Talking Politics

[Panthera Tigris]

NewExaminer​

"SEX PESTS ARE WELCOME AT THE NATIONALS" - REPORT
Embattled Prime Minister Scott Morrison has been given a reprieve of sorts, with the Liberals’ coalition partner saying it would welcome any disendorsed Liberals into the National’s fold.
Party head and Deputy Prime Minister Michael McCormack told the media today that politicians shouldn’t be measured by the social yardstick of inner-city lefties.
“Some of the core values of rural Australia, like hard work, misogyny, homophobia and alcoholism might be abhorrent to latte-sippers in Balmain,” McCormack said.
“But in the bush where men are men, and women tend to be either targets for inappropriate sexual behaviour or recipients of child support, different rules apply”.
“Take Barnaby Joyce,” McCormack said.
“In the space of twelve months, he was sprung shagging two women at the same time, outed as a New Zealander, clocked up a $45,000 bar tab at the Armidale Hotel, and was thrown out of the top pub for pissing in a pot plant”.
“But he still polled more than 50% in the last election”.
“So a bumbling, mediocre upskirter like Andrew Laming would be a good fit in our party”.
"He could even have a future in cabinet, possibly Minister for Women. After all, he's taken photographs of enough of them".
But a Liberal spokesman has cast doubt on the claims.
“Barnaby’s not much of a man”, the spokesman said.
“It took him five goes before he could even father a son, and even he’s not sure of the parentage of that one”.

 

[eZyT]

By definition, half the population is of average intelligence or lower.

yes the Bell Curve can be a cruel mistress.

However, surely half of the comfortably numb are females,

who would prefer to be a able to lay drunken on the couch,

without the risk of allegedly being buggered by the Attorney general?

shouldn't that give Labour 75% next election?

(note: If I was Labour leader right now, not only would I be standing aside and going to the next election with a woman in charge, but Id be introducing 1. a rigorous intelligence/empathy/morals test of all candidates and 2. A pre-requisite to pre-selection be that the candidate has spent 5 years of their adult life in a place other than a law firm, a union office, a political office or a university. Id be setting the bar really, really high and demanding all candidates are smart and in it to serve and ditching all the crap/corrupt/narcissists. Sure its kind of an oxymoron - honest politicians - but surely the time is right to really differentiate Labor from Liberal again)

 

[spook]

Plenty of conservative women victim-blame, ez.

 

[larabee]

Plenty of conservative women victim-blame, ez.

like this one...?

‘I would kill to be sexually harassed at the moment’: Liberal Teena McQueen stuns colleagues in closed door meeting

Liberal Party vice president Teena McQueen left colleagues stunned during a closed-door meeting of senior women on the NSW branch’s code of conduct.

www.theage.com.au

 

[eZyT]

Plenty of conservative women victim-blame, ez.

I tell you what, I reckon if I worked anywhere in the vicinity of Michaelia Cash,

I'd be investing in an anal chastity belt,

and claiming it on my tax as PPE

 

[Panthera Tigris]

i would imagine in the urgency required to flee DV, checking your abuser super policy details may be a little difficult.
and i would imagine that would require court to approve which may take a little long in the circumstances.

but it is an option worth considering how it could actually work.

Look, I totally get it, things that seem just in theory, wouldn't necessarily work in practical reality.

I suppose it was more ideologically where I sit. I very much come from a traditionalist, conservative upbringing (as I've said in other threads). Being an adult man to me is all about growing up, taking on adult responsibility and duty to your family. Although it is a dirty word in the current debate of "toxic masculinity", stoicism is still something I value highly that was very much instilled in me by being raised partly by depression era grandparents. And stoicism to me is about controlling one's emotions, not indulging impulses. Self restriction.

A man who abuses his wife is the antithesis to stoicism. He is clearly not controlling his emotions. And despite the dominant narrative. Women and men will never be equal in every single way, for the simple reason of biology and objective, observable scientific fact. But it's about taking responsibility for those advantages in strength and aggression we are born with and channeling it for positive things. Wielding that over one's spouse is a perversion of those values.

And as such, one who does it needs to be held personally accountable for those actions. And if that comes as a personal financial hit, to compensate those they abuse, this would be the most just outcome. That said, it may be unworkable in a practical sense.

 

[spook]

Look, I totally get it, things that seem just in theory, wouldn't necessarily work in practical reality.

I suppose it was more ideologically where I sit. I very much come from a traditionalist, conservative upbringing (as I've said in other threads). Being an adult man to me is all about growing up, taking on adult responsibility and duty to your family. Although it is a dirty word in the current debate of "toxic masculinity", stoicism is still something I value highly that was very much instilled in me by being raised partly by depression era grandparents. And stoicism to me is about controlling one's emotions, not indulging impulses. Self restriction.

A man who abuses his wife is the antithesis to stoicism. He is clearly not controlling his emotions. And despite the dominant narrative. Women and men will never be equal in every single way, for the simple reason of biology and objective, observable scientific fact. But it's about taking responsibility for those advantages in strength and aggression we are born with and channeling it for positive things. Wielding that over one's spouse is a perversion of those values.

And as such, one who does it needs to be held personally accountable for those actions. And if that comes as a personal financial hit, to compensate those they abuse, this would be the most just outcome. That said, it may be unworkable in a practical sense.

I hear ya, PT. But stoicism leads to bottling emotions, which often leads to outbursts, either of physical violence or its verbal cousin, or self-harm, alcoholism or other substance abuse, and/or depression. "Most men lead lives of quiet desperation."

Most of us above a certain age (let's say 40, but some as young as 30) were raised with the 'boys don't cry' mentality. You suck it up, you don't lag anyone out, and you sure don't show any sign of weakness. It's *smile*. It's harmful, to us men ourselves and the people around us. The weight that comes off your shoulders when you give up the façade of imperviousness and share your doubts and fears is liberating. For too long we heaped this burden onto our partners. That one woman was the focus and receptacle of decades of repression, and it wasn't fair. I love being able to talk to my mates now, to my brothers, my sisters, my dad.

These kids today, they don't know how lucky they are.

 

[Panthera Tigris]

I hear ya, PT. But stoicism leads to bottling emotions, which often leads to outbursts, either of physical violence or its verbal cousin, or self-harm, alcoholism or other substance abuse, and/or depression. "Most men lead lives of quiet desperation."

Most of us above a certain age (let's say 40, but some as young as 30) were raised with the 'boys don't cry' mentality. You suck it up, you don't lag anyone out, and you sure don't show any sign of weakness. It's *smile*. It's harmful, to us men ourselves and the people around us. The weight that comes off your shoulders when you give up the façade of imperviousness and share your doubts and fears is liberating. For too long we heaped this burden onto our partners. That one woman was the focus and receptacle of decades of repression, and it wasn't fair. I love being able to talk to my mates now, to my brothers, my sisters, my dad.

These kids today, they don't know how lucky they are.

Depends how dogmatically one interprets the concept of stoicism. Of course there is nuance in how one embraces it. If everyone indulged every impulse emotion they had, the world would be anarchy and chaos, we wouldn't have a society. For me it isn't a prison. Doesn't mean I'm emotionless. But I'm empowered to choose when and where I embrace emotions, where I think they are appropriate.

For example indulging one's anger and the violence that comes from that to bash one's wife is absolutely weakness. Weakness to not self restrain from indulging this emotion. Weakness to not man up and take responsibility for the power imbalance (in terms of natural strength and aggression) he has been born with.

And like you suggest, my wife is my absolute closest confidant and I hers. We don't have many others outside. But we don't see this as a bad thing. It intertwines us even closer. So there will be lasting deep friendship when the spark of the physical element inevitably fizzles out. And I tend to be affectionate with my children. But even my stoic grandfather of that earlier generation certainly was with me and my siblings and my mother and uncle before us. As I say, it's all about how it's applied.

 

[Brodders17]

Look, I totally get it, things that seem just in theory, wouldn't necessarily work in practical reality.

I suppose it was more ideologically where I sit. I very much come from a traditionalist, conservative upbringing (as I've said in other threads). Being an adult man to me is all about growing up, taking on adult responsibility and duty to your family. Although it is a dirty word in the current debate of "toxic masculinity", stoicism is still something I value highly that was very much instilled in me by being raised partly by depression era grandparents. And stoicism to me is about controlling one's emotions, not indulging impulses. Self restriction.

A man who abuses his wife is the antithesis to stoicism. He is clearly not controlling his emotions. And despite the dominant narrative. Women and men will never be equal in every single way, for the simple reason of biology and objective, observable scientific fact. But it's about taking responsibility for those advantages in strength and aggression we are born with and channeling it for positive things. Wielding that over one's spouse is a perversion of those values.

And as such, one who does it needs to be held personally accountable for those actions. And if that comes as a personal financial hit, to compensate those they abuse, this would be the most just outcome. That said, it may be unworkable in a practical sense.

all fair enough, but getting money out of a DV perpetrator probably wouldnt be easy, and risks more trauma for the survivor.

 

[Panthera Tigris]

Maybe a chant some of you gents might like to start at our next home match?

 

[Sintiger]

I read through this thread sometimes and think that many who post have an expectation gap. I used to expect politicians to do lots of things in the past but in the last decade I have worked in a space where I have seen them first hand. My expectations have been lowered because I have seen how ordinary, uninspiring and intellectually lacking many of them are, and that is across the political spectrum.
They tend to have a couple of things in common, an ego outstripping their ability and a way of seeing everything through a political lens .
They are generally advised by inexperienced people who have political and not practical backgrounds
For anyone who is a Utopia fan the Minister responsible for the NBA in that show is scarily close to the truth for many I have seen.
Sorry to be so cynical

 

[Panthera Tigris]

I read through this thread sometimes and think that many who post have an expectation gap. I used to expect politicians to do lots of things in the past but in the last decade I have worked in a space where I have seen them first hand. My expectations have been lowered because I have seen how ordinary, uninspiring and intellectually lacking many of them are, and that is across the political spectrum.
They tend to have a couple of things in common, an ego outstripping their ability and a way of seeing everything through a political lens .
They are generally advised by inexperienced people who have political and not practical backgrounds
For anyone who is a Utopia fan the Minister responsible for the NBA in that show is scarily close to the truth for many I have seen.
Sorry to be so cynical

Love Utopia. Rob Sitch has got it so close on both the bureaucracy and the political world and the dynamics around the relationship between the two.

I’m also quite a fan of ‘In The Thick Of It’ from the UK. That is scarily close to the mark at times!

Another point i’ve contemplated latey. I wonder if the political world attracts disproportionately sociopaths. People outside the norm of feeling and emotion.

For example, I would never run myself, as I actually would take really personally the criticism. And social media adds steroids to this theme.

And this is because I am a normal person with normal emotions. People that become successful in politics are perhaps outside of that. That’s not to say that all politicians (or those working close to them in their offices) are sociopaths. Just that it’s more concentrated than in the general community.

 

[Sintiger]

Love Utopia. Rob Sitch has got it so close on both the bureaucracy and the political world and the dynamics around the relationship between the two.

I’m also quite a fan of ‘In The Thick Of It’ from the UK. That is scarily close to the mark at times!

Another point i’ve contemplated latey. I wonder if the political world attracts disproportionately sociopaths. People outside the norm of feeling and emotion.

For example, I would never run myself, as I actually would take really personally the criticism. And social media adds steroids to this theme.

And this is because I am a normal person with normal emotions. People that become successful in politics are perhaps outside of that. That’s not to say that all politicians (or those working close to them in their offices) are sociopaths. Just that it’s more concentrated than in the general community.

Interesting point PT. I’ll try and catch that show. For anyone who has been in and around the public sector utopia is more of a documentary than a comedy !!
I think also these days we seem to be getting more and more politicians who have done nothing else in there careers except political staffing, or being trade union officials and then as politicians.
Generally these people don’t live in the real world you and I inhabit. They haven’t actually experienced anything that the people they are meant to be serving have.

 

[Althom]

Love Utopia. Rob Sitch has got it so close on both the bureaucracy and the political world and the dynamics around the relationship between the two.

I’m also quite a fan of ‘In The Thick Of It’ from the UK. That is scarily close to the mark at times!

Another point i’ve contemplated latey. I wonder if the political world attracts disproportionately sociopaths. People outside the norm of feeling and emotion.

For example, I would never run myself, as I actually would take really personally the criticism. And social media adds steroids to this theme.

And this is because I am a normal person with normal emotions. People that become successful in politics are perhaps outside of that. That’s not to say that all politicians (or those working close to them in their offices) are sociopaths. Just that it’s more concentrated than in the general community.

I wonder if the political world attracts disproportionately sociopaths?

I'm 100% sure it does.

 

[Panthera Tigris]

Interesting point PT. I’ll try and catch that show. For anyone who has been in and around the public sector utopia is more of a documentary than a comedy !!
I think also these days we seem to be getting more and more politicians who have done nothing else in there careers except political staffing, or being trade union officials and then as politicians.
Generally these people don’t live in the real world you and I inhabit. They haven’t actually experienced anything that the people they are meant to be serving have.

A bit of a preview for you

 

[eZyT]

there's nothing this govt. wont do,

to funnel the money of working men and women,

to the richest people in the land.

its their raison d'être

Crown among big companies given more than $90m by government to employ Aboriginal people

Greens senator Lidia Thorpe accuses the Coalition of using the strategy for alleviating disadvantage as a ‘slush fund’ for ‘their big donor mates’

www.theguardian.com

I can honestly say, in my intermittent ventures into crown, I have never been dealt cards by an aboriginal person.

 

[spook]

Where do I find this Utopia show? I have seen some episodes but not the whole thing.

 

[Scoop]

Where do I find this Utopia show? I have seen some episodes but not the whole thing.

It’s on Stan at the minute. This is my go to search engine.

https://www.justwatch.com/au

Utopia is spot on. Scarily accurate.

 

[jb03]

Utopia is absolute quality, could be a documentary (many great characters but Rhonda is a particular favourite). Not far behind Frontline.

The Thick of It And Veep in a similar vein are quality too.

 

[HR]

there's nothing this govt. wont do,

to funnel the money of working men and women,

to the richest people in the land.

its their raison d'être

Crown among big companies given more than $90m by government to employ Aboriginal people

Greens senator Lidia Thorpe accuses the Coalition of using the strategy for alleviating disadvantage as a ‘slush fund’ for ‘their big donor mates’

www.theguardian.com

I can honestly say, in my intermittent ventures into crown, I have never been dealt cards by an aboriginal person.

Equally the lack of tax paid keeps catching my attention. These companies have policies to uphold and promote their good standing in the community in which they operate. They don't need assistance from tax paying Aussies.
There are certainly other ways to get the "big" companies to employ and promote the needs of our Aboriginal and Torres Strait people.
Its not the feds only either. WA Labor stopped Brendan Grylls royalties for regions in WA by supporting the big boys claim that a 5 cent per tonne tax would put 400 employees out of work post the 2017 election. Well guess what, the regional miners cut way more than 400 within months of getting BG out of office under their scare tactics.
5 cents a tonne for our dirt would have made Australia better for everyone.