April162010
Lisa Pryor goes after the intern
So I am late in blogging on this one, but I thought I should mention Lisa Pryor’s column in Sydney Morning Herald a couple of weeks ago.
In the piece, Lisa Pryor mentioned an article I wrote for Crikey about the Hey Dad! scandal. I gave A Current Affair a ‘Wankley’ award for their coverage of Sarah Monahan’s allegations against former co-star Robert Hughes.
Tags: /sydney morning herald /hey dad! /intern /sarah monahan /robert hughes /defamation /Crikey
March162010
Today’s ‘me-first’ culture only impedes our will power
Sitting on the kitchen table is a copy of the document that everyone wants to read. It is a short file – maybe ten pages long – and has a light brown coffee stain next to the staple in the top left-hand corner.
Its appearance gives no indication of its significance, however, to this family the importance of this slender document cannot be understated. The contents of these pages have the power to make some people very happy and to leave others completely outraged.
It is the family will and, unfortunately, any benefits imparted from it will be bittersweet. In fact, the document may well be the catalyst to tear a family in half.
Discussing ‘the will’ is a disconcerting event for many families. It can feel like a premonitory action, as nothing is more awkward than debating a loved one’s estate when they are standing upright on two feet, instead of six feet under.
However, despite the discomfort of such discussions, the will is a necessary document. It is the most effective legal device in confirming the wishes of our relatives, when they pass.
Unsurprisingly, given their importance, Australians have one of the highest rates of will-making in the world. According to the NSW Audit Office, more than 90 per cent of Australians aged 50 or over have a last will.
But far from simplifying the issue of inheritance, will-making can simply herald in an age of bitter family struggles. Stories abound of people caught in a war they didn’t ever want, over wealth they don’t really need.
Currently, my family is stuck in a battle in the courts, with my grandparents’ estate sitting front and centre as the victor’s bounty. This matter is still before the courts, yet it has already affected our family forever.
Such disputes are neither new, nor are they peculiar to my family. Just last month, Jenny Kurg spoke out about the split in her family after the feud waged over the fortune of the famous Collingwood tote operator John Wren.
She claimed that the rift over the Wren inheritance sent her father to an early grave, and left her, her mother and her sisters with next-to-nothing.
Whether you believe that wills are made to be contested or that the wishes of an individual should be sacred, the issue of inheritance will forever be complicated.
However questions still remain, such as why do some of us become consumed with our own self-interest when the time comes to divvy up a dead person’s possessions?
A will can turn a once-compassionate human being into a scrounging creature solely concerned with providing for them and theirs.
Perhaps this is a result of the boom in economic and social conditions since the baby-boomer generation. The endless rise in our quality of life has bred an egocentric age of ‘me-first’, where everybody knows what is best for them and everyone else.
It may be that the advances of the last half-century have sparked a rise in the narcissistic attitudes of individuality that will happily override any loyalty to family.
As the old idiom goes; blood is thicker than water. Yet in post-modern culture, that blood will happily be spilt in the courtroom in the search for increased wealth.
Family members will wittingly declare war with each other based on the comforting basis that they knew that ‘dad have would have wanted it this way’. It’s not about timing either, relatives can be at their worst before or after a loved one is put into the ground.
Struggles such as these are many and they are being fought daily in family courts and tribunals. Regardless of claims to the contrary, rarely do any individuals ever feel content within their efforts. The only team that wins are the lawyers.
He who waits for dead man’s shoes goes a long time barefoot. Or perhaps more appropriately, he who waits for dead man’s inheritance goes a long time in debt. And not just financially.
This piece was first published in The National Times.
Tags: /wills /inheritance /family /money /greed
Buck’s nights have become a parody
It has just struck 11pm on a Saturday night and John has decided to mark tonight’s occasion by changing into a new outfit.
Accessorising with a large pair of clip-on earrings and a brown silk scarf, John has struggled into a floral dress that barely covers his hairy 187-centimetre frame.
On his feet, John is employing all of his power and balance to stay upright, as he battles a pair of white stilettos that are at least one size too small.
But on this particular night, John is barely in a state to care. Encouraged by his mates, John’s performance is part of a modern Australian tradition.
It is a buck’s party and — like countless men before him — the future groom is keen to get completely written off.
Bucks’ nights have become an unquestionable part of modern Australian wedding culture. For many, a “stag do” is seen as an integral part of boy’s evolution to man.
It is an event seen as a rite of passage, similar to a first job or a first beer. It has its origins in ancient Greece, where Spartan soldiers would toast a man before his impending marriage.
However, while it is unlikely that these ancient beginnings were innocent affairs themselves, the Australian tradition has morphed into an excuse to get away with completely unsociable behaviour.
It is rare for a weekend to go by without an incident of crime, violence or stupidity that has its origins in a buck’s party. Many venues are now loathe to accept a buck’s night group, as they can predict –with monotonous regularity – the trouble that they bring.
However, more than this, the biggest crime of the modern Australian buck’s party is that they have become utterly cliched. What was once a great male ritual has now morphed into a contrived mix of binge drinking, stupid pranks and, of course, the omnipresent lap dance.
These days, it seems that all men can think of when they plan a groom’s “last big night out” is to tiredly carry on the archetype of what their mates had done previously.
Typically, this involves 20 or so mates getting together, drinking beers and humiliating the buck with any number of sex toys, blow-up dolls and women’s dresses. Then comes the strippers.
But what perpetuates this tired formula of blokedom? Is it because Australian male culture demands that a buck’s night must involve extraordinary amounts of alcohol?
Or is it peer pressure, where we all must try to out-do each other with more beer, more naked women and more degrading pranks?
Or, like many other of society’s ills, should we simply blame it on Hollywood?
By no means a pioneer in its genre, 2009 film The Hangover includes all the traditional ingredients of a bachelor party – booze, strippers and multiple run-ins with the law – but ramps it up to an obscenely utopian level.
An unattainable vision from Hollywood such as this only ensures that the modern buck’s night will continue to employ the same old recipe.
For once, it would be great to hear of a buck’s night breaking the mould and avoiding the beer- pranks-strippers trap. However, paying a visit to any number of pubs this weekend will prove that this vision could be a while off.
It hits midnight and John has opted to change into a new outfit. This time it’s a lime green Borat mankini, a costume that only succeeds in making the floral dress of an hour ago look properly fitted.
If this is man’s last night of freedom. Why spend it like this?
This piece was originally published at the National Times.
Tags: /buck's night /stag do /male culture /australia /bogans /beer /strippers /party
Black Saturday from afar
f the town of Chuy, on the Uruguayan/Brazilian border, is renowned for anything, it is duty free shopping.
Walking its unsealed boulevard of ‘free shops’, it would seem entirely appropriate if Chuy’s streets were paved with its livelihood; cigarettes, liquor and pirated DVDs.
It is a town of contrasts and, as a result, acts as a microcosm for South America as a whole. It is in Chuy where you can find $300 Ray Ban sunglasses on sale amongst abject poverty.
It is also in the middle of nowhere and, needless to say, foreigners rarely go there. Lonely Planet warns people not to unless they are on their way to Brazil.
Perhaps it was apt that I was stuck in an internet café in this tiny go-between of a town on February 8, 2009. I was a long way from home on the day after Black Saturday, the worst natural disaster Australia has ever experienced.
On that particular day, the first thing I did was check my emails in the hope of receiving a message from my girlfriend.
I then loaded up The Age Online to get a feel for the latest news from back home. I had been away for three months and the first pangs of homesickness were beginning to set in.
When the site eventually loaded, my heart skipped a beat. Headlines filled the dusty screen, telling me that areas to the north of Melbourne were ablaze.
The fires were burning through Kinglake, Strathewan and Whittlesea, towns that were very familiar to me and where some of my friends lived. Worryingly, the fires were also surging towards Doreen, the town where my family lived and where I had grown up and gone to school.
Upon further investigation, it felt like the whole state was on fire. My dad’s house was under threat in Bendigo and my girlfriend’s parent’s property in Horsham was also close to another front.
An intense sensation of helplessness overcame me and I very nearly broke down. My family had always thought bushfires were a distinct possibility, but they were never considered a real threat.
We didn’t live in the bush, we lived on the urban fringe. We were right next to an ever-expanding suburbia, a development that, while awful on other levels, gave us a feeling of comfort towards bushfire.
In a panic, I rushed to the CFA website. Amongst the chaos, they were reporting a grass fire on Bridge Inn Road in Doreen. My school was on that road, and it was only three kilometres from my house.
The news outlets were reporting it as a day of unprecedented fire conditions. It was 45 degrees, with a hellish northerly blowing in excess of one hundred kilometres per hour.
I wanted more information, but there was none. A sense of misinformation, helplessness and guilt overwhelmed me.
I suddenly felt like I should have been there – in Melbourne – helping my family and friends. I could have helped them fight the fire, or at least provide support. Instead I was lazily enjoying myself on a four-month holiday.
Shamefully, I had even asked my parents for money two days before. They were now facing a real threat and I was grubbing for extra spending money.
In a heady mix of emotion and blame, even my self-pity made me angry, as if it were somehow disrespecting the people fighting for their lives back home.
The only way to find out more was to call home, a task made difficult by my refusal to take a phone on holiday and a lack of facilities in the small frontier town.
It took until much later that evening to get in contact. However, despite the scratchy line back home, I was able to ascertain that everyone was OK. My mother reassured me that they were fine. However, she also told me more of the scale of the destruction.
She told me that many people had died, people that we knew. She explained that properties were gone and it was impossible to say how extensive the damage was.
When telling me about the number of dead animals, my mother – an avid horse-lover – struggled to control her emotions. I told her I felt helpless, that I felt ashamed to be where I was and what I was doing.
“Don’t worry about us, have a good time,” she told me. “We’ll be fine.”
In the time after that terrible day, the bushfires were all over international news services. It felt like everyone that I met had heard about the catastrophe and expressed their sympathies. When I told them how close I lived to the affected area, they were shocked.
Three weeks later, I returned home where my mother greeted me at the airport. Almost immediately she began to tell stories that she had been told. There were horrific stories of death and there were amazing stories of survival.
I learned that my English teacher had died in the fire and that friends of friends had also perished. In contrast, friends of mine had heroically saved their house in Strathewan.
I had seen the whole thing unfold from afar, like it was a scene from a movie. It didn’t feel as real to me as it did other people.
My friends and family lived through the horror of that day, they saw it, they smelt it. Over a short period of time, it appeared to me that they had familiarised themselves with something impossible to understand.
By not being in Melbourne on that day, I avoided a harrowing experience. Yet I still feel a twinge of shame for how easily I escaped.
However, I’m sure the people closely affected by February 7 would trade anything to have been in my shoes.
In fact, a small border town half a world away on the Uruguayan/Brazilian border would have probably done quite nicely.
On this one year anniversary of the terrible Black Saturday bushfires I would like to extend my sympathies to all those affected by the events of February 7, 2009.
As the lives of survivors are rebuilt, the memories of those who lost theirs will live on.
This piece was originally published at upstart magazine.
Tags: /black saturday /bushfire /south america /travel /melbourne /tragedy
The Meredith Gift
With one short, sharp blast of an air horn they’re off. Fifteen sets of exposed genitals whizz past the gathered crowd with the speed and ferocity of an Olympic 100m final.
Fifty metres of pushing, shoving and biting sits between the naked runners and their prize – a crimson red cap that will guarantee passage to the next round.
All too quickly, it’s over. The Meredith Gift has been run and won. A bloke from Wollongong takes the men’s final, a woman from Carlton takes the lady’s event.
The trophy is a slab of beer, a treasure most of the sprinters have been imbibing all weekend. Welcome to Meredith.
Meredith Music Festival is an annual event held in the paddocks that surround the small Victorian country town that shares the festival’s name. It’s not just any old rock festival, it is a nineteen year-old institution that draws a cult of punters who return year after year.
The festival takes place over three days. There is only one stage – the supernatural amphitheatre – so missing a band is a difficult task. There is also the cinema and pink flamingo bar, for people who need a break from the crowds.
This year the line up was loaded, as it typically is, with some fine local and international acts. The weather threatened without ever bucketing down, rendering most of the gumboots purchased in the pre-festival packing rush useless.
After setting up camp, the musical entertainment began on Friday night with a fine set of finely crafted pop from up-and-coming band Oh Mercy. They are a group primed for big things, especially with tunes like ‘Seemed Like A Good Idea’ and ‘Get You Back’ sitting in their back pocket.
Akron/Family, one of the more highly anticipated acts of the festival, followed next with songs from their great album Set ‘em Wild, Set ‘em Free. Unfortunately the psychedelic folk-rock trio, who look like the offspring of Creedence Clearwater Revival, encountered some sound difficulties and didn’t quite capture the crowd’s imagination.
Another Friday favourite was the performance of electro songstress of the moment Sia. The diminutive Adelaidean impressed with her bracket of synth-laden pop.
However, the highlight of Friday’s entertainment was the enigmatic voice and stagecraft of South London singer-songwriter Patrick Wolf. Wielding, at different times, a violin, keyboard and ukulele, the glam pop singer’s set won over plenty of new fans.
Electronic dance-rock outfit YACHT rounded off the main list acts on Friday night, with their energetic set of high-paced pounding tunes. Appearing on stage in resplendent white, the energetic duo compelled the crowd to dance with their fantastic electro anthems ‘Summer Song’ and ‘The Afterlife’.
Saturday morning heralded in hangovers for those who slept and another drink for those hadn’t. The Meredith Tucker Tent did a fine job of keeping up with the huge demand for bacon and egg sandwiches. The coffee vans also did a roaring trade, as bleary-eyed music fans attempted to wake up for the first of the Saturday acts.
If strong lattes didn’t do the trick, then The Oh Sees’ midday set of swampy garage punk certainly provided the required heart starter.
Their set was followed by a weekend highlight in London rockabilly revivalists Kitty, Daisy and Lewis. The barely legal three-piece – who look so young they would struggle to get past security at the venues they play in – had feet tapping and heads moving with their infectious style of bare bones 50’s rock and roll.
When the kids broke into their twelve-bar hit ‘Going Up The Country’, rock and roll dancing was immediately brought back to the Victorian countryside.
Another highlight was the unstoppable hip-hop force of Pharaohe Monch. The crowd was bouncing in unison to the MC’s killer blend of wit, rhythm and message, especially to his super hit ‘Simon Says’.
However the crowd favourite of Saturday – and possibly the weekend – was the fantastic evening set from Paul Kelly.
With his band in top form, a swag of songs that never seem to age and a beautiful sunset as a backdrop, the singer-songwriter demonstrated just why his evocative lyrics appeal to everyone.
Mindful that he was playing to a festival crowd, Kelly had the punters singing along from the very first bar as he drew from his considerable back catalogue of greatest hits.
Highlights from the set were fantastic versions of ‘Dumb Things’, ‘How I Met Your Mother’ and ‘To Her Door’.
However, the best response came when the band launched into his Aussie Christmas tune ‘How To Make Gravy’. In true Meredith fashion, all manner of shoes, thongs and gumboots were held aloft in appreciation as the song finished.
Kelly was a tough act to follow, and unfortunately experimental group Animal Collective didn’t live up to the hype they brought with them from New York City. However, charming ex-Pulp front man Jarvis Cocker followed up with a memorable performance, as did garage rockers Eddy Current Suppression Ring.
The Melbourne four piece – who were allocated the Saturday midnight slot on the back of a fantastic live reputation – brought the inebriated punters back to life with head-poundingly good versions of ‘Sunday’s Coming’, ‘Insufficient Funds’ and ‘Which Way To Go’.
The highlight of a relaxed Sunday afternoon was the performance Townsville seven-piece The Middle East. The band’s Meredith show capped off a fantastic year for the Triple J Unearthed winners, with their finale of radio hits ‘Blood’ and ‘The Darkest Side’ being especially poignant.
Melbourne band Wagons were also in fine form on Sunday, as their humorous brand of country gathered and cheered up a hung-over and cantankerous audience. Their energetic versions of ‘Goodtown’, ‘Never Been To Spain’ and crowd favourite ‘Willy Nelson’ were especially enjoyable.
The Meredith Gift and sets from bands The Fauves and The Dacios were charged with bringing the debaucheries of the festival to a climax. Neither of the bands were too inspiring, however the annual nudie run did provide the perfect way to end the weekend.
It was a fantastically organised three days, with barely any trouble to be seen amongst the well-lubricated set of attendees. Meredith is of a different breed to other festivals and offers plenty of lessons for other events.
For one, Meredith prides itself on its ‘no dickheads’ policy. These days, it’s rare to go to a music event that isn’t overrun with bare-chested blokes draped in Aussie flags and wankers caring more for their own good time than other’s.
Happily, only one group of beer bong-toting lads matched the above description and they were promptly spoken to by organisers. No one is going to ruin the Meredith experience.
The other creed that Meredith abides by is a ‘no advertising’ principle. As Meredith Gift MC Angus Sampson put it well.
“Isn’t it refreshing to go to an event that doesn’t use our love of music to leverage financial gain?”
Attendees aren’t made to feel like the promoter’s piggy bank. The Nolan family – who own the farm that holds the festival – have a very clear idea of how a festival should be run.
Unlike almost every other festival of its kind, the event is BYO alcohol. Also, thanks to a ticket cap of 10,000, the camping is well set up and spacious.
There are no rows and rows of port-a-loos, instead permanent water-free composting toilets are employed. There is even a box for ideas and suggestions, which are taken very seriously.
A few months ago Meredith were included in a list of festivals that were taking music-loving punters for a ride.
It is unfair to compare Meredith with Falls or Pyramid Rock, this event is a completely different festival. The ticket price may be similar, but the attitude towards patrons isn’t.
It’s not a revelation to say that Meredith is an admired event; it always has been and always will be.
As the festival calendar becomes increasingly crowded, Meredith sits amongst the up-and-comers like an eternally cool, middle-aged rocker perched at the Napier Hotel bar.
However, what’s uplifting is that the organisers aren’t seeking to take advantage of their success. They are not interested in growth for the sake of growth. It is more important to improve and get better.
Meredith Music Festival. Where else can you see a killer line-up of bands and a whole lot of naked people tackling each other to the ground?
This piece was originally published at upstart magazine.
