Straya!

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If you’re like me then whenever you think of Australia Day, you think of bogans dressed head to toe in the Australian flag and drenched head to toe in beer. If you’re like me, then this also makes you cringe.

However, I would like to propose the notion that being a flag-wearing, beer drenched bogan is actually a good thing. “What?!” I hear you scream. “How could this possibly be a good thing?!”

Being a bogan is most commonly associated with being white and a bit of a xenophobe, which easy to be, on a day like Australia Day…if you’re a bogan…and a prick.

However, what would the alternative be? Imagine this fine country without any sense of national identity or something, any-thing, that fills us with pride.

What are we left with? A culturally desolate wasteland lost of a sense of belonging.

Yes, it’s healthy to cringe at bogans. Yes, it’s more than fine to want to punch any Australian that thinks it’s ok to reduce our national identity to something like Vegemite or a corked hat.

But if we don’t have any sense of inclusivity or community that comes with a cultural identity of any kind, then we are left with no one really feeling the need to be a part of one.

What does that create? It creates a bigger world. A world in which we all feel like an individual disconnected from the people around us, rather than national citizens or local citizens.

Of course, I’m not saying that this excuses xenophobia or even just generally being kind of a prick. But it’s a sense of national pride that every citizen of this country, no matter how new, or what creed or colour or what plot of land your parents happened to fuck on, can grab onto when living here.

Nationalism shouldn’t be used as an excuse to exclude, but as a platform for inclusivity.

So, don’t cringe when you see a bogan turning snags on the barbie. Join in and invite everyone you know or see. Because if you can’t make mates on Australia Day, when can you?

What Civil Rights?

 

So, here’s what’s been pissing me off the most lately. I feel as though this has probably been said a lot already, but Julia Gillard’s decision to allow religious exemption in civil rights legislation still burns at the edges of my outrage-o-meter. You don’t want to see me when it’s red. Oh golly, I eat Mr Hyde AND Dr Jekyll for breakfast, thank you very much.

If you aren’t familiar with what’s been happening lately, let me bring you up to speed. Basically, the PM signed off an a decision last week to allow religious institutions, including but not limited to churches and schools, to discriminate based on anything that might be slightly distasteful to the religious palette.

Ms Gillard has defended this one by saying that she would “fight for the religious freedom to discriminate.”

All I have to say right now is what is the point of having an Atheist Prime Minister, if she isn’t going to fight for the separation of church and state.  Essentially, we are taking another step back in the dark ages just because good ol’ Ms Gillard is far too scared of offending the religious right.

I put it to the blogging laity that this is one of the main reasons this country doesn’t seem to be moving forward at all as far as civil rights is concerned.

Here’s my letter to the PM.

Dear Ms Gillard,

No one will care if you come across as favouring the left as long as you stick to your guns. Rhetoric is only fine when it’s being acted on and you haven’t been acting much, (unless you count acting like you care about anything other than poll results).

Thanks so much your thoroughly pissed off public.

At least she’s better than the other guy.

My Two Cents

I’ve very much enjoyed Clementine Ford’s blog on the hypocrisy of “The Nice Guys” of dating websites and previous Jezabel posts on the same subject.

I’ve encountered so many, many nice guys in my lifetime and was surprised and relieved to know that they had a label in the online sphere.

I mean so many times as a woman you are told that if a man treats you right, then you should keep him close. Turns out that men where told the same thing – well you know, that if you treat a woman right she’ll snap you up.

I’ve not personally encountered these men in my own relationships – thank you Spaghetti Monster! However, I have had male friends who definitely fall under this category. They didn’t so much believe that because they where nice they deserved a relationship, but that you have to be an asshole if you want one.

This stereotype has been reinforced time and time and time and time again by the media. “Women always fall for the bad guy!” “Be a jack ass or you’ll get friend zoned!"

I know this has already been said in lots of ways, but I wanted to make a couple of points from my point of view all the same. Take them how you will.

Nice Guy Stereotype Mentality No.1:

“Women only fall for jack asses.”

The problem with that mentality lies in the sentence itself. Women don’t work as a collective. We aren’t a fucking ant farm or one of those jellyfishes that’s made of tiny jellyfish. This is why stereotypes have the power to be so destructive. They give us a license to see one human being with individual thoughts and feelings as a part of a collective that they haven’t signed up for.

Women do fall for jackasses. And they also don’t. Plus, we all have a little bit of jack ass (not the movie, which was just shit by the way). Men ALSO fall for jack asses. Seeing where I’m going with this now? We’re all different.

Nice Guy Stereotype Mentality No 2:

“I’m nice, so why don’t I have a girlfriend?”

Again: Problem. Lies. Sentence. The answer to that question lies with the assumption that being nice gets you a girlfriend. If you have a vagina and live in the western world, you are probably used to the basic common courtesy that human beings extend to each other under the characteristic of “being nice.” Thus, you are no one’s knight in shining armour.

That mentality insinuates that you think women are so used to being treated like shit that their knees are going to give way when someone asks them how their day is, which in itself is really fucking sexist. Understanding? This in turn makes you seem like a jackass! Congratulations, you’re a bit of a dick. Oh, but wait! Now you’re going to get ALL the chicks, right?

I think the real issue that lies behind the nice guy problem is that women do sometimes fall for jerks, but it’s usually because they’re not looking to be treated like human beings (low self-esteem and all that). In turn, this means that men who love to wack labels on women see an opportunity and hide behind it.

You can’t label women just because you’re scared of genuinely getting your feelings hurt or don’t know how to handle it when you do. Just like women can’t label men for the same reason (see previous post).

We’re all scared and insecure. Deal with it.