So how’d that “edgy” millennial social media strategy work out for you there?
The Sydney Opera House released a statement saying the Festival of Dangerous Ideas is “a provocation to thought and discussion, rather than simply a provocation”.
“It is always a matter of balance and judgement, and in this case a line has been crossed,” the statement said.
“It is clear from the public reaction that the title has given the wrong impression of what Mr Badar intended to discuss.
“Neither Mr Badar, the St James Ethics Centre, nor Sydney Opera House in any way advocates honour killings or condones any form of violence against women.”
Mr Badar says he did not choose the title of the speech, but did consent to it. He also said he wanted to discuss a different topic.
“I, in fact, suggested a more direct topic about Islam and secular liberalism – something like ‘The West Needs saving by Islam’ – how’s that for dangerous?” Mr Badar said.
“But the organisers insisted on this topic, which I think is still a worthy topic of discussion, for many reasons.”
Mr Badar also noted that events at the Festival of Dangerous Ideas are “confronting and provocative”.
What news story/commentary/analysis has grabbed your attention lately? In particular, what else is being shoved under the national and international media rugs while HILDA dominates the news right now?
As usual for media circus threads, please share your bouquets and brickbats for particular items in the mass media, or highlight cogent analysis or pointed twitterstorms etc in new media. Discuss any current sociopolitical issue (the theme of each edition is merely for discussion-starter purposes – all current news items are on topic!).
Categories: arts & entertainment, culture wars, ethics & philosophy, media
It’s time. 
Hoyden About Town 
Utter fail by the SMH’s sex commentator Matty Silver on asexuality. I have an open letter as response here. (Have actually just received a twitter response saying that she will respond to my letter! Let’s see if it contains less fail.)
There’s an article in The Conversation today (Crowded Housing Market Gives Youth Little Chance For Independence) which talks about the difficulty of getting established in the current housing market when you’re under thirty, and waxes eloquent about how much more difficult it’s going to be if the government’s lovely new “if you’re under thirty-one, you don’t get the dole for more than six months out of every twelve” rule passes through parliament intact. In it, the writer lists the full value of Newstart allowance: $255 per week, plus a maximum of $63 per week Commonwealth rent assistance.
What I find annoying, with the article’s focus on young people, is that she fails to point out this rate of Newstart is the amount paid to people of all ages. As in, that’s the rate I’m on at present, and I’m in my early forties.
It makes it hard to look for rental accommodation. Trust me, I keep looking every couple of weeks (the place we’re in at the moment is not a permanent situation. We’re going to have to be out of here by the end of September, which means we have to start looking seriously for new accommodation around about now-ish) and running down the list of properties available in WA which are affordable on Newstart allowance. That is, properties which are available for $250 per week or less.
Oddly enough, there’s a lot of them around. Problem is, they’re mostly out in the rural districts. I’m currently living in the Perth metro area. The number of affordable properties in the Perth metro area is generally less than ten. Total. And of those, at least one is severely damaged, and waiting on repairs.
So why don’t I move out to the country, you ask? Well, I don’t move out to the country, because if I do, I get to try living on no income a damn sight faster than the amount of time it’s going to take the new Senate to argue through either the straight version of the Budget bills or the heavily amended version thereof. Moving out to the country would be moving to an area of lower employment opportunity, and would render me liable for a six to twelve month breach of the conditions for receiving Newstart allowance. So we’re stuck in the city as though our feet are nailed to the floor, sinking even further into poverty.
All this as a result of a policy which was introduced in the seventies to deal with a minor problem blown out of proportion by the newspapers. Namely: there were a few surfers who were travelling from place to place while on the dole, and some pecksniff in the Sydney papers decided to get all up in arms about the issue. So the DSS (as it was then) put the policy in place: no moving from an area of high employment opportunity (i.e. a city) to an area of low employment opportunity (i.e. a country town), and consequently killed the long tradition of migratory labour. You wonder why farms have to hire foreign students on holiday visas as fruit pickers, when there’s people on the dole? That’s why. Because for a six week temporary job, someone on the dole would be looking at losing six to twelve months worth of payments, and the reward isn’t worth the risk.
@Jo – I saw that article. What a heap of crap it was too. I may be wrong, but I don’t recall learning that women thought with their vaginas. Her ‘evidence’ that blood flow to the vagina of asexual women = they really do want sex and won’t admit it or don’t realise that they do was really really bad reporting.
I am sure at different times, if I were wearing a blood flow meter then it would register the same. But just because that person is looking damn fine in those jeans doesn’t mean I am going to have sex with them or that I want to even. It is just a reaction to a visual stimulus. How you act on it depends on conscious thought. Bah!
On happier thoughts I am really enjoying Caitlin Stasey’s tweets at the moment (former Home and Away actor). I hadn’t heard about her until Ebs Wears Pink tweeted an apology she made about photos of her (from a few years back) wearing an American Indian Headress. She apologised for cultural appropriation, asked her followers to stop tweeting the photos and didn’t try to gaslight or claim she had done nothing wrong. Plus she is very pro girls wearing what they like and being comfortable in their own skin. Great to see. Plus she is extraordinarily articulate and concise in 140 characters.
@megpie71 – I hope you can find a solution to your housing issue soon. What a horrible Catch-22 to be caught in.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jun/25/morrison-asylum-seekers-should-go-home-or-face-very-very-long-detention
Worse than John Howard ever was. Unbelievable.