words are used to siply denote a lesbian or a gay man then it would take the nasty connotation out of them. It could no longer be a term of abuse.”
Vince Sorrenti and his mob did the same thing for “Wog” 20 years ago. Unfortunately all of LP were too busy watching the arts hour on ABC and missed that little cultural nugget.
Hence, they still get worked up about a word that isn’t even an epithet any more.
But you know, any excuse to have a go at the real enemy – bogans.
But you know, any excuse to have a go at the real enemy – bogans.
.
And Canadians. Let’s not forget the Canadians. They are evil.
FFS, yobbo, stop attacking a straw-LP and read what the OP, and many commenters, have explained, many times, is the true target of the post. Hint: it’s not bogans, it’s not the use of the term ‘wog’. It’s the Murdoch KKKolumnists and their swooning over-reaction to this sad little story.
I’ve even typed it real slow for the hard-of-understanding.
And I don’t know about other LP denizens, but what’s getting me “worked up” is the stubborn, obtuse refusal of you and several other trolls to acknowledge what has been spelled out here, in words of few syllables, simply so you can continue your dull, mindless trolling.
So, if you don’t mind, take your annoying obtuse friends elsewhere and start a little LP-Watch blog or something where you can declare to the world what “LP” thinks and what “LP” believes. It’s clearly your major area of expertise. Tell me, when “LP” has breakfast, do we all sip from the same latte or is there a choice of soy, decaf, extra shot, etc.? Enquiring minds want to know.
We don’t need you to tell us what “LP” thinks. I know my own mind, and if you can’t comprehend what has been declared here many times to be the true aim and motivation behind this post, then the problem, my friend, lies with you.
so anyway, what do you folks think of Lenny Bruce [as portrayed by Dustin Hoffman]?:
And I don’t know about other LP denizens, but what’s getting me “worked up” is the stubborn, obtuse refusal of you and several other trolls to acknowledge what has been spelled out here, in words of few syllables, simply so you can continue your dull, mindless trolling.
.
Whilst I agree that mass media populist manipulation would be a more stimulating subject, and I admit to contributing to the derailment, I don’t think Yobbo’s a troll. In fact I’ve never know him to be less than courteous and concise. And making a relevant point.
.
Also: there have also been people here who are part of the Word In Jail school of progress which is the basis of the Freedom To Say Wog riff of the News Ltd crew..
The surname of the woman in question is Werbeloff. She might be a lot of things, but a Skip isn’t one of them.
What John Ryan @ 74 said.
And Yobbo @ 80.
btw I have my espresso coffee black, half strength (or at home a small teaspoon from Nescafe jar.) And I wuz drinking lattes when they used to be called Spanish at the Piccolo Bar in King’s Cross. They wuz dreamt up by some wogs too.
Jeez, what did I do there. Almost tempted to change me moniker to Popeye but …
What struck me about Clare was her absolute innocence in her use of the word ‘wog’. That is, it is apparent that Clare has been socialised within a culture where racism towards immigrant groups is normalised to the point that the word is used unproblematically and not necessarily with an intent to degrade or humiliate, though it functions best in that capacity and never loses that intent.. But the word is much more loaded than even that and Clare speaks from a rich history within the discourse of whiteness on the function and the benefits to the dominant culture of “not being quite white” in Australia.
Its about the role that those who are not quite white, as opposed to being Black, play in assuring the the white nation of their own legitimacy. It was Gassan Hage in his book White Nation who argued that the immigrants of the post war period provided white australia with a site on which to relieve their anxieties regarding land ownership. And others have added to it in recent years:
“Multicultural Australia comes to value ethnic minorities for what they can offer the dominant cultural group. It is through the image of the ‘foreigner who desires what we already have’ that the dominant white Australian culture can affirm its own value as the object of the others’ desire. Notions like ‘the lucky country’ presuppose white Australians’ location in the land that others understandably desire. Such notions attest to the anxiety of a people whose history offers no secure self grounding”
by Toula Nicolacopoulos and George Vassilacolpoulos
from Whitening Race ed. Eileen Moreton-Robinson, god bless her, pg 47
Though Clare little knows this, this word assures white Australia of its own legitimacy in Indigenous land. This wog other functions in a way the original other never can, which is why the Indigenous other, is often absented all together and appears and disappears from public view with regular monotony. Aboriginals are too threatening. Their presence attests to the fact the land is stolen. Wogs just attest to the fact that whites have it. This is what Bolt means when he says she speaks plainly. She speaks plainly for whiteness.
Which has nothing much to do with how fecking hilarious the whole thing is, and that Bolt and Blair are so so desperate. Every time I play Clare, I can hear the Eagles song over and over.
“Tell me, when “LP” has breakfast, do we all sip from the same latte or is there a choice of soy, decaf, extra shot, etc.? Enquiring minds want to know.
.
The trouble with trying to use Blair’s post as a point from which to start an attack is that he just blandly posts the material without much further elaboration
except to joke that she now needs a PR agent.
More or less the same approach is seen on the other link.
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Phil is the person who claims she is a “role model” – it is a fabrication and one that isn’t needed in this situation. His ongoing inability to allow for opinions like those of Bolt and Blair is more his problem that anyone else’s but when it the basis for a shallow blog post the thread will undoubtably drift off into meaningless blather.
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“It’s the Murdoch KKKolumnists and their swooning over-reaction to this sad little story.”
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And this effort from Mercurius is disingenuous – there is no over-reaction from either commentator – they let their readers carry on but they have a light touch with the actual material. Please try harder Mercurius and if you do decide that reactions to LP posts should be posted elsewhere please add it to the Comments Policy so we can be sure you will be left alone with your thoughts and postings.
I thought the opposite Casey, I think Clare totally knows she is transgressing using ‘wog’ so publicly. You can see it in eyes that she almost expects the cameraman to say – “you can’t say it that, that way” and she would then re-state it etc.
Bogan she is not – here is her mum in Tele today:
It just gets better – the educated North Shore matron tut-tutting to the media outlet that is pushing and promoting her daughter’s “wink-wink street profiling skills.”
but on your main point, right on, sista.
That is all true, Casey in comment #88.
But at least this girl didn’t shoot or beat anyone, nor would she, I think, close down a dozen aboriginal homelands for a land grab.
A few nasty words in casual conversation are not the real issue. People shooting their mates over non-racial matters is an issue. People beating up Indian students, and the police response being a “you should stop speaking Hindi in public”, that’s an issue. The NT govt doing a landgrab with the thin gloss of aboriginal welfare as the excuse, that’s an issue.
Let’s keep focused on the real issues of violence and racism in our society. Segregation didn’t end in the US because they stopped anyone from saying “nigger”, it ended with legislative changes and at the point of a federal gun. Likewise, the real issues of violence and racism in Australia will not be dealt with by worrying about some naive chick who’ll be forgotten two weeks from now.
But I guess we like to distract ourselves from the real issues. “Too hard” basket and all that. Keep it all nice and abstract.
“She might be a lot of things, but a Skip isn’t one of them.”
Sam @85… can you please give us some examples of proper Skip names?
“So, if you don’t mind, take your annoying obtuse friends elsewhere and start a little LP-Watch blog”
Sorry, it’s really only a few nameless lefties who are that pathetic.
Im quite happy to keep commenting here, assuming of course I don’t get moderated (again) for not toeing the company line.
“Vince Sorrenti and his mob did the same thing for “Wog” 20 years ago. Unfortunately all of LP were too busy watching the arts hour on ABC and missed that little cultural nugget.”
My goodness! Do you really not GET it or do just not want to get it?
Wogs, like queers and niggers appropriated the epithets in order to dilute their common use by the bigots. Then again, there’s no guarantee that members of those groups won’t use it in a derogatory manner. It’s just much less likely.
Guns don’t kill people. Idiots with guns kill people. It’s the intent of the person behind the delivery that makes the difference, savvy?
C’mon Murph, now who’s being disingenuous? You know that Bolt and Blair choose their material precisely to “let their readers carry on”, even if they have a “light touch with the actual material” themselves.
There’s a reason they chose to put this young lady up on their blog, and not, say, a video of baby pandas. They know what they’re doing, you know what they’re doing, and we know it too. It’s not disingenuous to call them on it.
Adrien, FWIW I’ve always found your contributions on this and most other threads to be anything but trolling. You’re often incisive, challenging, interesting (and pompous!) too boot. But all Yobbo’s done is use this thread as a platform to tell the world, over and over, his opinion of LP, which is so terribly interesting and on-topic, not to mention “courteous and concise”. See his comment @ 94 for a case in point.
And Yobbo, nobody here gets moderated for “not toeing the company line”. They often get moderated for being off-topic, or refusing to engage with the central ‘thesis’ (for want of a better term) of a post. Was the title of this post “Please tell us, over and over again, your opinions about LP! They’d make a fascinating thread!” ? Didn’t think so…
When I encountered the video, I was surprised that the word “wog” came from the lips of such a young woman.
I’m 37. I’ve notice that one of the differences between me and the teens is how much more multi-racial is their generation than mine. Far more Asian-Australians and Indian-Australians, and quite a few African-Australians now… and even more in the pre-teens. My wife and I like to look after a 10 year old boy (a son of a friend of mine); many of his friends are refugees from Somalia and Ethiopia – building a new life in this country. With such a mix – why would Clare notice someone who’s of Italian or Greek background? Doesn’t she have any friends like them, or are they even aware?
I might be sheltered living in inner-city West End, but I’m really surprised to hear an old-fashioned ethnic slur in this day and age. Not used self-deprecating, but used for other people. People may not like certain groups of people, but at least they’re fairly clever in hiding it. Even my bastard bigoted landlord isn’t that stupid. Dropping “Wog” like that is a good way of earning the “racist” label. In most circles I know (professional or otherwise), it’s a good way towards social death.
But not in the bogan circles Clare knows.
I was going to disagree with you Kiashu when you posted a similar comment above. This thread isn’t about vicious street violence and guns. Obviously you would like it to be so, and it’s a topic that needs to be covered over and over because it’s so prevalent etc. This thread however is about News Corp and how they they knowingly promoted one crime scene television report only because the young person uses racial epithets and is a very good looking white girl.
They have done this because firstly and mainly it sells a shitload of papers and garners online hits and secondly because it fits totally within their on-going, unceasing culture war agenda. Whether a national media organisation should have promoted this footage is an issue, imo. It was News Corp’s choice to promote this now online hybrid of Pauline Hanson, Corey Worthington and Australia’s Next Top Model.
In relation to the crime being reported by Clare, we need to know a lot more about the circumstances of the shooting and participants to know whether this is time-old Kings X thuggery perpetrated by members of the underworld, who have and probably will always control the Cross. Or whether it was gang related or…. whether it represents a trend towards more random individuals carrying guns. ie. not organised or gang related. But until we know more about the crime, there isn’t a whole lot you can say about it except it seems incredibly moronic.
I don’t know if you watched Underbelly, but I would have thought that even based so loosely and so poorly on real events, that people would at least have taken from both series, that hoods and standover men shoot each other a lot and for not much of a reason from whatever ethnic background.
“Hood shot in Cross” ….hold the presses, not. “North Shore princess wog popping testimony”…June bonuses here we come.
Sorry, it was of course Channel Nine who filmed it – not sure if they broadcast it or just put it online (??) and then News Corp. jumped on to promote second.
Apply as required.
Jo @ 90 You can see it in eyes that she almost expects the cameraman to say – “you can’t say it that, that way” and she would then re-state it etc.
I agree, that’s what I saw. There was a slight pause in her eyes before she said the wicked w word.
Let’s keep focused on the real issues of violence and racism in our society. …
…But I guess we like to distract ourselves from the real issues. “Too hard” basket and all that. Keep it all nice and abstract.
Jeebus, is there anything so tedious as a blogger/commenter who comes into someone else’s blog and complains that the poster is writing about X when, in fact, Y is so much more important. I’ve had a cursory look at your blog Kiashu, and I see no mention of the important issue of racial attacks on people “of Indian appearance” in Melbourne. We have written about that on LP. This is not to say that we’re so wonderful for doing so, there is much more we can do. However, you might try getting off your own ass, or onto it, and writing one yourself. And remember at any one time the number of potential meaningful topics is infinite. ‘K?
While things like this end up making both sides look silly, I was always under the impression that the word “wog” doesn’t carry the weight it once did. I’m not sure about other states but here in SA we have franchises like Wog In A Box which is obviously a take off of Wok In A Box, presumably they sell Italian food.
You really need to get out more. Really. I mean that in the nicest possible way. I reckon a lot of the young ‘uns (with the help of the grubs in the meeja and populist pollies) are feeling under siege.
Casey @ #88: I hate to be the one to pop your balloon, but the reality is that you’d be hard-pressed to identify a single square foot of real estate on this planet that hasn’t been “stolen” by/from one group or another over the millennia. I can never remember whether the Caribs wiped out the Arawaks or vice versa, but the Spaniards didn’t have to wipe out both b/c one had already done the other in. Why on earth do they speak Arabic in Algeria? Don’t they know that Arabia is way over in the other direction? And I reckon those Turks had better clear out of Anatolia and hand it back to the Greeks they stole it from, so that the Greeks can make amends by handing it back to the Lydians and the Hittites, who… well you get the picture.
That whole zany text you quoted was just a fun excuse to get all hatey on the white folks, cuz that’s what’s allowable these days. Sort of like a lot of this thread. Nothing feels better than righteous indignation, duz it.
Nothing to see here, really, just another fine day at the hot dog stand.
Casey @ #88 overlooks the most salient point in the whole ‘Clare’ fiasco. And that is in how class is used by media conservatives in the service of sexism. In a near death experience i.e. the shooting, the textual construction of the interview denies Clare Werbeloff the correct means of expression. However, a closer analysis reveals a number of narratives concerning the bridge between reality and class may be discovered. Thus, several discourses concerning the Clare Werbeloff mode of expression exist. In this scenario we can use the term ‘power relations’ to denote the bridge between class and language. Therefore, a number of conceptualisms concerning the paradigm of sexual identity may be found in the behaviour of ‘Clare Werbeloff’ and that the media’s interpretation is fundamentally impossible.
The above has gotta be everyone’s favourite commenter, Mr Greenfield, doing a drive-by parody …
“…just a fun excuse to get all hatey on the white folks, cuz that’s what’s allowable these days. Sort of like a lot of this thread. Nothing feels better than righteous indignation, duz it.”
Apparently declarations of white victimhood feel kinda nice too. Oh it breaks my heart, it duz.
Sleep with one eye open. Gripping your pillow tight. The strawman he comes…
Paulus, it does have something of that particular tone of bitterness poorly disguised as satire that our good friend is so adept at conveying.
You keep accusing me of changing the subject and setting my own agenda, Mercurius. But it wasn’t me who brought up bogans in this thread. That was the wonderfully egalitarian LP inhabitants.
When I encountered the video, I was surprised that the word “wog” came from the lips of such a young woman.
Down and Out, why would you be so surprised at this in our multicultural world?
People are not encouraged to celebrate Australian Heritage and Culture with its overtones of racism, classism, and out and out thuggery – they are encouraged to take joy in anything they choose.
We all like to feel we belong, we’re tribal creatures at heart, and “wogs” have been self-identifying as wogs for decades, and the ones I associate with don’t have any issue with being called a wog by a skip. They are just as quick to pay out on the skips.
It’s all in the intent (unless you’re hauled in under the RTTA, of course), and intonation is generally a pretty good indicator of that.
Go do a search on youtube for “lebs” – a lot of those self-identify as wogs, too. They’re more than happy to make derogatory remarks about the whites, and the skips, and the aussies, and as the kids are learning in schools these days, white people are mean to aboriginals.
So are you a skip and are you proud to be one?
FFS, people, she just said what she saw, we’re onto bloody whiteness studies already?
Japerz!, for various reasons, you can ‘t pop my balloon from that far away – so lets move on shall we?. Yes I have wine beside me. Further, I live to be zany as you know. Now where were we you big hunk of spunk? Now, now – thats not what you think it means, which is quite my point you know. Oh yes now – what was it you said? You said “???” Which you’ve said before Japerz. I mean how many times can you say “???” and get away with it?
Anyway: To which I say, what the fracking hell does ??? have to do with what I said? Which Ive said before. Further to this, Ive also said this before: “I love it when an American who has no idea of what he is talking about tells an Australian about how it goes down in Australia. But still its good to hear from you. And its Kath and Kim, the Australian version you really need to watch to stop with the “???” It really explains Clare too.
mars08 — I see no reason why both things couldn’t be true at the same time.
“It makes so little difference, at so much more
Than seventy, where one looks, one has been there before.”
Ah, Mister Wallace Stevens. Why do we bother reading anyone else?
No shit!
Do you have any idea how funny this thread is after a few drinks???
Ah, Casey, when you make it such fun to get a rise out of you, I can hardly be faulted now can I?
I’m sure it is indeed highly entertaining to hear a nutty sep who’s never set foot in Australia bloviating all sorts of opinions about the Oz perspective. Hey, I’m not above providing a bit of comic relief. What a crazy global globe we all live in! …So you can just imagine how hilarious I find it when I see all sorts of kooky strident opinions about America aired here, most of which would seem to apply more accurately to medieval Atlantis than the country I’ve lived in all me life. Sauce, gander, complete the sentence.
But all of this is off-topic. Sorry to derail, but it’s always a pleasure to break a lance with ya. Speaking of Aussie TV, I’ve become kind of a Ronnie Johns fan, after Fyodor linked that Chopper Reid sketch. Funny show. Is it still on?
I’d need more than a few, I think.
Jacques @ 102 – I too thought that wog had been reclaimed quite a while ago. A friend mentioned to me a while back about how when she was living in Europe had to remember that it was still considered a derogatory term over there.
Perhaps there’s a bit of a generation gap here in the interpretation? Certainly it can be used in a derogatory manner, but I didn’t think it was being done so in that video, just shorthand for someone of greek or italian background without any further judgements attached.
The next Pauline Hanson figure perhaps? Maybe she’ll appear on reality TV. I can see the next pitched program now: “Corridors of power! New reality show featuring however-many Young Hopefuls in their Journey tords a Place in the Feral parliament. YOU have the power to vote them in – or out!! Watch young Clare Whosit as she battles the others for the seat of…”
It’ll be sponsored by the Murdoch media and it’ll be a historical milestone as the first MP to get her seat via SMS vote.
On a platform, of course, of Zero Tolerance towards border protection, crime, and latte leftists.
You read this here first.
Yes, but did you see when they aired them here? “???” indeed.
I bet if Little Miss Pretty Face went up to an Italian or Middle Easterner and called him a fat wog to his face, should wouldn’t have a pretty face for much longer.
What is it with the Right and their love of racial slurs?
You can talk, silkworm, having just implied that Italians and Middle Easterners readily beat up women.
The Italian guys I know wouldn’t attack “Little Miss Pretty Face”, even if she did call them a wog.
She’s a fake. Su was right!
http://www.smh.com.au/national/bogus-bogan-exposed-top-cop-disarms-cult-of-chk-chk-boom-20090523-biyj.html
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Heh. That makes me respect her even more, for having the imagination and poise and confidence to make up a story like that, on the spot, with a news camera in her face. That’s more than I could do.
Clare, marry me!
Pitiful
I believe that the above descriptor gets to the heart of the matter for many LP denizens.
So Tim and Andrew’s undoctored, non-p.c., voice of reality turned out to be a fraud.
I wonder how long it will take the boys to fess up, on their blogs, that they have been conned big-time?
Fat and skinny went to war
Fat got shot by an apple core.
Bogus bogan exposed as having had too much botox. (IMO). I stand by my comment. She knew exactly what she was doing.
That it’s a fraud is irrelevant. The whole point was it was funny and it stirred up the sensitive souls of the PC crowd. People like you. Marvellous!
Oh really?
Good thing you guys aren’t cops. Otherwise you’d be out on the beat looking for a “fat wog” and a “skinnier wog” to arrest. Turns out her account is false.
Good the media are so ‘spot-on’ in reporting these valuable eyewitness accounts. Good thing she ‘identified’ the ethnicity of the perps, because as we all know the problem with crime-fighting today is that nobody’s ‘allowed’ to talk about ethnicity.
The cops are far better at catching crims than you guys, Andrew Bolt, the TV reporters or Clare Werbeloff.
But at least, out of all this, your credulousness is on display for all the world to see.
AC, as I said in comment #6
They (News Ltd) jumped all over it, that’s the only reason I even bothered to post this.
I’m now greatly amused that their enthusiasm for this appears to have been Punk’d…..as the kids say these days.
So, yes, like you, we all think it very funny.
In other news, Clare saw Goody Proctor with the devil.
What is it with racists and lying?
What is it with ideological blogging and epigrams?
Hey, Mercurius, I wasn’t aware this was about fighting crime!
AC, the public lie she told may have delayed or circumvented the police investigation of a crime. I’m sure if someone from Greenpeace tried a stunt like that the Blolts would be all over it.
Because of the suggestion of a tie to viral marketing, it’s even more concerning – media manipulation to the max, delibertely pushing all of society’s most intolerant buttons. Talk about distortion. I’m sure my tongue in cheek description of a reality show competition for a parliamentary seat will be reality in the next couple of years, given the level of sheer bloody cynicism.
Helen, your point is well-taken.
AC @129… “That it’s a fraud is irrelevant…
Wake up to yourself! The meeja jumped on this because they KNEW there were tossers out there who’d get their jollies from hearing Clare’s dribble. Sort of like the “kiddies overboard” fable. Some people just NEEDED to believe it.
BTW. Am I the only one who does NOT think she’s hot? Hard face, waxy skin and vacant eyes don’t “do it” for me. Ooooooh sexist!
Paulus @122…“The Italian guys I know wouldn’t attack “Little Miss Pretty Face”, even if she did call them a wog.”
That’s encouraging! Now can you please tell us how many Italian guys you actually know? Where were they born? How old are they? Where were they educated. How, exactly, are they “Italian”. See…? if it’s just the colour of their skin and eyes, their unusual surnames and/or the fact that they can speak another language… they might not really be “Italian” at all.
Wogs, like queers and niggers appropriated the epithets in order to dilute their common use by the bigots. Then again, there’s no guarantee that members of those groups won’t use it in a derogatory manner. It’s just much less likely.
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Well in the case of Afro-Americans the word was used because slavery had taught them to use it. The words ‘bitch’ and ‘buck’ are a legacy of slavery – of the time when African slaves were animals to be bred (charming innit?). For this reason various black leaders and voices – Garvey, X, Public Enemy – tried to stamp out the use of the word but others – like The Last Poets – appropriated it. It was also the basis of an inter-generational conflict. Please see the argument between father and son Sean Nelson and Samuel Jackson in Fresh for illustration.
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Words change. In Melbourne there’s a bunch of Korean break-dancers. They listen to old school hip-hop and dress likewise. They are excellent. Yesterday I saw one teaching a young Euro-African dude some moves in a quintessentially Asian way.
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And they all say yo nigga to each other. Asian homeboys, Skip homeboys. Wogs. They all use it. It doesn’t mean anything racial it’s simply a term of endearment or machismo. Words change. I agree, it’s not the word it’s the meaning behind it. But you won’t change peoples’ hearts by putting words in jail. I’m not a homophobe but I use the word fag. I’m not racist but I use the word wog. It’s good. The words then no longer belong to bigots.
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I think most of the people here seem to agree with that and don’t think that ‘wog’ is inherently offensive. But the, imho, idiotic opinion that you can change the world by controlling what people say still obtains. And it’s the legacy of that kind of PC thought control that feeds Blair/Bolt and their readers.
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Adrien, FWIW I’ve always found your contributions on this and most other threads to be anything but trolling. You’re often incisive, challenging, interesting (and pompous!) too boot.
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Well thanks but I’m not pompous. I’m arrogant.
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But all Yobbo’s done is use this thread as a platform to tell the world, over and over, his opinion of LP, which is so terribly interesting and on-topic, not to mention “courteous and concise”. See his comment @ 94 for a case in point.
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Yeah but it was concise and courteous.
That’s right, pal, because it was a very funny impression of the way some people actually talk. What are you going to do? Ban impressions?
mars, she may be ‘hot’ if you like lifesized barbie dolls, or acres of botox. Otherwise…
Amongst other functions the Media are mythmakers.
Here are some myths:
1. There is a positive correlation between physical attractiveness and reliability.
2. There is a positive correlation between paleness of complexion and reliability.
3. Wogs shoot each other in public.
The Right has attempted to profit from propagating these myths.
I’m pleased to see that right wingers have proven themselves once again to be naive, stupid, and desperate for any success on their failing prosecution of the culture wars.
Saw a promo for her spot on ACA, they had her say ‘chick chick boom’ while pointing her fingers as a gun at the camera. She doesn’t look like she’s worried about anything.
Aside from the initial posting of the ‘Raw’ footage on ninemsn, Blair and Bolt going off and now the reports that it’s a fake, i haven’t been aware of the media ‘jumping’ on this. The blogosphere on the other hand…
I agree with what someone else has said, the public can and should now lie to the media, it is no longer the exclusive domain of politicians and PR flaks.
Mars – Where were they born? How old are they? Where were they educated. How, exactly, are they “Italian”. See…? if it’s just the colour of their skin and eyes, their unusual surnames and/or the fact that they can speak another language… they might not really be “Italian” at all.
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Look I think you should realize that this is a political blog. This is not the place to consider candidates for ‘this thing of ours’. They don’t have to be 100% Sicilian so you can trace their relatives back to the old country. Now let’s go get some Danish on de boulevard and you sit in the front seat. No no no I ain’t gonna make with de ice pick cause you’re busting my balls.
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C’arn would I lie to youse?
Another Pauline Hanson? I doubt it. A bored young woman out to shit stir the media – I think so. She did have the perspicacity to pick Channel 9. (Y’know the place where they have the Footy Show and a variety of nonPC commentators – including Andrew Bolt regularly on The Today Show. And now she’s going on ACA. I think this is a young girl either looking for her 15 minutes of fame (which can be dangerous – remember Corey Worthington) or sawway to get into the media (probably a long shot that won’t work, but if that’s what she wants may she be successful.
And everybody is calling her Clare the Bogan, now. Another unacknowledged squizz at LP?
btw, she didn’t mislead the police. Told them straight up she was hoaxing the media (though I don’t know if she said ‘hoax’.)
The Helen Demidenko of the Western Suburbs maybe?
Or is it true she’s from the Peninsula?
Here’s an article by Barista on another example of the intersection of news and marketing, with science unfortunately being the thing that is distorted this time. I disagree with the commenters who are complaining about the perceived triviality of this thread (it’s always a hoot when someone takes the time and trouble to comment on a thread just to say how unworthy of time and trouble the thread is.) I think this is a trend which is hugely capable of f**king up the human conversation just that little bit more and that’s something we really don’t need.
Hah! She fooled me. Yes, it is a good thing I’m not a cop. But then, as soon as she talked to the cops she admitted it was made up. So even a investigative non-genius like me would have been alright
Helen, my blog talks about issues of race and social and legal justice quite a lot. I had quite a lot to say about Haneef, for example.
You may find it “tedious” to be happily and worriedly talking about the patch of mud on the tip of the iceberg and have someone else point out the great body of the iceberg about to tear into the ship, but such is life. The words we use to describe other groups are a symptom, not a cause of the social difficulties those groups face.
We prefer to focus on symptoms rather than causes because dealing with symptoms require no real change, effort or sacrifice on our part, whereas dealing with causes may do. We nod thoughtfully at public events when the MC says, “we acknowledge the traditional owners of this land,” but we wouldn’t give a blackfellah a job. We frown and wag our finger at our mate who refers to women as “bitches”, but when that woman at work shows up with a black eye again, we mind our own business. We march demanding the federal government says “sorry”, but when the NT government removes funding for successful Aboriginal homelands, we don’t even write a letter to anyone.
It’s alright not to care. Nowhere is it written that we must dedicate our lives to the eradication of all wrongs in the world. But we should not be hypocrites. If we’re going to claim to be concerned about this or that issue, we should focus on its causes not its symptoms.
Sink to THEIR level? Yes that should improve our society immeasurably. So now Clare morphs into a culture/values crusader?
And maybe carrying handguns should no longer be the exclusive domain of thugs and cops? Sheeesh…
Mate, what would qualify as the media ‘jumping’ on something, in your book? Ninemsn is a huge media vehicle with big money behind it, and two News Ltd. columnists featured it too. It went viral. Then it’s on the front page of the Sunday Papers, and the girl is going on ACA Monday night. If you don’t think that’s a media pack ‘jumping’ on something then I guess you think the Corey Worthington story was an example of restrained under-reporting too?
Mate, the contribution of LP and the liberal blogosphere to this clusterf**k is a drop in the bucket. There’s no money here and we’re not a ‘go-to’ site for anyone except a few special-interest readers.
Like I said, the video didn’t turn up on Ninemsn or Bolt & Blair as a random brain-fart of theirs. There’s a reason they put Clare’s video up instead of a picture of petunias or a video of baby pandas. They’re not ‘innocent’ reporters, and now they’ve also been exposed as duplicitous dupes at worst or credulous dopes at best.
Wow, that’s progress.
More of an Australian “Joe the Plumber”?
Mercurius,
I don’t think the person that originally had the idea thinks, and i certainly don’t think, that we should be lying to the media. It was an ironic comment.
Ninemsn may be a huge media vehicle but when the footage was originally posted it was as what they call ‘raw’ footage, i.e. footage to accompany a written report (in this case a shooting in the cross) that they haven’t edited (much) before putting on the net. A cheap way to have video before the evening news report. Bolt and Blair then jumped on, but i wouldn’t describe that as the media jumping on something (heaven forbid Bolt and Blair get to dictate what makes the news rather than just commenting on the news.) The reason why it is in the Sunday papers and she is going on ACA is because it has become such a big thing on the internet that the MSM want to cash in as well as the fact that there is fresh news, i.e. that she made it up.
True, IIRC the first time i saw this video was on ninemsn after exiting hotmail. I then saw it a second time after people on facebook were raving about how funny it was. Mumbrella has had a number of posts on the topic and i might have seen references to it on twitter. Perhaps i should have said ‘the net’ and not the blogosphere. If someone is able to provide evidence that the MSM were onto this before Bolt and Blair’s posts and the Sunday papers, excluding the original article on ninemsn, i would love to see it.
Aw thanks guys. Finally I’m gonna be rich. With my new reality show:
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Clare The Bogan and Joe The Plumber: The Shock Romance
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Soon to be followed by Clare The Bogan and Joe The Plumber: The Wedding, Clare and Joe: Newlyweds, Clare and Joe: Getting Bored. Joe the Plumber’s guest spot on The All New Queer Eye For The Straight Guy, Posh, Katie Holmes and Clare the Bogan in shock lesbian threesome orgy pix and then finally Joe The Plumber: Diary of a Gay Porn Star
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Just off to see Mephistopheles viz the sale of a now redundant part of me.
Surely one of the attractions of being a bogan is that it so bloody EASY. Just declare yourself a patriot and embrace your prejudices without question. And add a splash of aggressive ignorance as needed. Done!
That said, it’s even easier to get the “wog” label. You just have to come into the world with the wrong colour skin and eyes. That’s all. From that point, the bogans will know what you are.
Now before you wingnuts get into a lather of confected outrage… I am NOT saying that all anglo-Australians are bogans. Just the ones who want to be. And not all non-anglos are “wogs”, but don’t bother trying to explain that to the bigots. They see what they want to see.
Tjhere’s also a rumour going round it was all a product placement for Toohey’s Extra Dry Beer, which Clare was standing in front of while she … well… made a fool of Channel 9.
Can wogs be bogans?
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MMMmm let’s see. Carlton Sat Night. Groups of wog guys talking about cars and being macho and totally brain-dead. Yes they can be.
.
Just with better shoes.
Ha! Confusing innit? I reckon that’s neither “wog” nor “bogan”. It’s just todayz yoof strutting their stuff.
Heh!, perhaps you should add a ‘this person votes’ stamp.
I’d be willing to bet that Clare plays the victim card in the ACA interview.
On second thoughts, I wouldn’t have the stomach to watch the bloody show… so all bets are off.
I am a bit confused. Where is the fraud? Was there an altercation between two men at Kings Cross at 3 am? Were they both “wogs”? Was one “fatter” and one “skinnier”? Was one shot? Was Clare there? Was that Channel Nine footage actually taken at 3 am in Kings Cross?
If the answer to all/most of these is ‘Yes” then the OP still has to explain why his only interest in the story revealed his offensive misogynist and classist perspective.
And to the poster above, who claims it is all OK because she is a ‘member of the Oz feminist blogosphere and has given this thread a tick for not being misogynist and classist’, she needs to go away and have a long look at herself.
Good grief, Sylvia!
Misogynist? Classist? What?
Are you sure you’re posting in the right discussion????
(Oh dear, I hope I that comment wasn’t sexist, or something)
Greenslime, Mars08.
Well, now that you mention it… yes. But I’ve been taking some antibiotics and it seems to be settling down…
Oh. Ooops. Sorry. Never mind.
Ahem…
I assume “Greenslime” is a regular troll around these-here parts????
Or was my original answer closer to the mark?
Well this has been a truly hilarious thread that has throughly encapsulated the kind of pointless moral/culture wars panics that sweep through the blogosphere. A bestiary of blogging sociopathy.
Trolls, self-righteous autodidacts, fidgety finger waggers, concern trolls, flying monkeys, off topic preachers, turbo nitpickers, hobby horse riders, self-conscious contrarians, cooler than thouists and pissing ‘em off artists have all being doing wheelies here.
I’ll just point out that any TV cameraman who can find and frame an articulate talking head at 3am in Kings Cross is definitely earning their money.
Everything else beyond that can probably now be mathematically plotted these days (looking at you here Gummo) as yer standard blogosphere hot flush.
“I assume “Greenslime” is a regular troll around these-here parts????”
Trying to be. I doubt some of comments ascribed to it above are the real thing. They lack the authentically desperate “look at me, please look at me” spirit.
Whatevs. These discussions are so passe. For better or worse, Clare has shined alot of media attention on what would have otherwise been reported as standard fare.
The shooting that is. And Sylvia asks pertinent questions. Check out this
So if the police offered you a way out of both testifying and claiming responsibility for your words, by saying it was all a prank, a test of social divisions on language by some media company or somewhat, my question is would you not take it?
Let’s hope that all 17 other witnesses still testify.
That’s the best thing I’ve read here in ages.
If you are watching this, it means that I have been murdered by a fat wog.
Well Joe de Hildebrand comes up with just about the best defence of Clare Werbeloff in the circumstances:
Yes, this woman was a woman with a nation’s hopes on her shoulders. Unfortunately that nation was New Zealand and all its hopes have been fulfilled.
But there are at least lessons we can learn from this sorry episode. First among them is that online videos should all be taken enormously seriously at all costs, especially if they are filmed late at night at Kings Cross.
Secondly, if at all possible we must try to find a way for those videos to make us angry. If you can’t see anything offensive in them the first time, look again. And even if you are not offended by them, remember, somebody else might be and you can get angry on their behalf.
And thirdly, and most importantly, we must reevaluate our opinion of Clare Werbeloff in light of the indisputable fact that she deliberately made up a story and deceived millions of people all over the world.
I certainly have and now I love her even more.
It now appears all Clare Werebeloff wanted was to be famous:
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25532634-5006784,00.html
Katz @ 140
Spot on Katz.
She said wog? Quelle horreur! If she really wanted to fuck with everyone’s minds she should have called them wops or dagoes and sat back and enjoyed the ensuing confusion. And maybe she’s not such a clever dick as it turns out; it was only a matter of time before the police would be asking her some questions about her ‘eye
witnessmissed’ it account.Not sure how ACA are going to run with this one? What is the angle? Pretty young (uncouth) thing lies on national television about a murder she did not actually witness for 60 seconds of fame? If I were the news editor I’d can it and move on.
There was this fat wog with a moustache, and this skinny skip with a goatee beard and a bald head, and the skinny skip says to the fat wog “Oi bro, your old boss Lenin was Christlike in his compassion, eh?” and the fat wog goes “no shit man? and the skinny skip says “no shit bro” so the fat wog goes chk chk chk in his pocket and pulls out a medal and gives it to the skinny skip, and the skinny skip says “Hey, what’s this bro?” and the fat wog says “It’s the Order of Lenin, bro!” and then I turned away to write it all up because I’d seen enough.
Is Joe Hildebrand paid to write that stuff? (#165)
Australia has no shortage of mouthy, pert young personages. Some of them even tell the truth as they see it.
Joe, if you are there. For the last time, Clare Werbeloff isn’t the subject of interest here.
The uses made of her by the Right Wing media is the only matter of public interest.
Now Joe Hildebrand, speaking on behalf of lazy, naive, embarrassed keyboard kommandoes of the Murdoch Stable, rummages through his cluttered brain and finds a face-saving device. Clare, it seems, should not be taken seriously after all.
“And it wasn’t us culture warriors of the Opposition Organ who took her seriously when we plastered her over every outlet that we control. Oh no! We were in on the joke all along.
“When is TEH LEFT going to develop a sense of humour?”
Hilarious.
Nabakov – No. You are lying.
.
The Clare Fraud was reported by The Herald-Sun yesterday. It was a very small article amidst the rear news pages awash with vital information about Posh Beckham’s feud with [insert name of some other talentless non-entity here] and some bloke what caught a geezer at Lily Allen’s breasts.
.
Have those who tried to make Clare a freedom for speech fighter revisited the issue or did they quietly drop it? I’d find out myself but I can’t be bothered.
Blair couldn’t help himself:
http://blogs.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/timblair/index.php/dailytelegraph/comments/chk_chk_checked/
Creative Clare caries an honest skateboard ‘ey?
.
She’s gonna wack Joe the Plumber upside the head with it. She just found out that he’s been seeing Carson Kressley. Always new Carson had a thing for bogans.
.
Then she’s going down to the plaza with Shazza to tawk to some fully sick boy whose been sleeping with yer cuz. Yo bro, she’ll say, why are you seriously only sleeping with my coz bro? She is fully hot.
.
And he’ll say: I only have eyes for Carson. He’s a fully hot fag and you should see what he’s done for my boudoir. Oh! The patent leather shine with electric blue and aggressive oranges. The 1930sDeco references. Oh! They had designers then.
.
Anyone listen to the new Aussie street patois? The mix of Low Bogan and West Coast Gangsta Brain Death is soooo appealing.
.
Not.
.
Does this lot actually know how stupid they sound?
The right still win from this.
They can either run with “Poor thing, threatened by crim wogs she is now forced to say she lied.” She is a victim of the multicultis.
Or “Hey she wa just joking can’t you lefties take a joke? The left wing media obviously can’t.”
Or even “Typical lying lefty with her post modernist ways. Pretty though.”
For bonus points they might run all three arguements at once.
Doesn’t really matter. Isn’t wog passe now anyway? (And I’m saying that as a part wog.)
Oy, we ain’t some small hick town y’know, this is Syderney, the big smoke:
News corp pic of a Channel Nine function with Clare’s sis attending: (h/t mumbrella comments)
http://www.newsphotos.com.au/ImageDetail.asp?RefNum=97060433
Cause like a tenth of a degree of separation doesn’t mean you are like sleeping with your coz or calling on your fully sick PR boys does it?
I know you are but what am I?
calling on your fully sick PR boys
LOL Jo. Nailed it.
Now let me see if Tim Blair has got this right. Kevin Rudd also saw the fat wog shoot the skinny wog cause he was out on the town at the Pink Pussy Cat with Clare the Bogan drinking Toohey’s Ultra Dry but now he’s shit scared the fat wog is gonna come after him and point at him with his finger and do that noise Clare makes when she points at you with her finger.
Or
Many years go Kevin Rudd watched Clare play Test Cricket with some kid in short pants?
Make up yer mind, Tim.
Make up yer mind, Tim.
Why would he do that when you can make up his mind for him, Paul? :p
Why, oh why? Why did I enter “skinny wog” into Google????
Fame is bloody awesome, innit?
What!?! No lie detector?
I want my money back!
OTOH, there’s this:
http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=817783
Maybe we got it rong? And it seems Clare the King’s Cross Bogan could get a career out of her inspired lunacy, eh?
A question which seems not to have been asked yet: why did people ever think her “eyewitness account” was the real deal when she had her hand cocked at head height while doing the “chk chk boom!” yet the victim was shot in the legs?
I trust Paul’s question is a rhetorical one.
The non-rhetorical answer is that the Right Wing media desperately wanted Clare the Bogan to be the real deal.
Sad, really.
Clare IS the real deal.
Katz, making stuff up again eh?
Clare’s delivery of her script got the attention, not the accuracy. She made up the story (silly bint) that in no way takes back the word “wog”.
The fact that the film clip is make believe does not suddenly turn it into a political video. It wasn’t political before, it isn’t political now.
SATP appears to have a very rural definition of “political”.
Katz @ 184,
The question is half-rhetorical. I have enough South American friends to know that some of them find the term “wog” very offensive, still.
OTOH, the refreshing point to Clare the Bogan’s explanation is she wasn’t purposely trying to be racist and that most of her peers don’t consider such terms racist anymore. Presumably they are terms just seen as some type of Aussie slang.Its hard for me to know, since most of the people I mix with are 40 and upwards. I don’t have a lot of experience of kids of Clare’s generation.
And one has to admit, some people see our slang as highly insulting. For example Sol Trujillo, who doesn’t seem to get that what we objected to about him was not his Hispano-American background, but the fact that he was a gung-ho American capitalist.
Lord Bloody Wog Rollo would be turning in his grave.
Or applauding. Or something.
Paul,
Consistently through this thread I have been uninterested in Clare the Bogan’s motives. My interest has been the Right Wing media.
However, on the question of the use of the word “wog”, from the perspective of Melbourne at least, it appears to have lost some of its venom by virtue of the fact that putative wogs are pleased to call themselves wogs in much the same way as Irish Catholics have embraced the term “Mick” or English have embraced the term “Pommie”.
Needless to say, some racial and religious epithets have become not less but more taboo over time.
Oh my! All must read this. http://blogs.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/piersakerman/index.php/dailytelegraph/comments/our_cocked_up_and_loaded_leadership/
So the analysis seems to be Clare is a fake. But not as fake as Obama and Rudd. Some of the comments are interesting, the Whitlam meme popping up again…
tssk @ 190,
I rarely read Piers, even on the occasional pension day when I leaf through the Tele for free in one of the local coffeeshops. I don’t like spewing at breakfast time.
But he’s got it wrong when he infers Kevin Rudd might be a socialist. No such luck.
And the Right Wing media never cease to amaze. Thanks Tssk!
Poor Clare the Bogan. Less than a week ago she was a darling of the anti-PC Keyboard FreiKorps.
Now, according to Piers Akerman, she is a botoxed Kevin Rudd, in drag.
The Right Wing splutterati are demented.
From Crikey, the world according to Clare Werbeloff:
Iraq: One set of sand wogs said to another set of sand wogs hey mate you stole my oil and the other said no I didn’t mate and they said yeah you did and then it was shock shock awe.
The 2008 US election: This thin Abo went up against this coffin dodger and it was all hope hope change.
Pandemics: This new wog takes over from this old wog and everyone gets totally sick.
Oedipus: This old wog says to this young wog hey mate your wife is your mother and he says no mate and he says yeah totes and then it’s pfflp pfflp arghhh*.
The Iliad: These Westie wogs went the hack on the Eastside Wogs cos the Eastside wogs stole the Westies town bike and this wog couldn’t find his way home cos all their houses look the same.
I’m joining the Coalition of the LOLing, Oz.
But it wasn’t JUST the “wog” epithet, was it.
Clare gave us the full skit… she bunged on the wog accent, throw in a few “fully sick” wog terms and played the stereotype that wog are willing to shoot you if you fuck their cousins.
All primo stuff for the redneck crowd.
Clever Clare.
BTW… I must confess that I’d missed the “fully sick mates” bit of her act until my teen daughter pointed it out. Maaate, I’m a middle-age bloke who’s lived all his life in Wollongong, and I’ve NEVER heard a wog speak like that.
I think it’s an urban wog thing, mars08. We hear it in Adelaide too.
Perhaps your large-country-town wogs haven’t quite caught up with it yet. Oh, wait …
So lemme see, bro.
Are you saying that Adelaide is more woggified than Wollongong?
Yeah I’ve hear of fully sick (or hell sick). But “fully sick boyz” is not something I’ve come across. Word. etc.
Dunno, mars. It’s probably not even significantly more cosmopolitan, despite our pretensions.
Um, I’m pretty sure, ‘fully sick boys’ is a Fat Pizza line.
I’m not saying that she’s lying, just that the police haven’t offered us any evidence she didn’t see the shooting other than her word, and that the ACA interview was gushing repetitious insane guff. And there is a business arrangement between Channel 9 and the NSW police.
And it is convenient she didn’t see it. The victim didn’t either apparently.
Hey… back up a bit, sparky. Youse are missing the point!
Read through this discussion. Clearly the only victim here is that Clare chick.
Soz Mars what’d I miss?
My point is this seems way stranger than lefties getting their tits in a tether or right-wingers creaming their daks over a hot chick who uses the word wog. Thats not quelle horror, its quelle surprise.
The only quotes I’ve seen from the victim were emailed when Justin Kallu said she had “no brains”, and in court (?) when he said the accused was “absolutely not” the shooter. Other than that; zip.
To me, the whole
shebangchkboom seems spun to high heaven.My apologies rumrebellious.
I overcooked the sarcasm in my last comment…
Tis ok. Just thought I would leave you all with the Steve Price interview and what some random kiwis at TVNZ (can’t link for some reason) think of it all:
What sheep-fuckers.
Wow! And here’s me thinking that Clare’s just a cretin.
The term “wog” is racist when a bogan like Clare uses it.
To me, the whole shebang chkboom seems spun to high heaven.
That, we can all agree on.
It seems like we may not be seeing the last of Clare for some time.
*vomits a bit*
fwiw, I stand by my original comment @ 13
From the link at #207: “Chk-Chk Boom girl impresses Nine’s bosses”.
No surprises there. Look how they feel about Sam Newman.
Also, there is a bloody great obvs hole in her ‘testimony’ that I don’t think anyone has mentioned yet. A real wog* crook would not have said ‘slept with’.
*sarcasm
I do like the comment from Peter Meakin in that link. ‘Thank God She’s Not Here’!
There was this skinny fame whore and this fat camera guy and she was going bullshit, bullshit, bullshit and he was shooting, shooting, shooting.
Then she called on her fully sick PR boys and it went KRR, KRR CHINK and then I ran away.
You’re right, PC. Do hoaxers these days not even care about tone and register in their ethnic humour?
This, incidentally, is how it’s done. And they’re Lebs, not wogs. Oh-my-god.
So,it looks like she got what she wanted – a job in the meedja. (Maybe she’ll end up on Q&A?). God help the poor girl if 9 puts her on The Footy Show.
Really, apart from the fact that she has the Southern Cross tatooed on her ankle or somewhere around it, we don’t really know much about this kid, apart from the fact that she’s a bloody good con artist.After all the entire original spiel to camera, including the inferred or explicit racism, sounds like it was bullshit. Australia’s got talent. Maybe.
I was not clear on what accent she was doing. It contained elements of both Sleek and Jonah imo, eh bro?
Once upon a time the Nine Network was the hottest media property in Australia.
How many sharks have Nine Suits jumped since the Good Old Days?
Add Ms Chkchk to than number.
Feeling queasy yet, Nine Stockholders?
And a soupçon of Con the Fruiterer, I think, Casey.
But really, we should all just hug and forgive.
[ahem]
Indeed Liam. I deeply appreciated the speedos. Thank you. And, incidentally, I am with Pop Smith, who lay down his life for Cronulla Beach in the Great War and that.
Here are The Invincibles doing their take …
A bit of head-scratching over at Tim B. Liar’s wrt one of your comments, Casey, the long words have made their heads asplodey.
A bit of Jonah would explain the surmised trace of NZ accent, which I too noticed
ha ha ha thanks Helen. The only people who seem to get upset about discussions of whiteness are white folks.
http://blogs.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/timblair/index.php/dailytelegraph/comments/dominant_discourse_functionally_legitimised/
Heh. You’ve just been “made” by Il Crapo, Streghetta. But where are the flying monkeys?!
Poor Clare, it’s hard to be orange ya know.
Am I the only person who forgot to toon in for the Chasers return..scratch my 10.41am.
Go Casey! Does this mean you become The Donna if you take down enough flying monkeys and sit on enough trolls etc. (Def. no problems getting stains out of the bedding and boot.)
Did you say Monkees? There can never be enough Monkees
You know that’s not even Mike Nesmith’s real hat, don’t you Casey?
[moniker is a genuine mondogreen of my very own, sorry for any offence taken]
Come on FDB, The Monkees were so a real band. And, further, I now have my friend here singing “Last Train to Cocksville” Thanks for that.
You want monkeys? You can’t HANDLE Monkey!!!.
Monkey Dance mix!
*high-fives Darin*
Jazz-funk fusion Monkey Magic!
Dig that bass.
“VASFSRFEFDGs: Kinda slow compared to the orange range version. Not bad just slow.”
Everyone’s a critic now.
I need to talk to some friends… This thing is crying out for some slide guitar…
Mike was my favourite Monkee.
Mike was also my favourite also because he was the only one in the band who could play a musical instrument.
also, also enough alsos!
I also do that joe2.
Also, can I say to AG, thank you.
Also, Mike Nesmith had a clever Mom, known as “Bette”, who turned a typing mistake to her advantage, “bigtime honey”.
http://inventors.about.com/od/lstartinventions/a/liquid_paper.htm