There will be more photos and videos to follow, but I just want to say thanks to the people who came to the forum last night. Your interest in the topic was fabulous and thanks so much for sharing your thoughts. It was lovely to get the chance to meet all of you. You deserve a round of applause.
A photo of the forum’s speakers (Professor Chris Nash is wearing a red shirt, Matthew Ricketson from The Age is standing behind Jane Nethercote from Crikey. Jane’s attired in the striped dress). Also featured are some of the people who attended.
See you tomorrow night. Make sure to climb the stairs next to the bar and buy your booze downstairs. There will be students in the area (the University of Melbourne is just across the road), so be alert but not alarmed. Rockin’ dude (sorry, just practicing in case I run into any students).
Media Under Rudd
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
Time: 7:00pm - 8:30pm
Location: Prince Alfred Hotel
Street: 191 Grattan Street, Carlton
City/Town: Melbourne, Australia
While in the Melbourne CBD this morning, I was handed a flyer by a young man. The young man and his two friends were wearing white t-shirts that had something like “We are all family” written on the back. One of his friends had a Chinese flag. The flyer states the following:
MEDIA DISTORTION!
VIOLENCE!
In the Memory of the Victims in the Tibetan Riot (March 14, 2008)
There has been disgraceful truth distortion in large scale by such medias like CNN, BBC, CTV, NTV, RTL, FOX, Washington Post, etc.
Right to live is deprived with violence, no freedom of speech can be secured with truth being trimmed. To stop further violation on the most basic human right to life and freedom of expression, we stand up shouting out:
The flyer also contains some quotes from various sources and statistics from Xinhua. Here’s a couple of the quotes, followed by a few of the statistics:
“Tibetans gone crazy….” (ABC News)
“Oh my God, someone has a gun” “Oh my God. Oh no. That’s crazy. One hundred people are trying to stone one man.” (The Guardian)
18 civilians and 1 police officer killed; 382 civilians injured…908 shops were looted. Damage has cost a estimated loss of more than 244 million yuan (about US$34.59 million).
There’s nothing on the flyer to indicate who’s responsible for writing it, although perhaps the people who put up those websites are.
Moody youngsters take note: the film version of HortonHearsaWho! represents the character of Jo-Jo as a sensitive and hardworking genius who looks like a mini-emo rather than the “twerp” he is in the book. Even if you can’t relate to a kid who looks sad most of the time because his dad doesn’t listen, there’s plenty to enjoy in this wonderfully funny and visually delightful take on Dr. Seuss’s tale of an elephant who saves the tiny people of Whoville thanks to some clover and a willingness to believe in something even though it can’t be seen. The movie features the voices of several comedy giants, including Jim Carrey, Steve Carell, Seth Rogen and Carol Burnett as an authoritarian kangaroo. Given the kangaroo will do anything to uphold the status quo and ensure the jungle’s children don’t exercise their imaginations, it’s no surprise she’s pouchschooling her joey (a wonderful dig at the kind of homeschooling that’s all about indoctrination and keeping difference at bay). Meanwhile, the councillors of Whoville are angry that plans to celebrate their supposedly utopian community’s centenary are being disturbed by the Mayor’s warnings about the danger they’re in. Just like all the best movies for littlies (e.g. Beauty and the Beast and Aladdin); there’s humour, pop culture references adults can embrace, dramatic tension, good versus evil, and a happy resolution, while fans of Seuss’s nonstop rhymes won’t be disappointed. Alas, also like a lot of films for littlies, it’s rather sexist, with the Mayor’s daughters being vacuous and apparently unsuitable to follow in their father’s footsteps.
One suspects a comedic musical about errant ex-footballer Wayne Carey would be a very black look at the psyche of a certain kind of male (not sure what song from Hairspray the cast might break into when Carey hits his girlfriend with a glass).
A less difficult subject for funny songs is the blokey but unthreatening Shane Warne, the former spin bowler with a beer gut, and a, errr, big thing for blondes.
Eddie Perfect, who more than entertained at last year’s Melbourne International Comedy Festival (MICF) with his turn as a kinky Alexander Downer, has returned to MICF in 2008 with a sneak peek at his upcoming ShaneWarne:TheMusical.
There’s a sad moment in Helen Garner’s exquisite TheSpareRoom when the cancer-ridden but ever-smiling Nicola admits that what she regards as her life’s failures (e.g. childlessness, being a singleton, and lack of persistence) is compelling her to fight her illness in any way she can.
Unfortunately for her friend Helen, a writer who lets the ailing woman reside with her for three weeks out of what appears to be a mixture of altruism, love, and ego, this fight takes the form of daily visits to a dodgy clinic located in the CBD.
After finding Garner an intrusive and maddening presence in journalistic efforts such as JoeCinque’sConsolation, it’s a relief to discover that “fictional” Helen, with all her flaws, fury and brutal honesty, is on the side of the good guys.
Was Angelina Jolie on a tram in Melbourne tonight being chatted up by a bloke who wasn’t Brad Pitt?
The success of Internet dating sites, speed dating, singles events and books that let people know how to pick up indicates that finding love these days isn’t such an easy task. For any single gentlemen reading this blog who are looking for a lady love (excuse my heterosexism and sexism) but aren’t sure how to go about it, I am happy to pass on something I heard on the tram tonight. Yes, one young chap managed to get the telephone number of a fellow passenger/female by loudly uttering such lines as:
Wow, you’re thirty, I wouldn’t have spotted that. You could be a model.
You really look like Angelina Jolie.
Yes, he actually got her phone number with those lines, so if he can do it you can too. Perhaps “Tram Romeo” has started something beautiful, but if he’s anything like some of the men mentioned in an article on TheNew YorkTimes website she better read the “right” books. The item by Rachel Donadio is an interesting insight into a rather peculiar form of snobbery: Continue reading ‘“You really look like Angelina Jolie”’
Just wondering if anyone’s opinion of Wayne Carey has changed after the Enough Ropeventure or after seeing that photo of Carey’s father on the front of the Herald Sun yesterday. For those who missed it, the picture more than suggested that Carey Snr is an unreflective boozer from the old school of unreflective boozers (thinking, for example, about the role fathers play in providing positive male role models for their sons).
Many years ago (and when I say many I mean many), I donned a John Taylor t-shirt, a bubble skirt and jellybean sandals to go see Duran Duran play live in concert at Festival Hall. I also teased my hair in a way that probably made me look like an extra from Dynasty rather than a New Romantic. The excitement of just thinking about that momentous show is causing a strange pain to spread toward my left arm. While Festival Hall has long since been converted into a block of unsightly apartments, Duran Duran lives on and on and on and on and on. Alas, it seems Simon Le Bon, Roger Taylor, Nick Rhodes and John Taylor (sigh) stuffed up the first show of their latest world tour a little bit. Nevertheless, the “screaming women in their 30s…did not seem to mind the snafus”. Of course, Duran Duran had some wonderful pop hits such as “Planet Earth”, “Hungry Like the Wolf” and “Save a Prayer” (sigh). This one’s for all the “screaming women in their 30s” and beyond.
Just a message to Melburnians: On Wednesday 16 April 2008 from 7.00pm, Larvatus Prodeo will be holding a forum about “Media Under Rudd” at the Prince Alfred Hotel, 191 Grattan Street Carlton. Speakers to be confirmed, but please mark it down in your diary.
There’s an article in the latest edition of TheWeekendAustralian Magazine about people who are called beggars, bums, hobos, vagrants, tramps and no doubt other labels too offensive to mention.
One of the beggars discussed in the item is a man many Melburnians would’ve seen sitting in various locations in the CBD.
Readers are told that his name is Wayne and that he has found begging to be a wretched experience, which would be unsurprising to anyone who has glimpsed his despondent face.
Just witnessed the Victoria Police Showband doing a rather nice performance of “What’s Going On”, which was made famous by the late Marvin Gaye. Thought this event was rather amusing, but also wondered whether the choice of song might confirm to some of Christine Nixon’s opponents that coppers these days are a bunch of flaccid appendages:
Picket lines and picket signs
Don’t punish me with brutality
Talk to me, so you can see
Oh, what’s going on
What’s going on
Ya, what’s going on
Ah, what’s going on
Of course, Nixon’s opponents are mostly individuals whose willies get bigger when a burly uniformed bloke hits an offender on the noggin with a telephone book. Ahhh, for the good old days of policing when there was no women, gays, disables, accountability and models of policing that depend on the brain rather than brawn.
ThirteenTonneTheory: LifeInsideHuntersandCollectors is the title of Mark Seymour’s book about the Hunters and Collectors, one of Australia’s most interesting, if never as successful as they should’ve been, rock bands. Seymour appeared before a packed bookshop in Carlton last night to discuss the book, and to perform a superb acoustic version of “Say Goodbye”. Seymour provided an interesting insight into internal band politics and the way record company executives sometimes shoot you down just when you think you’re about to hit it big. The former lead singer of the “Hunters” still looks the part of an Aussie rock god, and he also still possesses that strong masculine presence which played such an important role in the image of the group. When asked whether he would do the music thing again but just for fun and not a career, Seymour replied that he never does anything just for fun. Incidentally, Seymour was interviewed by the amiable Mick Thomas, who used to front the band Weddings, Parties, Anything (they’re touring again, by the way).
The Melbourne International Comedy Festival (MICF) starts in a week, but already the sound of chuckles can be heard throughout this laughable city. Like every other year, MICF promises to be everything from execrable to excellent to exciting to execrable. Acts appearing include Ross Noble, Arj Barker, Dave Thornton and Daniel Kitson. It should be noted that performers don’t have to audition to appear at MICF, so if you can tell a joke (gags about Irishmen and Englishmen walking into bars are particularly popular) or you’ve composed some searing political satire about John Howard (ouch, topical), you might like to present your own show. Anyway, with MICF almost upon us, it seemed like a good time to ask readers what their favourite comedy moments are. Also, one of LarvatusProdeo’s regular readers (let’s call him “X”) lets us know when we aren’t providing enough opportunities to produce lists, haikus or whatever. One of my favourite comedy moments features Tony Hancock failing to understand Bertrand Russell and LadyDon’tFallBackwards in the classic episode of Hancock, “The Bedsitter”.
Larvatus Prodeo is an Australian group blog which discusses politics, sociology, culture, life, religion and science from a left of centre perspective. more»
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