It's time to retire this baby. This is post number 466, I think. I had hoped to get aMusing to 500, but I fear it's not to be.
I'm going to start a new blog at some point but it's obvious that blogging regularly has been a very low priority for me this past couple of years.
This is...for now... the final post for this title. Thank you Muse for adding spice thus far. <3
Sunday, January 29, 2012
Saturday, December 17, 2011
Closed lids of peace: A Poem
In the leaning towards the laying down
I veil these eyes and relax my frown.
Casting aside all earthly graces
To feast upon the open spaces,
Within the heart.
All those that flash sight behind closed lids of peace
That bring forth healing for daily griefs.
All this I lean towards in laying down;
To be a death, a little one for little while.
All this, so that tomorrow's rise can smile.
I veil these eyes and relax my frown.
Casting aside all earthly graces
To feast upon the open spaces,
Within the heart.
All those that flash sight behind closed lids of peace
That bring forth healing for daily griefs.
All this I lean towards in laying down;
To be a death, a little one for little while.
All this, so that tomorrow's rise can smile.
Tuesday, December 06, 2011
Teenagers having babies? So what's the real problem?
There's a bit of brouhaha in Australia this past 200+ years.
It's been happening - off and on - since Captain Cook first spotted Botany Bay and subsequent hordes of disadvantaged and desperate "criminals" left English shores to be bound forever to the land Downunder.
Teenage pregnancy.
It's not new but every generation judges women on the basis of it.
Interestingly, it's always; always; always the young women who are "at fault" for this "alarming and unthinking act of irresponsibility". Rarely have I heard pop culture news and current affairs shows on TV, such as A Current Affair, Today Tonight, or other reports of this ilk decry the actions of the males involved.
Apparently, despite all the work of the feminist movement since suffrage, it is the fault of a girl when she has sex. It is always her fault if she has a baby.
Time this idiocy and shaming stopped.
Not the pregnancies per se: there will be pregnant females throughout time and history. Some of the mothers will be young, some will be old. This isn't the problem. The thing that MUST be stopped is the judgement. It is time to stop the unnecessary judgement of teenage mothers.
It is time to provide these young people with responsible sex education which is health and pleasure centred. I'm not insisting on abstinence only sex education but I am insisting that our young people - both male and female - are given the information they need to make an informed choice about their sexuality. They need to understand how to respect the autonomy and rights of others, including those they are sexually attracted to.
Young women who insist that remaining a virgin at age 12, 13 or 15 is "really uncool" must be asked why this is so important?
My hunch is that it's about male hegemony even now days despite the apparent progress women have made for equality. Female competition for male attention comes about through a socially embedded belief that females "control" male desire and attraction. This belief has been around it seems, forever. Women are consistently and subtly blamed for having sex, being sexual beings and inducing sexual behaviours in males.
Our young women have been, too long, educationally and emotionally ill equipped to assert their rights. This is especially true with regard to contraception and even sex itself. Our male dominated culture has ensured that sexually active young females are not only shamed, vilified or made objects for sexual gratification for males, but that they will also be prevented from making good choices under the duress of this shaming. This shaming occurs if a young woman says yes or even, no to any kind of sexual expression.
To this day, the problem is society's insistence that men are weak and entirely incapable of showing restraint in the presence of female sexuality*. It's a lie and our kids are not learning that this is a lie. It means that young men are let off the hook and are abnegated of their responsibilities. It's always the woman's fault right?
So, our young men need to have this embedded myth and their beliefs about female sexuality challenged. Young men need to understand that women are not responsible for their "need" to have sex, let alone their decision to indulge in risky sexual activity. Regardless of physiological erection, a man is quite capable of making a compassionate ethical choice as to how he will engage with another person in the act of sex. Another person, by the way, includes a woman.
Young men need to be given permission to say "No" too. They need to be taught that they are capable of engaging with females respectfully, with empathy. And if desire and attraction are mutual and consent is given with no coercion, in sexual pleasure. They need to be taught how to recognise genuine female desire and not its culturally stultified version which is often one of compliance as a favour done in return for masculine attention. Sometimes it is very hard for young women to know the difference between their real desires and the culturally imposed ones via this myth of male weakness.
Young men need to understand that young women are their equals in every sense and that that equality demands they respect a woman's right to say no if she so chooses. Young men need to be given the social and emotional tools to ensure they do not turn a sexual rejection into a backlash of sexual violence. Young men need to be educated to the fact that contraception is a mutual decision and that practising safe sex is equally their obligation.
And on the other side of the coin; young women cannot be counted on to say "No" to sex while there is buy-in to this myth of male weakness. As a society, we cannot have it both ways. We cannot expect males on the one hand to be wanton and destructive forces of nature when it comes to sex and then expect young women to be the epitome of virginal purity on the other. It cannot work like that.
Women are entitled to their sexuality and its expression. It is not their fault for owning a clitoris or a vagina. These are however, things about being a woman which should be amazing and wondrous with their discovery one of immense mutual satisfaction for both partners.
Women need and want to feel safe around men. They need to understand that sex has been created to be a mutually joyful experience; an experience they can say Yes or No to when they are ready. They need to feel that they can express their personal sexual identity without needing to use it as a form of competition against other females and as currency for male attention. They need to know female sexuality and its expression need not be attached to shame. They need to know that their sexuality is a thing to be celebrated and enjoyed; a wonderful aspect of the human experience.
So, let's stop this idiotic ranting about taking away the Baby Bonus for teenage mothers. In fact, let's include the young fathers in this payment. Let's give our young men - who are helping to create the next generation - permission to step up to their obligations as parents, empowering them to become good fathers.
On another point: let's also stop our cultural obsession with promoting the youngest of models in our advertising; portraying girls as sexually alluring objects of desire and yet vilifying women of the same age for being sexual, having sex and giving birth! The confusion is too much so let's just stop that now shall we?
Let's work to develop healthy sexual expression in our teenagers. Stop the shock, horror and judgement and instead, teach our youth, effectively, about sex and sexuality with open honesty and compassion. Let's stop being coy about sex and give it full candour in discussion. Let's provide the youth of today with healthy pleasure-centred sex information which empowers them, helping them to see themselves as precious, wondrous beings, capable of choosing for themselves how they want to express their personal sexuality, safely and joyfully.
* With thanks to Hugo Schwyzer of Pasadena City College U.S.A for teaching me this.
It's been happening - off and on - since Captain Cook first spotted Botany Bay and subsequent hordes of disadvantaged and desperate "criminals" left English shores to be bound forever to the land Downunder.
Teenage pregnancy.
It's not new but every generation judges women on the basis of it.
Interestingly, it's always; always; always the young women who are "at fault" for this "alarming and unthinking act of irresponsibility". Rarely have I heard pop culture news and current affairs shows on TV, such as A Current Affair, Today Tonight, or other reports of this ilk decry the actions of the males involved.
Apparently, despite all the work of the feminist movement since suffrage, it is the fault of a girl when she has sex. It is always her fault if she has a baby.
Time this idiocy and shaming stopped.
Not the pregnancies per se: there will be pregnant females throughout time and history. Some of the mothers will be young, some will be old. This isn't the problem. The thing that MUST be stopped is the judgement. It is time to stop the unnecessary judgement of teenage mothers.
It is time to provide these young people with responsible sex education which is health and pleasure centred. I'm not insisting on abstinence only sex education but I am insisting that our young people - both male and female - are given the information they need to make an informed choice about their sexuality. They need to understand how to respect the autonomy and rights of others, including those they are sexually attracted to.
Young women who insist that remaining a virgin at age 12, 13 or 15 is "really uncool" must be asked why this is so important?
My hunch is that it's about male hegemony even now days despite the apparent progress women have made for equality. Female competition for male attention comes about through a socially embedded belief that females "control" male desire and attraction. This belief has been around it seems, forever. Women are consistently and subtly blamed for having sex, being sexual beings and inducing sexual behaviours in males.
Our young women have been, too long, educationally and emotionally ill equipped to assert their rights. This is especially true with regard to contraception and even sex itself. Our male dominated culture has ensured that sexually active young females are not only shamed, vilified or made objects for sexual gratification for males, but that they will also be prevented from making good choices under the duress of this shaming. This shaming occurs if a young woman says yes or even, no to any kind of sexual expression.
To this day, the problem is society's insistence that men are weak and entirely incapable of showing restraint in the presence of female sexuality*. It's a lie and our kids are not learning that this is a lie. It means that young men are let off the hook and are abnegated of their responsibilities. It's always the woman's fault right?
So, our young men need to have this embedded myth and their beliefs about female sexuality challenged. Young men need to understand that women are not responsible for their "need" to have sex, let alone their decision to indulge in risky sexual activity. Regardless of physiological erection, a man is quite capable of making a compassionate ethical choice as to how he will engage with another person in the act of sex. Another person, by the way, includes a woman.
Young men need to be given permission to say "No" too. They need to be taught that they are capable of engaging with females respectfully, with empathy. And if desire and attraction are mutual and consent is given with no coercion, in sexual pleasure. They need to be taught how to recognise genuine female desire and not its culturally stultified version which is often one of compliance as a favour done in return for masculine attention. Sometimes it is very hard for young women to know the difference between their real desires and the culturally imposed ones via this myth of male weakness.
Young men need to understand that young women are their equals in every sense and that that equality demands they respect a woman's right to say no if she so chooses. Young men need to be given the social and emotional tools to ensure they do not turn a sexual rejection into a backlash of sexual violence. Young men need to be educated to the fact that contraception is a mutual decision and that practising safe sex is equally their obligation.
And on the other side of the coin; young women cannot be counted on to say "No" to sex while there is buy-in to this myth of male weakness. As a society, we cannot have it both ways. We cannot expect males on the one hand to be wanton and destructive forces of nature when it comes to sex and then expect young women to be the epitome of virginal purity on the other. It cannot work like that.
Women are entitled to their sexuality and its expression. It is not their fault for owning a clitoris or a vagina. These are however, things about being a woman which should be amazing and wondrous with their discovery one of immense mutual satisfaction for both partners.
Women need and want to feel safe around men. They need to understand that sex has been created to be a mutually joyful experience; an experience they can say Yes or No to when they are ready. They need to feel that they can express their personal sexual identity without needing to use it as a form of competition against other females and as currency for male attention. They need to know female sexuality and its expression need not be attached to shame. They need to know that their sexuality is a thing to be celebrated and enjoyed; a wonderful aspect of the human experience.
So, let's stop this idiotic ranting about taking away the Baby Bonus for teenage mothers. In fact, let's include the young fathers in this payment. Let's give our young men - who are helping to create the next generation - permission to step up to their obligations as parents, empowering them to become good fathers.
On another point: let's also stop our cultural obsession with promoting the youngest of models in our advertising; portraying girls as sexually alluring objects of desire and yet vilifying women of the same age for being sexual, having sex and giving birth! The confusion is too much so let's just stop that now shall we?
Let's work to develop healthy sexual expression in our teenagers. Stop the shock, horror and judgement and instead, teach our youth, effectively, about sex and sexuality with open honesty and compassion. Let's stop being coy about sex and give it full candour in discussion. Let's provide the youth of today with healthy pleasure-centred sex information which empowers them, helping them to see themselves as precious, wondrous beings, capable of choosing for themselves how they want to express their personal sexuality, safely and joyfully.
* With thanks to Hugo Schwyzer of Pasadena City College U.S.A for teaching me this.
Sunday, December 04, 2011
Alone in the crowd because I want it that way
This series of photos over at the Behance Network are beautiful and tell a story about our modern lives - at least in the wealthy First World.
I wonder what the real story is though.
Perhaps it is that people "need" tools to protect themselves from the crowd. In the early 20th Century, it was the cigarette that created that elusive forcefield of protected space around a person's body. Now it's our phone.
It's like a security blanket now isn't it? It feels safe because we don't have to look into another person's eyes and see what we think we can see there.
It's like a silent statement of "Do Not Look At Me!" It's like adopting a non-threatening and passive aggressive stance when one feels cornered and in fear.
I'm not sure it's actually like that for everyone, but I know for me, I use my smartphone as a replacement for the book I used to use for the same reason... to "lose myself" in the crowd.
I wonder what the real story is though.
Perhaps it is that people "need" tools to protect themselves from the crowd. In the early 20th Century, it was the cigarette that created that elusive forcefield of protected space around a person's body. Now it's our phone.
It's like a security blanket now isn't it? It feels safe because we don't have to look into another person's eyes and see what we think we can see there.
It's like a silent statement of "Do Not Look At Me!" It's like adopting a non-threatening and passive aggressive stance when one feels cornered and in fear.
I'm not sure it's actually like that for everyone, but I know for me, I use my smartphone as a replacement for the book I used to use for the same reason... to "lose myself" in the crowd.
Saturday, August 20, 2011
Crazy time: Cave time
Describing 2011 as the globe's "Annus horribilis" is probably a bit cutesy! Even so, it has been one hell of a year so far, eh?
Crippling droughts to rip roaring storms and floods; riots, terrorist killings, Coup d'Etats and civilian rebellions; wobbly economies, Wikileaks and stock market crashes; earthquakes and volcanic ash plumes; the tsunami to end all tsunamis, killer tornado's, hurricanes and cyclones; nuclear meltdowns, extreme famine; phone hacking, Amy Winehouse, pageant mums and carbon tax. Whatever next?
Unless you're living - by choice - in a cave somewhere quiet and news free, you'll probably be feeling the effects of massive disaster/compassion/shock fatigue like me right?
I'm so over the manic quality of 2011.
It's as if the gods were about to use us as the ball in a celestial cricket match. Some Shane-Warne-wannabe-demi-god up there, is intently rubbing this little blue planet against his crotch, licking his upper lip with focused glee as he sights poor goddess Diana down the other end of the pitch. Lord help us!
Meanwhile, those naughty gods have forgotten that their ball is a indeed, a planet...with human beings. Human beings they're supposed to be looking out for because we're fragile and silly but ever so precious and rare. Every one of us.
The human race and this ball we call 'home' are definitely taking a beating this year. At least that's how it feels. Are we being carefully prepared for even more catastrophic happenings just around the corner? I hope not!
I sense that there is already way too much compassion fatigue. I know I have it in spades at the moment. There are just too many shocks slugging at my emotional spidey senses.
I always try to dig deep for anyone caught up in unbelievable tragedies, but this year it feels like my pockets aren't nearly deep enough to make a dent of a difference. It's easy to think 'Why bother?' It can seem so hopeless sometimes. That isn't an excuse to stop helping, just that keeping up with this apparent onslaught of tragedy after tragedy is so draining and soul destroying.
Perhaps this is why Will and Kate's wedding was I think, pretty much, the one genuinely collective joyful moment we've had this past year. How gracious of them to choose 2011 as their year to marry. A day to celebrate incredible lightness of being and for setting our hearts aglow with wonder and delight. Their wedding day gave us a tiny ray of inspiration and hope that we can overcome anything. I'm not even into the royal family that much, but I do remember the simple joy I felt on that day, knowing that True Love does indeed, exist. It was so sweet and romantic, so pompously pleasant. All those miles of lovely smiles to warm the cockles of our anxious hearts. God Bless 'em for that amazing, wonderful moment!
A few months on and again there's that uneasy undercurrent of anxiousness about what next egregious event lays in wait around the bend. Things feel uneven, distorted and the energy seems "off" - although don't ask me what I mean by that as I have no idea, it just *feels* that way.
Am I reading too much into things do you think?
I have had the thought that, given the enormity of tragedy this past year, countries around the world will soon be drawing down their metaphorical shutters, . Battening down the hatches, so to speak. I think people everywhere may suddenly decide to go back to being "tribal" rather than "global" for awhile. The more depressing the news, the more these tribes will hunker down, ever more vehemently protective of their own. And this will be true for internet tribes too I reckon. It'll be like the worlds people are under blankets, too scared to peep out into the dark, too terrified to hang a toe over the edge, lest the monsters underneath nibble at them.
The risk with this happening is that creeping fear will become blatantly open xenophobia and we all know what happened the last time somebody decided a particular race was to blame for the world's woes. That mustn't happen again... ever!
So? Is this the Armageddon? End Times? The Great Tribulation? The Beginning of The End of All Life as we Know It?
Well, I don't think anyone actually believes the world will end on the 21st December 2012 but...sheesh! With events of this year, one does do a mini double take at the concept! It does feel like there's major change afoot on all sorts of levels, both human and terrestrial. I guess my grandparents generation must have felt similarly at the beginnings of both world wars and that nasty economic depression in between. Nice thought? Not!
Maybe I'm over dramatising! I certainly hope so. But, if we are going to have more large scale floods, riots, terrorist attacks, coups, earthquakes, volcanoes, tsunamis, droughts, tornados, cyclones, hurricanes, nuclear meltdowns and mouse plagues within the next year and a bit, I'm defs off to find me a nice quiet, news free cave! Care to join me?
Crippling droughts to rip roaring storms and floods; riots, terrorist killings, Coup d'Etats and civilian rebellions; wobbly economies, Wikileaks and stock market crashes; earthquakes and volcanic ash plumes; the tsunami to end all tsunamis, killer tornado's, hurricanes and cyclones; nuclear meltdowns, extreme famine; phone hacking, Amy Winehouse, pageant mums and carbon tax. Whatever next?
Unless you're living - by choice - in a cave somewhere quiet and news free, you'll probably be feeling the effects of massive disaster/compassion/shock fatigue like me right?
I'm so over the manic quality of 2011.
It's as if the gods were about to use us as the ball in a celestial cricket match. Some Shane-Warne-wannabe-demi-god up there, is intently rubbing this little blue planet against his crotch, licking his upper lip with focused glee as he sights poor goddess Diana down the other end of the pitch. Lord help us!
Meanwhile, those naughty gods have forgotten that their ball is a indeed, a planet...with human beings. Human beings they're supposed to be looking out for because we're fragile and silly but ever so precious and rare. Every one of us.
The human race and this ball we call 'home' are definitely taking a beating this year. At least that's how it feels. Are we being carefully prepared for even more catastrophic happenings just around the corner? I hope not!
I sense that there is already way too much compassion fatigue. I know I have it in spades at the moment. There are just too many shocks slugging at my emotional spidey senses.
I always try to dig deep for anyone caught up in unbelievable tragedies, but this year it feels like my pockets aren't nearly deep enough to make a dent of a difference. It's easy to think 'Why bother?' It can seem so hopeless sometimes. That isn't an excuse to stop helping, just that keeping up with this apparent onslaught of tragedy after tragedy is so draining and soul destroying.
Perhaps this is why Will and Kate's wedding was I think, pretty much, the one genuinely collective joyful moment we've had this past year. How gracious of them to choose 2011 as their year to marry. A day to celebrate incredible lightness of being and for setting our hearts aglow with wonder and delight. Their wedding day gave us a tiny ray of inspiration and hope that we can overcome anything. I'm not even into the royal family that much, but I do remember the simple joy I felt on that day, knowing that True Love does indeed, exist. It was so sweet and romantic, so pompously pleasant. All those miles of lovely smiles to warm the cockles of our anxious hearts. God Bless 'em for that amazing, wonderful moment!
A few months on and again there's that uneasy undercurrent of anxiousness about what next egregious event lays in wait around the bend. Things feel uneven, distorted and the energy seems "off" - although don't ask me what I mean by that as I have no idea, it just *feels* that way.
Am I reading too much into things do you think?
I have had the thought that, given the enormity of tragedy this past year, countries around the world will soon be drawing down their metaphorical shutters, . Battening down the hatches, so to speak. I think people everywhere may suddenly decide to go back to being "tribal" rather than "global" for awhile. The more depressing the news, the more these tribes will hunker down, ever more vehemently protective of their own. And this will be true for internet tribes too I reckon. It'll be like the worlds people are under blankets, too scared to peep out into the dark, too terrified to hang a toe over the edge, lest the monsters underneath nibble at them.
The risk with this happening is that creeping fear will become blatantly open xenophobia and we all know what happened the last time somebody decided a particular race was to blame for the world's woes. That mustn't happen again... ever!
So? Is this the Armageddon? End Times? The Great Tribulation? The Beginning of The End of All Life as we Know It?
Well, I don't think anyone actually believes the world will end on the 21st December 2012 but...sheesh! With events of this year, one does do a mini double take at the concept! It does feel like there's major change afoot on all sorts of levels, both human and terrestrial. I guess my grandparents generation must have felt similarly at the beginnings of both world wars and that nasty economic depression in between. Nice thought? Not!
Maybe I'm over dramatising! I certainly hope so. But, if we are going to have more large scale floods, riots, terrorist attacks, coups, earthquakes, volcanoes, tsunamis, droughts, tornados, cyclones, hurricanes, nuclear meltdowns and mouse plagues within the next year and a bit, I'm defs off to find me a nice quiet, news free cave! Care to join me?
Friday, July 22, 2011
The inconvenience of gender polarity.
Gender to most people in the North World is probably defined as being either male or female depending on biological sex at birth.
If you were born with a penis, you were placed into the gender category "Male". You were given a name that reiterated this measurement and clearly marked your polarity for all the world to know and concur with. You were "encouraged" to wrestle, explore, dissect, investigate, grunt and idealise your mum.
If you were born with a vagina, a whole host of other social polarity views were conferred on to you out of deference, indignation, hatred, and objectification. All of which were just because you ostensibly have or had a vagina.
Your sex your gender doth not make. Not anymore.
Gender in modern sexuality is becoming a blurred concept. Gender is now more than just a biological constraint of genetics; it is now a personal and very individual concept of identity.
You have now - at least in the opulent, self-actualising North - opportunity to completely and dynamically redefine the paradigm that is your sex. You can now place your gender role anywhere along a mutable identity scale regardless of whether you have a penis or a vagina.
For example:
You can be completely and utterly Cisgender. This means that you will concretely and resoundingly affirm your biological sex with your gender role. If you were born a boy, you will identify with all things society has deemed to be "Boys do as boys will". You will co-opt all the social expectations for being male unto your Self. If you are female, you will completely identify your role in society within the social structures of "Being a Woman". This is who you ARE. You cannot be otherwise! You were born with your sex and you identify your gender role with that sex.
If however you are any of the following, your gender identity becomes a little more obscure to the rest of world - if not yourself.
You can be male biologically but *feel* female and ergo *gay* - as in sexually attracted to other males.
You can be male biologically but *feel* very male but still *gay*.
You can be male biologically but *feel* female but not *gay*
You can be male biologically but *feel* either female or male and be attracted sexually to both sexes. You can be this and be attracted to only one other of these sexes.
You can be female biologically but *feel* incredibly male, whilst being *straight* according to social sexual pairing.
And so it goes on.
Gay men who like to dress like *blokes*.
Gay men who dress androgynous, so no one can really tell what sex they are.
Straight females who feel like they just never fit with the stereotype for being female...
The variations are as many as there are those who question the polarity of gender.
The simple answer is: There are no two genders.
There aren't even really two sexes as some people can actually be another type of sex altogether - Intersex. There will come a time when this term will be included in the little boxes on documents entitled "Sex".
The inconvenience for most Cisgendered people in North World societies is that we're decidedly uncomfortable with this inability to package people into either "male" or "female". It's uncomfortable because a Cisgendered person simply cannot comprehend gender outside of their experience: that being, identifying completely with their biological sex. We are so accustomed to feeling that we're male or female according to our vagina or our penis, that the idea of being anything else is confounding, confusing and even terrifying!
The reason I muse on this is because I was watching an episode of Glee Project tonight and a character auditioning on the show for a spot in the Glee cast is decidedly difficult to label instinctively as either a *male* or a *female*.
Turns out that S/He is definitely a male biologically - although I had to go to Google to source that info. How s/he presented on the show was this confusing mixture of both female and male behaviours and a decidedly hermaphroditic physique.
I was astonished at how uncomfortable it made me feel.
Of course I am ashamed of this discomfort. I pride myself on being as non-judgemental and as open-minded as I can be about people. I accept - at least on a theoretical level - that people come in all sorts of shapes, sizes, postures, creeds, races and so on. I love that about humanity - at least on a global scale. When I am confronted by the reality of this diversity it leaves my inner bean feeling more than a little discombobulated! And I need to understand why.
As a Cisgendered female, it was hard to figure out just WHO this "Alex" person actually was! I absolutely had to place this person into a gender labelled box. And there were only two boxes! Male or Female! All this transpired in my mind in a nano-second. All this in order to feel comfortable about who Alex was/is. Hence the Googling!
For me, identifying "Alex" as male made the pieces of his gender identity and his sexual orientation feel more normal, comforting, absolute and understandable. Not being able to identify his biological sex made me anxious, nervous. His gender role was too indeterminate and amorphous to understand. I found I had to focus so much on him/her just trying to figure out which sex s/he was that I ended up missing a fair proportion of the other activity on this tv show.
Accepting that gender isn't a polarity and that some people will choose to move themselves around the gender spectrum is far more difficult for Cisgendered people than I thought it would be. Of course, I do need to learn how to do this. For people who don't identify as male or female but somewhere else on that curve it must be hell. Feeling comfortable with ones identity is critical to a whole host of mental, emotional and psychological successes in life! Being unable to even pinpoint where one would fit on the gender curve must be positively awful! The simple fact of knowing instinctively that your identity is ... 'Thus'.... be it male, female, intersex or on a point anywhere around there is a rather sublime blessing I would have thought.
There is much complexity in the way our civilisation structures notions of sex and gender. A part of this is simply to keep society in some kind of order, preventing too much "difference" creating or causing anarchy, fear and the potential break-up of the Tribe, leaving it vulnerable to attack and dissolution.
Our language, art, politics, environment, our philosophies and religions all tell of the human struggle to understand identity. Polarising identity down to just two social sexual gender roles is just not good enough any more.
Diversity means we have to expand our dreaming and our concepts to new levels. Can we do that?
Can I do that?
It's time I should.
Our very survival may depend on it.
If you were born with a penis, you were placed into the gender category "Male". You were given a name that reiterated this measurement and clearly marked your polarity for all the world to know and concur with. You were "encouraged" to wrestle, explore, dissect, investigate, grunt and idealise your mum.
If you were born with a vagina, a whole host of other social polarity views were conferred on to you out of deference, indignation, hatred, and objectification. All of which were just because you ostensibly have or had a vagina.
Your sex your gender doth not make. Not anymore.
Gender in modern sexuality is becoming a blurred concept. Gender is now more than just a biological constraint of genetics; it is now a personal and very individual concept of identity.
You have now - at least in the opulent, self-actualising North - opportunity to completely and dynamically redefine the paradigm that is your sex. You can now place your gender role anywhere along a mutable identity scale regardless of whether you have a penis or a vagina.
For example:
You can be completely and utterly Cisgender. This means that you will concretely and resoundingly affirm your biological sex with your gender role. If you were born a boy, you will identify with all things society has deemed to be "Boys do as boys will". You will co-opt all the social expectations for being male unto your Self. If you are female, you will completely identify your role in society within the social structures of "Being a Woman". This is who you ARE. You cannot be otherwise! You were born with your sex and you identify your gender role with that sex.
If however you are any of the following, your gender identity becomes a little more obscure to the rest of world - if not yourself.
You can be male biologically but *feel* female and ergo *gay* - as in sexually attracted to other males.
You can be male biologically but *feel* very male but still *gay*.
You can be male biologically but *feel* female but not *gay*
You can be male biologically but *feel* either female or male and be attracted sexually to both sexes. You can be this and be attracted to only one other of these sexes.
You can be female biologically but *feel* incredibly male, whilst being *straight* according to social sexual pairing.
And so it goes on.
Gay men who like to dress like *blokes*.
Gay men who dress androgynous, so no one can really tell what sex they are.
Straight females who feel like they just never fit with the stereotype for being female...
The variations are as many as there are those who question the polarity of gender.
The simple answer is: There are no two genders.
There aren't even really two sexes as some people can actually be another type of sex altogether - Intersex. There will come a time when this term will be included in the little boxes on documents entitled "Sex".
The inconvenience for most Cisgendered people in North World societies is that we're decidedly uncomfortable with this inability to package people into either "male" or "female". It's uncomfortable because a Cisgendered person simply cannot comprehend gender outside of their experience: that being, identifying completely with their biological sex. We are so accustomed to feeling that we're male or female according to our vagina or our penis, that the idea of being anything else is confounding, confusing and even terrifying!
The reason I muse on this is because I was watching an episode of Glee Project tonight and a character auditioning on the show for a spot in the Glee cast is decidedly difficult to label instinctively as either a *male* or a *female*.
Turns out that S/He is definitely a male biologically - although I had to go to Google to source that info. How s/he presented on the show was this confusing mixture of both female and male behaviours and a decidedly hermaphroditic physique.
I was astonished at how uncomfortable it made me feel.
Of course I am ashamed of this discomfort. I pride myself on being as non-judgemental and as open-minded as I can be about people. I accept - at least on a theoretical level - that people come in all sorts of shapes, sizes, postures, creeds, races and so on. I love that about humanity - at least on a global scale. When I am confronted by the reality of this diversity it leaves my inner bean feeling more than a little discombobulated! And I need to understand why.
As a Cisgendered female, it was hard to figure out just WHO this "Alex" person actually was! I absolutely had to place this person into a gender labelled box. And there were only two boxes! Male or Female! All this transpired in my mind in a nano-second. All this in order to feel comfortable about who Alex was/is. Hence the Googling!
For me, identifying "Alex" as male made the pieces of his gender identity and his sexual orientation feel more normal, comforting, absolute and understandable. Not being able to identify his biological sex made me anxious, nervous. His gender role was too indeterminate and amorphous to understand. I found I had to focus so much on him/her just trying to figure out which sex s/he was that I ended up missing a fair proportion of the other activity on this tv show.
Accepting that gender isn't a polarity and that some people will choose to move themselves around the gender spectrum is far more difficult for Cisgendered people than I thought it would be. Of course, I do need to learn how to do this. For people who don't identify as male or female but somewhere else on that curve it must be hell. Feeling comfortable with ones identity is critical to a whole host of mental, emotional and psychological successes in life! Being unable to even pinpoint where one would fit on the gender curve must be positively awful! The simple fact of knowing instinctively that your identity is ... 'Thus'.... be it male, female, intersex or on a point anywhere around there is a rather sublime blessing I would have thought.
There is much complexity in the way our civilisation structures notions of sex and gender. A part of this is simply to keep society in some kind of order, preventing too much "difference" creating or causing anarchy, fear and the potential break-up of the Tribe, leaving it vulnerable to attack and dissolution.
Our language, art, politics, environment, our philosophies and religions all tell of the human struggle to understand identity. Polarising identity down to just two social sexual gender roles is just not good enough any more.
Diversity means we have to expand our dreaming and our concepts to new levels. Can we do that?
Can I do that?
It's time I should.
Our very survival may depend on it.
Sunday, July 17, 2011
Aspiration to Resolve: The journey between
As much as I aspire to nearly everything - except gardening and sewing - I really don't do Resolve very well.
Aspiration comes from the Latin 'aspiratio' meaning desire. It has various other meanings but in this context it is about a strong desire to achieve something tangible and real. It is the aim of such a desire.
Resolve is both a noun and a verb and comes from the Latin 'resolvere' meaning to unloose or dissolve. As a verb, resolve is to solve a problem, As a noun, resolve is a determination to achieve a given purpose or objective.
Resolve is not my strength. Both the doing and the being.
I aspire easily. Aspiration requires no obligation; only amorphous wishes based on self-created fairy tales. Aspirations publically announced look fine and worthy but they mean absolutely nothing after a time has passed.
Resolve however means to commit in full to stepping out onto the path to the destination - regardless of the effort required to get there. Resolve is always defined by the present - not the future. A proper resolve is evident in the actions of the Now. Aspiration is usually about something that may or may not occur in the future and is not yet proven.
Resolve means to be so sure of ones ability to achieve something that the will is set into a permanent state of determination and physical action. Perception, side-tracks, fate, perspicacity, do not sway the resolute soul.
Because I am a commitment-phobe of the worst kind, I find resolve to be inordinately difficult. Resolve is "easy" if the goal is small and achievable. If the outcome desired is practical and objectively useful, resolve becomes either a habit or a usual task that "must be done". But, resolute commitment to those dreamy, schemey wonderful illusions that make up many of my aspirations is impossible.
The disconnect between aspiration and resolve within is as vast as the universe is wide. Nothing but nothing will *make* me resolve to do anything but myself. My Self is an ornery, stubborn romantic who aspires to nearly everything so long as that Self doesn't need to physically or psychologically do anything to actually achieve those dreams.
It's not a question of "how do I achieve this dream?" It's more along the lines of... "This would be nice but it's too hard so I'll just enjoy the fantasy of it and that is all"
I'm a child in this respect. I lack the mature will to grapple with self-discipline so as to create tangible realities from dreams and wishes. I would rather lose myself in the wonders of imagination and the pleasant pain of longing than ever think through the practical implications of action for achievement.
So I will aspire to losing weight, being a beautiful person inside and out, owning a property portfolio, writing novels that sell in the millions, reading all the classics of literature, become famous without losing my privacy.... the list goes on....
but I shall never actually resolve these things. I am simply too lazy to do so.
Aspiration comes from the Latin 'aspiratio' meaning desire. It has various other meanings but in this context it is about a strong desire to achieve something tangible and real. It is the aim of such a desire.
Resolve is both a noun and a verb and comes from the Latin 'resolvere' meaning to unloose or dissolve. As a verb, resolve is to solve a problem, As a noun, resolve is a determination to achieve a given purpose or objective.
Resolve is not my strength. Both the doing and the being.
I aspire easily. Aspiration requires no obligation; only amorphous wishes based on self-created fairy tales. Aspirations publically announced look fine and worthy but they mean absolutely nothing after a time has passed.
Resolve however means to commit in full to stepping out onto the path to the destination - regardless of the effort required to get there. Resolve is always defined by the present - not the future. A proper resolve is evident in the actions of the Now. Aspiration is usually about something that may or may not occur in the future and is not yet proven.
Resolve means to be so sure of ones ability to achieve something that the will is set into a permanent state of determination and physical action. Perception, side-tracks, fate, perspicacity, do not sway the resolute soul.
Because I am a commitment-phobe of the worst kind, I find resolve to be inordinately difficult. Resolve is "easy" if the goal is small and achievable. If the outcome desired is practical and objectively useful, resolve becomes either a habit or a usual task that "must be done". But, resolute commitment to those dreamy, schemey wonderful illusions that make up many of my aspirations is impossible.
The disconnect between aspiration and resolve within is as vast as the universe is wide. Nothing but nothing will *make* me resolve to do anything but myself. My Self is an ornery, stubborn romantic who aspires to nearly everything so long as that Self doesn't need to physically or psychologically do anything to actually achieve those dreams.
It's not a question of "how do I achieve this dream?" It's more along the lines of... "This would be nice but it's too hard so I'll just enjoy the fantasy of it and that is all"
I'm a child in this respect. I lack the mature will to grapple with self-discipline so as to create tangible realities from dreams and wishes. I would rather lose myself in the wonders of imagination and the pleasant pain of longing than ever think through the practical implications of action for achievement.
So I will aspire to losing weight, being a beautiful person inside and out, owning a property portfolio, writing novels that sell in the millions, reading all the classics of literature, become famous without losing my privacy.... the list goes on....
but I shall never actually resolve these things. I am simply too lazy to do so.
Monday, May 30, 2011
The "Older" Woman and her relationship with her body
The following has been inspired by a post from Hugo Schwyzer over at "Healthy is the New Skinny". A cause which I support if still a little in two-minds about. Skinny is still considered healthy way too much I think and for some of us older women (who don't have the genetic predisposition towards the metabolism of a race horse) - skinny is unobtainable.
**
Two pregnancies, some 20+ years, a predilection for sweets and an aversion to extreme sports has defined my body size and shape to be...well... pudgy.
Am I a victim of my genes or simply "out of control"?
The mixed messages young women receive about how they should appear and how effortless they have to make it all seem to be thin, popular and gorgeous is abhorrent. But it doesn't make it easier for us older women either to be saddled (sic) with the heavy weight of disdain for our physical selves.
When I turned 40 years of age, I celebrated this:
"I can be what I want to be now and not give a damn about what others think".
I guess it's true that I never really needed to give a damn in my teens, my 20's or my 30's but for some reason, turning 40 seemed to be a rite of passage that meant I was now "old" and that I needn't concern myself with my looks or my weight anymore because I should be proud to be an older woman. Besides, I was to all intents and purposes now effectively "invisible" to male scrutiny!
Yes! I thought turning forty meant a woman could turn off her obsessions with weight, skin, hair and fitness because it didn't matter anymore. And it didn't! But it does!
Well 6 months shy of 50 and I know it still matters. I am every bit as obsessed with weight, body size, and my looks as I was in my 20's. However, now I rarely bother with trying to make the effort because it is just too an insurmountable task to rectify the ravages of age.
Women in my age group suffer the ignominy of defeat more often than not. Why bust our weary guts over weights and jogging shoes when sharing a whinge and cake with a friend over coffee is so much more civilised and culturally acceptable?
And lets not even mention the equal measures of shame and excitement that come with sex! Having it I mean! It's okay to have sex at nearly 50...so long as one can do it in semi darkness under covers and in conventional ways that won't shine the scathing light of recrimination on your inability to control your daily calorie intake!
Women of nearly 50 should be graceful, confident with gleaming healthy skin and sparkling eyes! They must be wealthy and stable emotionally. They must carry their healthy, slender bodies with nubile grace and flexibility. They must wear their near perfect platinum hair short with carefree aplomb! Women of nearly 50 are supposed to be contained, healthy; happy to excess with their success and completely unfazed by the practicalities of managing carefully sculpted manicured and painted fingers and toes! Women of 50 are supposed to be denizens of female beauty and gloriously youthful personalities but still look like they're effortlessly 50!
it's enough to make a real 49 year old female weep from frustration!
I feel ugly 90% of the time. I feel like a frumpy, double-chinned, wangy-eyed monster! It's true. I rarely FEEL beautiful. I grasp at the desire to change my size, my weight, my lifestyle, my eating habits, my self-worth like pick-up sticks! If you do one thing wrong - the whole lot crumbles and you lose.
Lots of people - including certain family members who shall remain nameless - all try to inspire me to taking control of my "out of control" life, reminding me of my "responsibilities" to ensure that my weight remains in a healthy range and not become a slack-arsed blob hell-bent on dying from the familial blight of heart disease.
It's easy to cop out of course and therein lies the fundamental problem. Too much of my world is consumed with physical appearance as "THE" sign of health and prosperity! Too much of my world - like the world of my younger sisters - is consumed with the fatal disease of caring too much about the packaging and not nearly enough about the woman underneath.
Thing is...that woman underneath knows this so focuses most of her aspirations to being recognised for her packaging rather than her gifts, talents and strengths - many of which she's barely been able to identify within herself! This sad fact is due to nearly 40+ years of being misdirected in her attention to that packaging requirement.
I'd love to "lose weight" and be considered "healthy" but it kinda means that food becomes the Enemy. I have to corral it, infuse it with powers it shouldn't have; make it an agonising fight to the kilo.
At 49 - food should be my friend and ally. It should give me energy and a health fuelled life, full of joy. Eating should be something so pleasurable and sensual, that it must be savoured at all times, alone or with friends (and lovers).
At 49 - food should be something that I enjoy. But I do and I don't and I can't. My body - the body that is lumpy, bumpy and determinedly pudgy reminds me daily that *I* am a failure at being a woman even when my intelligence refuses to acknowledge such nonsense. I love food too much so my culture would have me know. I love the "wrong" foods according to the skinny celebrity nutritionists trolled out for current affairs programs. If they are so bloody wrong I ask you - why aren't there health warnings on the packets?
This is the war with which I live every day. My obvious "inability" to curb my female fatness and my desire to eat what I like usurps my theoretical acceptance that who *I* am is not defined by my appearance.
If health is the objective of eating then why is it so difficult? Why is eating so fucking HARD to get "right". Why do we need so many educational programs and tips, and points and "easy ways" to "improve" our eating habits? Why must food become such an enemy for the middle aged frumpy female when the real crux of the problem lies not with food but with society's obsessions with physical appearance!
Women in their middle years must be cut some slack. We need to be given a round of applause for our achievements, our intelligence, our Selves. We've raised kids, looked after others, nurtured, sacrificed, studied, learned, educated ourselves, given, travelled, exercised our rights as human beings. We've generated business, made profits, worked, invented, adopted technology, won races, run governments. We've designed, lifted the game, challenged stereotypes and loved with passion and vigour.
Instead - we are barrelled for our muffin tops and spare tyres and for what we put into our mouths. We're made to feel like unmitigated failures because we aren't the BMI of Beyonce or Madonna! Worse - we feel invisible because we aren't considered beautiful or desirable anymore!
It all really does have to stop!
I'm having toast....with margarine and jam! So what of it?
**
Two pregnancies, some 20+ years, a predilection for sweets and an aversion to extreme sports has defined my body size and shape to be...well... pudgy.
Am I a victim of my genes or simply "out of control"?
The mixed messages young women receive about how they should appear and how effortless they have to make it all seem to be thin, popular and gorgeous is abhorrent. But it doesn't make it easier for us older women either to be saddled (sic) with the heavy weight of disdain for our physical selves.
When I turned 40 years of age, I celebrated this:
"I can be what I want to be now and not give a damn about what others think".
I guess it's true that I never really needed to give a damn in my teens, my 20's or my 30's but for some reason, turning 40 seemed to be a rite of passage that meant I was now "old" and that I needn't concern myself with my looks or my weight anymore because I should be proud to be an older woman. Besides, I was to all intents and purposes now effectively "invisible" to male scrutiny!
Yes! I thought turning forty meant a woman could turn off her obsessions with weight, skin, hair and fitness because it didn't matter anymore. And it didn't! But it does!
Well 6 months shy of 50 and I know it still matters. I am every bit as obsessed with weight, body size, and my looks as I was in my 20's. However, now I rarely bother with trying to make the effort because it is just too an insurmountable task to rectify the ravages of age.
Women in my age group suffer the ignominy of defeat more often than not. Why bust our weary guts over weights and jogging shoes when sharing a whinge and cake with a friend over coffee is so much more civilised and culturally acceptable?
And lets not even mention the equal measures of shame and excitement that come with sex! Having it I mean! It's okay to have sex at nearly 50...so long as one can do it in semi darkness under covers and in conventional ways that won't shine the scathing light of recrimination on your inability to control your daily calorie intake!
Women of nearly 50 should be graceful, confident with gleaming healthy skin and sparkling eyes! They must be wealthy and stable emotionally. They must carry their healthy, slender bodies with nubile grace and flexibility. They must wear their near perfect platinum hair short with carefree aplomb! Women of nearly 50 are supposed to be contained, healthy; happy to excess with their success and completely unfazed by the practicalities of managing carefully sculpted manicured and painted fingers and toes! Women of 50 are supposed to be denizens of female beauty and gloriously youthful personalities but still look like they're effortlessly 50!
it's enough to make a real 49 year old female weep from frustration!
I feel ugly 90% of the time. I feel like a frumpy, double-chinned, wangy-eyed monster! It's true. I rarely FEEL beautiful. I grasp at the desire to change my size, my weight, my lifestyle, my eating habits, my self-worth like pick-up sticks! If you do one thing wrong - the whole lot crumbles and you lose.
Lots of people - including certain family members who shall remain nameless - all try to inspire me to taking control of my "out of control" life, reminding me of my "responsibilities" to ensure that my weight remains in a healthy range and not become a slack-arsed blob hell-bent on dying from the familial blight of heart disease.
It's easy to cop out of course and therein lies the fundamental problem. Too much of my world is consumed with physical appearance as "THE" sign of health and prosperity! Too much of my world - like the world of my younger sisters - is consumed with the fatal disease of caring too much about the packaging and not nearly enough about the woman underneath.
Thing is...that woman underneath knows this so focuses most of her aspirations to being recognised for her packaging rather than her gifts, talents and strengths - many of which she's barely been able to identify within herself! This sad fact is due to nearly 40+ years of being misdirected in her attention to that packaging requirement.
I'd love to "lose weight" and be considered "healthy" but it kinda means that food becomes the Enemy. I have to corral it, infuse it with powers it shouldn't have; make it an agonising fight to the kilo.
At 49 - food should be my friend and ally. It should give me energy and a health fuelled life, full of joy. Eating should be something so pleasurable and sensual, that it must be savoured at all times, alone or with friends (and lovers).
At 49 - food should be something that I enjoy. But I do and I don't and I can't. My body - the body that is lumpy, bumpy and determinedly pudgy reminds me daily that *I* am a failure at being a woman even when my intelligence refuses to acknowledge such nonsense. I love food too much so my culture would have me know. I love the "wrong" foods according to the skinny celebrity nutritionists trolled out for current affairs programs. If they are so bloody wrong I ask you - why aren't there health warnings on the packets?
This is the war with which I live every day. My obvious "inability" to curb my female fatness and my desire to eat what I like usurps my theoretical acceptance that who *I* am is not defined by my appearance.
If health is the objective of eating then why is it so difficult? Why is eating so fucking HARD to get "right". Why do we need so many educational programs and tips, and points and "easy ways" to "improve" our eating habits? Why must food become such an enemy for the middle aged frumpy female when the real crux of the problem lies not with food but with society's obsessions with physical appearance!
Women in their middle years must be cut some slack. We need to be given a round of applause for our achievements, our intelligence, our Selves. We've raised kids, looked after others, nurtured, sacrificed, studied, learned, educated ourselves, given, travelled, exercised our rights as human beings. We've generated business, made profits, worked, invented, adopted technology, won races, run governments. We've designed, lifted the game, challenged stereotypes and loved with passion and vigour.
Instead - we are barrelled for our muffin tops and spare tyres and for what we put into our mouths. We're made to feel like unmitigated failures because we aren't the BMI of Beyonce or Madonna! Worse - we feel invisible because we aren't considered beautiful or desirable anymore!
It all really does have to stop!
I'm having toast....with margarine and jam! So what of it?
Wednesday, April 27, 2011
How I feel about the Opera House now that I've seen it
Sydney Opera House.
For the past 30 years or so, it's been this iconic photograph for me. Not quite representative of my notions of Australia as a nation but accepted as a "National Symbol" nonetheless.
SOH is a postcard; a marker of Aussie superiority in all things just a "little-bit-out-there". It has appeared to be an aloof, austere and stand-offish kind of place reserved for those with money and elitist sensibilities.
For me, it was always two dimensional and tiny in photos. Sure! There was a sense of the building being "big" but in photos you never quite know "how big" do you? It was of course, a thing of beauty but sort of unearthly and unreal (in the not real sense of that term).
This Easter I got to see Sydney Harbour and the Opera House up close and personal for the very first time. Describing my reaction to and sense of this place though is somewhat difficult. Initially, I was more excited by the Harbour Bridge than I was about the Grand Old Dame across the harbour.
Still, seeing SOH for the first time "live" from across the harbour, on the lawn under the bridge at twilight was pretty awesome and inspirational to say the least. Sydney was lighting up before my eyes as the night sky grew darker. The awesome and mystical spectacle of the birds soaring above the bridge, under-lit by the bridge lights, making them appear like bobbing embers; surreal, strange. startling was what mainly drew my attention. But, the Grand Old Dame was furnishing her sails with lovely lights and soon appeared like a holographic postcard of Sydney at night - all that alluring etherealness. A life-size postcard to me even then though, but I stood there watching her with a growing sense of wonderment of the beauty of the building and a pull in the soul to go be there, to be under the sails and inside 'her' precinct.
Visiting SOH on the Saturday afternoon in the drizzling rain was again a different experience to what I expected. After romantic notions of her elusiveness and beauty ebbed, seeing this iconic building up close took on industrial sensibilities. It felt like it was still "Under Construction", the granite walls and forecourts all seemed very prosaic, practical and understated now. Perhaps it was the grey skies and interminable drizzle, but she felt like she was just piles of cement, bathroom tiles and textured pink granite. Quixotic, given her propensity to be so... so... billowy in photos
The grand sails, majestic as they are in photos, seemed somehow slightly "ordinary" as if the SOH was something understated and utilitarian rather than out of reach and elitist. There was something earthy about the place, a sense of more proletariat than bourgeoisie; a fecund, prosaic and down-to-earth grandeur rather than ethereal and sublime.
Being up close to the Opera House was quite, quite different to the sense I had of her in photos. In photos and on television, she glows like a spectre of transcendence, gloriously lit and wondrous. Standing on her steps, she seemed rather understated, like a stately and dignified dowager Aunt. I'd always imagined her being so much more an elusive "Prima Donna" than an approachable "Dowager" myself!
She is admirable though.
Superbly, wonderfully admirable.
My friend, MT and I did the basic tour. My legs and feet were pretty much killing me by now given the steps and hills I'm so not used to traversing on a regular basis. The tour of the Opera House included many, many more steps but we got a sneak peak at both the majestic concert hall and the understated impressiveness of the Opera Theatre.
There are other arena's too which we saw and admired.
The purple carpet was overwhelming.
The reflection of the harbour underneath her flared skirts of glass was divinely artistic.
But the thing that really got under my skin and made me love this building was how much she is about and for People. This is a building for The People. Regardless of age, colour, gender, race, religion or hairstyle, this building is a performing arts centre for the masses - however the masses choose to be or become. And there is pride in this fact. The SOH is yours, mine, ours, theirs and beyond. It is a building that epitomises the egalitarian values of artistic expression and accessibility to the theatres of every day life.
That we nearly "missed out" on achieving this building is a story all of its own. I am, however, remarkably satisfied by the experience of being there - and astonished that I found this building to be so much more....available...than I ever imagined.
For the past 30 years or so, it's been this iconic photograph for me. Not quite representative of my notions of Australia as a nation but accepted as a "National Symbol" nonetheless.
SOH is a postcard; a marker of Aussie superiority in all things just a "little-bit-out-there". It has appeared to be an aloof, austere and stand-offish kind of place reserved for those with money and elitist sensibilities.
For me, it was always two dimensional and tiny in photos. Sure! There was a sense of the building being "big" but in photos you never quite know "how big" do you? It was of course, a thing of beauty but sort of unearthly and unreal (in the not real sense of that term).
This Easter I got to see Sydney Harbour and the Opera House up close and personal for the very first time. Describing my reaction to and sense of this place though is somewhat difficult. Initially, I was more excited by the Harbour Bridge than I was about the Grand Old Dame across the harbour.
Still, seeing SOH for the first time "live" from across the harbour, on the lawn under the bridge at twilight was pretty awesome and inspirational to say the least. Sydney was lighting up before my eyes as the night sky grew darker. The awesome and mystical spectacle of the birds soaring above the bridge, under-lit by the bridge lights, making them appear like bobbing embers; surreal, strange. startling was what mainly drew my attention. But, the Grand Old Dame was furnishing her sails with lovely lights and soon appeared like a holographic postcard of Sydney at night - all that alluring etherealness. A life-size postcard to me even then though, but I stood there watching her with a growing sense of wonderment of the beauty of the building and a pull in the soul to go be there, to be under the sails and inside 'her' precinct.
Visiting SOH on the Saturday afternoon in the drizzling rain was again a different experience to what I expected. After romantic notions of her elusiveness and beauty ebbed, seeing this iconic building up close took on industrial sensibilities. It felt like it was still "Under Construction", the granite walls and forecourts all seemed very prosaic, practical and understated now. Perhaps it was the grey skies and interminable drizzle, but she felt like she was just piles of cement, bathroom tiles and textured pink granite. Quixotic, given her propensity to be so... so... billowy in photos
The grand sails, majestic as they are in photos, seemed somehow slightly "ordinary" as if the SOH was something understated and utilitarian rather than out of reach and elitist. There was something earthy about the place, a sense of more proletariat than bourgeoisie; a fecund, prosaic and down-to-earth grandeur rather than ethereal and sublime.
Being up close to the Opera House was quite, quite different to the sense I had of her in photos. In photos and on television, she glows like a spectre of transcendence, gloriously lit and wondrous. Standing on her steps, she seemed rather understated, like a stately and dignified dowager Aunt. I'd always imagined her being so much more an elusive "Prima Donna" than an approachable "Dowager" myself!
She is admirable though.
Superbly, wonderfully admirable.
My friend, MT and I did the basic tour. My legs and feet were pretty much killing me by now given the steps and hills I'm so not used to traversing on a regular basis. The tour of the Opera House included many, many more steps but we got a sneak peak at both the majestic concert hall and the understated impressiveness of the Opera Theatre.
There are other arena's too which we saw and admired.
The purple carpet was overwhelming.
The reflection of the harbour underneath her flared skirts of glass was divinely artistic.
But the thing that really got under my skin and made me love this building was how much she is about and for People. This is a building for The People. Regardless of age, colour, gender, race, religion or hairstyle, this building is a performing arts centre for the masses - however the masses choose to be or become. And there is pride in this fact. The SOH is yours, mine, ours, theirs and beyond. It is a building that epitomises the egalitarian values of artistic expression and accessibility to the theatres of every day life.
That we nearly "missed out" on achieving this building is a story all of its own. I am, however, remarkably satisfied by the experience of being there - and astonished that I found this building to be so much more....available...than I ever imagined.
Sunday, April 03, 2011
Information
There is a never-ending supply of information. It is neither static or fluid. Information resides. I don't think it does anything more than that. Resides.
It does change of course. Information is a collection of data. It's words, symbols, images, numeric scales. It's news I guess, in a sort of transient way. That transience is cached of course, so it isn't as transient and temporary as we might like to assume. Still, Information on the World Wide Web (WWW) has the smell of the ephemeral about it, sort of part elusive and mostly forgettable.
We talk of there being an Information Overload. A total bombardment to our psyches of bytes and bits of data that compresses and explodes our minds in simultaneous fashion. We are supposedly changing humanities neural perceptions of thought, thinking and doing through the use of our Informational tools - maybe!
David Allen of Getting Things Done fame, doesn't believe in Information Overloads. He is right I think. No one ever dies upon walking into a library which is replete with information.
The information we get from the web is not quite like books, however. Books usually have editors. This gives the information contained within a book a certain quality of credibility that is difficult for non-editors to refute.
Books on a shelf are also encapsulated. They're physical. They have boundaries. The information in them is emphatic and embodied.
Information from the WWW is jangling on the psyche. We pick at information from the web like a baboon picks at ticks. We seek, surf, scrutinise, taste or discard. We don't so much as read information as scan it for further scrutiny. There's no definition to it. There's links to links to new links to new Information
Knowing how to discern the nature of Information is becoming the skill de rigueur! To know how to tell if what's been purported has merit: to know how to sift through what is a possible truth and what is out and out fiction. This is the skill that is required of readers today. To just read without discernment is foolish and gullible. To read with an acute awareness for the potential veracity or none in what one is reading is becoming a requisite device in the cognitive toolkit.
Thought and opinion are as much on the readers bookshelf as is encyclopaedia. What one now needs to understand is that there still is no overload of Information - just that there is a plethora of crap through which to wade in order to find what it is you're looking for!
This probably happened in the past too - people were bombarded with leaflets and essays at the beginning of mass literacy! Many gullibly accepted what they read regardless too! That happens with the web even now.
It took nearly 10 years before I finally convinced people that sending me emails about some scandalous virus doing the rounds were an inefficient waste of my time - and theirs! Learning HOW to find out if those emails were indeed "true" is the key to utilising Information from the web in a useful way.
So reading isn't the same as it used to be. To read a book, it's sort of orderly; you read page 1, then page 2 and the thoughts all flow in sequential order pretty much! Reading and absorbing Information from the web is quite different. There's a sort of subconscious Occam's Razor in play within the psyche. If its boring, seems unintelligible, sounds crazy, isn't able to be verified, seems "wrong" somehow - it'll most likely go viral and thousands will accept it as the undeniable "truth".
If the Information on the web is indeed astutely edited, peer-reviewed, collectively agreed to, open to argument and discussion, it's likely going to just sit there on the web, cached for eternity, resembling a cyber version of my Dad's old Encyclopaedia Brittanica's on the bookshelf. Useful but decidedly prosaic and utilitarian, hardly likely to be anything but scanned when necessary by those who are looking for answers.
Hardly overload. Hardly transient.
It does change of course. Information is a collection of data. It's words, symbols, images, numeric scales. It's news I guess, in a sort of transient way. That transience is cached of course, so it isn't as transient and temporary as we might like to assume. Still, Information on the World Wide Web (WWW) has the smell of the ephemeral about it, sort of part elusive and mostly forgettable.
We talk of there being an Information Overload. A total bombardment to our psyches of bytes and bits of data that compresses and explodes our minds in simultaneous fashion. We are supposedly changing humanities neural perceptions of thought, thinking and doing through the use of our Informational tools - maybe!
David Allen of Getting Things Done fame, doesn't believe in Information Overloads. He is right I think. No one ever dies upon walking into a library which is replete with information.
The information we get from the web is not quite like books, however. Books usually have editors. This gives the information contained within a book a certain quality of credibility that is difficult for non-editors to refute.
Books on a shelf are also encapsulated. They're physical. They have boundaries. The information in them is emphatic and embodied.
Information from the WWW is jangling on the psyche. We pick at information from the web like a baboon picks at ticks. We seek, surf, scrutinise, taste or discard. We don't so much as read information as scan it for further scrutiny. There's no definition to it. There's links to links to new links to new Information
Knowing how to discern the nature of Information is becoming the skill de rigueur! To know how to tell if what's been purported has merit: to know how to sift through what is a possible truth and what is out and out fiction. This is the skill that is required of readers today. To just read without discernment is foolish and gullible. To read with an acute awareness for the potential veracity or none in what one is reading is becoming a requisite device in the cognitive toolkit.
Thought and opinion are as much on the readers bookshelf as is encyclopaedia. What one now needs to understand is that there still is no overload of Information - just that there is a plethora of crap through which to wade in order to find what it is you're looking for!
This probably happened in the past too - people were bombarded with leaflets and essays at the beginning of mass literacy! Many gullibly accepted what they read regardless too! That happens with the web even now.
It took nearly 10 years before I finally convinced people that sending me emails about some scandalous virus doing the rounds were an inefficient waste of my time - and theirs! Learning HOW to find out if those emails were indeed "true" is the key to utilising Information from the web in a useful way.
So reading isn't the same as it used to be. To read a book, it's sort of orderly; you read page 1, then page 2 and the thoughts all flow in sequential order pretty much! Reading and absorbing Information from the web is quite different. There's a sort of subconscious Occam's Razor in play within the psyche. If its boring, seems unintelligible, sounds crazy, isn't able to be verified, seems "wrong" somehow - it'll most likely go viral and thousands will accept it as the undeniable "truth".
If the Information on the web is indeed astutely edited, peer-reviewed, collectively agreed to, open to argument and discussion, it's likely going to just sit there on the web, cached for eternity, resembling a cyber version of my Dad's old Encyclopaedia Brittanica's on the bookshelf. Useful but decidedly prosaic and utilitarian, hardly likely to be anything but scanned when necessary by those who are looking for answers.
Hardly overload. Hardly transient.
Sunday, March 27, 2011
Body and Soul?
I just listened to the first audio file of a lecture series given by Professor Hugo Schwyzer of California USA. I shall probably listen to the rest in this particular series of recorded audio's around the topic of "Beauty and the Body in the European-American Tradition".
The topic introduces Plato's concept of Body and Mind (or Soul) being at odds. Plato contended that both the body and the soul were replete with desires but were often contradicting each other. The amorphous disembodiment of the Soul as a separate entity from the corporeal physical "Thing" which carried it, determined much of our Western Judeo-Christian historical perceptions of our Selves.
Professor Schwyzer wants his students to challenge this notion of our bodies and our minds being at odds with each other with the body being a sort of whipping-boy for its "shameful" needs and desires. He wants his students to come to a point where both mind and body are integrated into a Whole that is the Self.
It's a dangerous idea really. At least, I think it is! It means that a large proportion of Western Culture must undergo a shift in language and thought about beauty; and particularly about how much the physical body is subjected to in terms of denigration and idealism.
Only this morning I dropped the not-so-useful platitude, "Never judge a book by its cover" into a comment in Facebook. And there it was: (the comment was in relation to the idea that a young girl was "invisible" to other "because" of her looks and physical shape) there was my nod to the embedded ideology that the True person is not her physical body but that it is her essence or soul that are far more valuable and if only the other girls could "see" that! I had indefatigably bought into the common notion that the mind/soul part of a person are worth so much more than the physical body a person inhabits.
The body identifies us. The essence of who we are - our soul and our mind - are given outline and identity through the limitations of our physical self. Our bodies guarantee that we can be known in the world, that we exist. Our fingers, toes, noses and earlobes, eyes and girth all help to shape our relationships and our function on this planet as do our thoughts, ideas, personalities and temperaments. It all counts to making up the Self. We cannot be the thoughts, personalities, temperaments or creative beings we are without embodiment; not at least, in the corporeal sense of that term.
But let's be careful here!
Looking at what I just said, what did you immediately think?
Did you think that I was implying that a "lack" of beauty is to be empirically measured against an objective "standard"? Did you assume I was being shallow as to to subject young men and women to the torment of having to beat their bodies into a form that is "pleasing" to others? To what or who's standard?
I say no such thing. I am in fact saying that it is our current obsessions with standardised notions of what constitutes "beautiful" that is letting us all down. We are isolating our bodies as objects. We are capitulating to the notion that the body is inherently "bad" and therefore must be subdued - even extinguished - in order for our minds and souls to be freed to be our true selves!
This is where language lets me down. What I want to reiterate is that since listening to this lecture, I realise that we all deserve soooooo much more than platitudes about our bodies not being as important as essence, personality, soul, temperament, ephemeral being! My skin is every bit as much Me as what I think and the sum of my quirky idiosyncrasies which mark my unique nature.
This is about accepting the whole of myself instead of railing against my body out of a misconception that proclaims it's bad, unpleasant, unruly and "ugly".
Beauty exists. There are people for whom the aesthetic of the physical is a lovely, wonderful gift. We enjoy looking at and appreciating beauty. It is pleasurable and sensuous to admire something that pleases the eye.
Thing is, when I measure "my" body against the beliefs and perceptions I have about someone else's body, I'm doing my Self a disservice. I am not honouring myself nor am I loving myself. I even do the other person a disservice! I place them in an impossible place where my perception of their "perfection" makes them less human than me! They become objectified and I exude envy, which is not very fair on anyone.
There isn't anything less important about the body than there is about the mind or soul. We are people, complete with all our idiosyncratic personal tendencies, likes, dislikes along with a unique and identifiable shape with which we are endowed through nature and nurture.
Loving my body means defining a new language for myself. A language which is inclusive of everything that makes me unique as an individual. A healthy mind is a healthy body, is a healthy attitude, is a healthy relationship with others. It's not about grotesque, gorgeous, good and bad when it comes to my body. It's time I re-educated my instinctive Platonian good/evil thinking to a more wholistic mindset when it comes to thinking about my Self and others.
I am my body. I am my Self. I am.
Therefore "Beauty" not only refers to how healthy and cared for my body is, it also refers to how I think and feel about Life itself.
Therefore "Body" includes the thoughts I have which define my nature and ideological presence. My personality is as much the bodily "shape" I give to the world as my physical shape.
Therefore acceptance of other people as they are, becomes much more important.
The topic introduces Plato's concept of Body and Mind (or Soul) being at odds. Plato contended that both the body and the soul were replete with desires but were often contradicting each other. The amorphous disembodiment of the Soul as a separate entity from the corporeal physical "Thing" which carried it, determined much of our Western Judeo-Christian historical perceptions of our Selves.
Professor Schwyzer wants his students to challenge this notion of our bodies and our minds being at odds with each other with the body being a sort of whipping-boy for its "shameful" needs and desires. He wants his students to come to a point where both mind and body are integrated into a Whole that is the Self.
It's a dangerous idea really. At least, I think it is! It means that a large proportion of Western Culture must undergo a shift in language and thought about beauty; and particularly about how much the physical body is subjected to in terms of denigration and idealism.
Only this morning I dropped the not-so-useful platitude, "Never judge a book by its cover" into a comment in Facebook. And there it was: (the comment was in relation to the idea that a young girl was "invisible" to other "because" of her looks and physical shape) there was my nod to the embedded ideology that the True person is not her physical body but that it is her essence or soul that are far more valuable and if only the other girls could "see" that! I had indefatigably bought into the common notion that the mind/soul part of a person are worth so much more than the physical body a person inhabits.
The body identifies us. The essence of who we are - our soul and our mind - are given outline and identity through the limitations of our physical self. Our bodies guarantee that we can be known in the world, that we exist. Our fingers, toes, noses and earlobes, eyes and girth all help to shape our relationships and our function on this planet as do our thoughts, ideas, personalities and temperaments. It all counts to making up the Self. We cannot be the thoughts, personalities, temperaments or creative beings we are without embodiment; not at least, in the corporeal sense of that term.
But let's be careful here!
Looking at what I just said, what did you immediately think?
Did you think that I was implying that a "lack" of beauty is to be empirically measured against an objective "standard"? Did you assume I was being shallow as to to subject young men and women to the torment of having to beat their bodies into a form that is "pleasing" to others? To what or who's standard?
I say no such thing. I am in fact saying that it is our current obsessions with standardised notions of what constitutes "beautiful" that is letting us all down. We are isolating our bodies as objects. We are capitulating to the notion that the body is inherently "bad" and therefore must be subdued - even extinguished - in order for our minds and souls to be freed to be our true selves!
This is where language lets me down. What I want to reiterate is that since listening to this lecture, I realise that we all deserve soooooo much more than platitudes about our bodies not being as important as essence, personality, soul, temperament, ephemeral being! My skin is every bit as much Me as what I think and the sum of my quirky idiosyncrasies which mark my unique nature.
This is about accepting the whole of myself instead of railing against my body out of a misconception that proclaims it's bad, unpleasant, unruly and "ugly".
Beauty exists. There are people for whom the aesthetic of the physical is a lovely, wonderful gift. We enjoy looking at and appreciating beauty. It is pleasurable and sensuous to admire something that pleases the eye.
Thing is, when I measure "my" body against the beliefs and perceptions I have about someone else's body, I'm doing my Self a disservice. I am not honouring myself nor am I loving myself. I even do the other person a disservice! I place them in an impossible place where my perception of their "perfection" makes them less human than me! They become objectified and I exude envy, which is not very fair on anyone.
There isn't anything less important about the body than there is about the mind or soul. We are people, complete with all our idiosyncratic personal tendencies, likes, dislikes along with a unique and identifiable shape with which we are endowed through nature and nurture.
Loving my body means defining a new language for myself. A language which is inclusive of everything that makes me unique as an individual. A healthy mind is a healthy body, is a healthy attitude, is a healthy relationship with others. It's not about grotesque, gorgeous, good and bad when it comes to my body. It's time I re-educated my instinctive Platonian good/evil thinking to a more wholistic mindset when it comes to thinking about my Self and others.
I am my body. I am my Self. I am.
Therefore "Beauty" not only refers to how healthy and cared for my body is, it also refers to how I think and feel about Life itself.
Therefore "Body" includes the thoughts I have which define my nature and ideological presence. My personality is as much the bodily "shape" I give to the world as my physical shape.
Therefore acceptance of other people as they are, becomes much more important.
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
2011 and then some.
In memory of the vast numbers of people who have lost their lives in a series of astonishing natural disasters within the first three months of the year.
2011 - and then some.
Two thousand and eleven:
the number of waves that hit the shores
of Life
on this small blue planet:
the number of lives that waved
goodbye:
the number of questions that
churned in the minds of
the living:
the number of answers that
will forever remain
unknown.
Two thousand and eleven
wings on which prayers
will be hung.
Ten fold and then some,
will my tears wet these tattered grounds
as I pray.
Two thousand and eleven
litres of wet,
soaking our droughts
of yesterday like old dishcloths,
gloppy and fouled.
Two thousand and eleven
YouTube videos -
drawing pictures in miniature
of these lives;
tearing up screens
into which the informed helpless peer.
So sad,
so afraid,
so critical
are our souls as
two thousand and eleven -
ten fold,
and then some -
stay missing forever
at the threshold of the
Age of the Water Bearer.
2011 - and then some.
Two thousand and eleven:
the number of waves that hit the shores
of Life
on this small blue planet:
the number of lives that waved
goodbye:
the number of questions that
churned in the minds of
the living:
the number of answers that
will forever remain
unknown.
Two thousand and eleven
wings on which prayers
will be hung.
Ten fold and then some,
will my tears wet these tattered grounds
as I pray.
Two thousand and eleven
litres of wet,
soaking our droughts
of yesterday like old dishcloths,
gloppy and fouled.
Two thousand and eleven
YouTube videos -
drawing pictures in miniature
of these lives;
tearing up screens
into which the informed helpless peer.
So sad,
so afraid,
so critical
are our souls as
two thousand and eleven -
ten fold,
and then some -
stay missing forever
at the threshold of the
Age of the Water Bearer.
michelle
March 2011
March 2011
Tuesday, February 08, 2011
River Rise
I watched the river rise
and in its flow I saw,
the depth of natures glory
and her scathing violent flaw.
I watched the river rise,
it's gloating ripples fast,
encroaching, stultifying -
engorging what was past.
I watched the river rise.
My heart? It did but still
and fret within these caged ribs
for what lay sleepless nights until.
I watched the river rise
and gathering every wit
I ascertained its victory march
upon the Walmer gauge - ill lit.
I watched the river rise
and cowered, shrinking, as the streets
vomited black water forth
under wheels and sand and feet.
I watched the river rise.
These neighbours alive and well,
who in rescue came their remedy;
thus, our commune's heart did swell.
I watched the river rise.
Palpable and fierce -
the terror of its importune,
our collective labours pierced.
I watched the river rise.
Sense and sensing, emoting strong,
such wily fear with hospitality merged
to buffet that watery throng.
I watched the river rise
and in its wake appends
the rise of a large and kinder beast -
our community more strongly wends.
and in its flow I saw,
the depth of natures glory
and her scathing violent flaw.
I watched the river rise,
it's gloating ripples fast,
encroaching, stultifying -
engorging what was past.
I watched the river rise.
My heart? It did but still
and fret within these caged ribs
for what lay sleepless nights until.
I watched the river rise
and gathering every wit
I ascertained its victory march
upon the Walmer gauge - ill lit.
I watched the river rise
and cowered, shrinking, as the streets
vomited black water forth
under wheels and sand and feet.
I watched the river rise.
These neighbours alive and well,
who in rescue came their remedy;
thus, our commune's heart did swell.
I watched the river rise.
Palpable and fierce -
the terror of its importune,
our collective labours pierced.
I watched the river rise.
Sense and sensing, emoting strong,
such wily fear with hospitality merged
to buffet that watery throng.
I watched the river rise
and in its wake appends
the rise of a large and kinder beast -
our community more strongly wends.
M. Pitman
January 2011
Wimmera, Victoria Floods
January 2011
Wimmera, Victoria Floods
Sunday, January 30, 2011
How has the Internet changed the way you think?
In recent days I have stumbled on a treasure-trove of ideas and thoughts from some of the worlds eminent thinkers and captains of intellectual analysis. www.edge.org is a collaborative conversation based around a yearly topic posed by the editors , notably, John Brockman.
In 2010 the question above was posed and some 160 thinkers, artists, scientists, actors and dignitaries have written essays to probe this question in depth.
I thought I would add my own thoughts to this mix. Not because I consider myself equal amongst these people who have already given comment, but because the internet is MY tool for thinking, learning and doing many things in the everyday ordinariness that is my life.
The question is worthy of pondering by anyone with more than a passing interest in email, let alone virtual reality worlds such as Second Life or social networking platforms such as Facebook or Twitter. And my generation... the end of the Baby Boomers... are prime candidates to ask this question too. You see? It is MY generation who straddle the pre-internet and post-internet worlds who can answer this with any integrity. For those in Gen X and Gen Y - the internet is so pervasive a tool from their infancy that I believe they are already innately adjusted to its size and shape.
How has the internet changed the way *I* think? It's a bit like asking Cro-Magnon man how the spear changed the way he hunted?
Prior to 1995, any mention of the word "Internet" would have had me both intensely intrigued and simultaneously baffled. I vaguely knew of its existence but I did not understand it's implications or use. Our family got our first computer in February of 1996. My children were little and they were the focus of my entire life at that point. I was an exhausted mother and wife, crabby and lacking in the stimulative intellectual environments I have always craved.
I thought in black and white for the most part. I was a Wimmera Girl, a Lutheran, a Mother, a Wife. My husband owned a small business and we produced things and sold them to people who wanted them. Life was mundane. Ideas were only useful if they produced results or created something useful to others. Social interaction was limited to pre-existing friendships - also with similarly aged children of their own - and immediate family. Life for me at that time was conservative, fundamentalist and apart from the joy of watching my kids grow, quite depressing! I felt lonely and detached in many ways. I over-compensated by throwing myself into various voluntary positions in the local arts community and in my church. However, these never really did give me what I was seeking.
What was I really seeking? With hindsight I can see clearly what was missing in those days. Possibilities and Words. Together these two combine in the most magical way.
All my life, from the first memories I have of being able to think about the world around me, I have been seeking the magic kingdom of never-ending possibilities. Ideas are the spring board to possibilities. Words are the medium by which they are given life.
Intellectual critique and investigation into everything I didn't know I didn't know has been my heart's desire for a long, long time. From the time I was little, I used books as my tools to discover these possibilities. All my learning about things had until that point been from books. Family life in 1995 was wonderful on the surface but it was replete and without my books, I knew I would be on the brink of a black and foreboding malaise of the mind.
It was 1997 before my then partner, 'Baz' decided to put our family on the internet. Ostensibly this was to facilitate the running of our business. About the same time, I re-entered the workforce. My place of work was also connected to this vast strange world of emails and information on the World Wide Web (aka the 'Web'). I learned with faltering steps, how to start interacting with this awesome and amazing thing called "The Internet" and it's offspring "The Web".
I quickly discovered there was more to the internet than mere emails. Tentatively, I eyed message boards, seeking to find like minded others with whom to connect and exchange ideas with. At the time it scared the crap out of me... the thought of engaging with strangers whose faces could not be read or bodies seen was frightening and alien. I decided that I would "protect" myself by finding a message board of other females... mothers... with whom I could discuss things, in a general way.
My first real foray into social networking was through a little Australian message board for mums. Downundermums quickly became a second "home". It was here that my proclivities for words, text and the ability to type suddenly took on momentous importance. Here were women from the far reaches of my own nation who understood what it was like to be mothers to young children and yet still feel isolated, despite the strong sense of family. We all became firm friends. I still count many of them as my friends to this day.
My thinking grew outwards. I learned so much about the possibilities of the internet through this forum. I learned how to hunt down websites for factual information. I learned from these wise and strong women how to discern a "troll" and how to sense integrity in the information presented. I learned how to "emote" over electronic media - an important skill given there is no body language per se. More importantly, I learned that it is very very possible to love and deeply admire people you have never met in person and yet can be incredibly close to despite the distances. Never in my youth could I have imagined that having "pen-pals" in this way would become such an immediate and powerful means of connecting to others. Downundermums was my sanity saver.
13 years have past and the internet has become a critical tool in my everyday interactions with people. Even people I see regularly face to face, I "meet" with online as well. It's as if the internet adds a facet to the personality that isn't obvious in person. How a person interacts in text online can be very different from their physical persona. I've learned that how a person presents online is as multidimensional as the person face to face. There is a character and shape to their persona that is embedded within the syntax and semantics they use to express themselves. Facebook, for instance, is - quite frankly - a fascinating portrait of the simultaneous simplicity and complexity of human psychology.
With exploration into virtual worlds like Second Life, the advent of Google to search for what I want to know, the calls I can make across the globe using Skype, the networks I've formed through Facebook, the checking of hoaxes and spam emails using breakthechain.org and so on... the internet is both my pen, my paper, my resources toolkit, my encyclopaedia and my diary.
Thus, my thinking has changed. Dramatically.
I think through these fingers on the keyboard. Typing out my thoughts as they occur is both cathartic and energising. I "see" the world differently now. I see endless possibilities. Ideas ripple at every corner of my peripheral attention span. Everything is mutable, changeable, less solid and it's constantly metamorphosing into difference. Life feels fluid, hyper changeable and exciting viewed through this electronic window. The limits of the collective imagination are being pushed in all directions.
Once there was a time when I believed there were only two genders in the world. Now I understand that Gender is a purely personal perception and can't be pinned onto another person like a name-tag. There are scales of gender with a moving slider that can fall at any point across 4 dimensions! How freaky is that?
Once there was a time when I believed that information by experts was irrefutable. Now I understand that that same information can be queried by the masses en masse. How incredibly democratic (rightly or wrongly depending on the information in question) is that?
Once I never even knew that such a thing as a 10,000 year clock could exist but thanks to the World Wide Web - I know this is a fact!
Only this week, I have been able to seen incredibly detailed overhead photographic maps taken during our recent floods! This technology would have been considered far too fantastic even 10 years ago! Now through the connections I have with others online, I'm immediately able to access this information for myself! Incredible!
The internet is, at its weakest, the vilest of perpetrators for misinformation and depraved thinking. At its very best, it is a collaborative tool for humans to exchange the information which builds up and edifies for the collective good. It can be used to teach, to heal, to inform, to disseminate, to query, question, critique, amuse and yes... change. It isn't so much three dimensional as fractal in its audio-visual and psycho-social appeal.
The internet will change our antecedents in ways we can barely imagine right now. I for one am just glad I saw its birth and am able explore just a few of the infinite possibilities it creates through words, sounds, images and interaction. :)
In 2010 the question above was posed and some 160 thinkers, artists, scientists, actors and dignitaries have written essays to probe this question in depth.
I thought I would add my own thoughts to this mix. Not because I consider myself equal amongst these people who have already given comment, but because the internet is MY tool for thinking, learning and doing many things in the everyday ordinariness that is my life.
The question is worthy of pondering by anyone with more than a passing interest in email, let alone virtual reality worlds such as Second Life or social networking platforms such as Facebook or Twitter. And my generation... the end of the Baby Boomers... are prime candidates to ask this question too. You see? It is MY generation who straddle the pre-internet and post-internet worlds who can answer this with any integrity. For those in Gen X and Gen Y - the internet is so pervasive a tool from their infancy that I believe they are already innately adjusted to its size and shape.
How has the internet changed the way *I* think? It's a bit like asking Cro-Magnon man how the spear changed the way he hunted?
Prior to 1995, any mention of the word "Internet" would have had me both intensely intrigued and simultaneously baffled. I vaguely knew of its existence but I did not understand it's implications or use. Our family got our first computer in February of 1996. My children were little and they were the focus of my entire life at that point. I was an exhausted mother and wife, crabby and lacking in the stimulative intellectual environments I have always craved.
I thought in black and white for the most part. I was a Wimmera Girl, a Lutheran, a Mother, a Wife. My husband owned a small business and we produced things and sold them to people who wanted them. Life was mundane. Ideas were only useful if they produced results or created something useful to others. Social interaction was limited to pre-existing friendships - also with similarly aged children of their own - and immediate family. Life for me at that time was conservative, fundamentalist and apart from the joy of watching my kids grow, quite depressing! I felt lonely and detached in many ways. I over-compensated by throwing myself into various voluntary positions in the local arts community and in my church. However, these never really did give me what I was seeking.
What was I really seeking? With hindsight I can see clearly what was missing in those days. Possibilities and Words. Together these two combine in the most magical way.
All my life, from the first memories I have of being able to think about the world around me, I have been seeking the magic kingdom of never-ending possibilities. Ideas are the spring board to possibilities. Words are the medium by which they are given life.
Intellectual critique and investigation into everything I didn't know I didn't know has been my heart's desire for a long, long time. From the time I was little, I used books as my tools to discover these possibilities. All my learning about things had until that point been from books. Family life in 1995 was wonderful on the surface but it was replete and without my books, I knew I would be on the brink of a black and foreboding malaise of the mind.
It was 1997 before my then partner, 'Baz' decided to put our family on the internet. Ostensibly this was to facilitate the running of our business. About the same time, I re-entered the workforce. My place of work was also connected to this vast strange world of emails and information on the World Wide Web (aka the 'Web'). I learned with faltering steps, how to start interacting with this awesome and amazing thing called "The Internet" and it's offspring "The Web".
I quickly discovered there was more to the internet than mere emails. Tentatively, I eyed message boards, seeking to find like minded others with whom to connect and exchange ideas with. At the time it scared the crap out of me... the thought of engaging with strangers whose faces could not be read or bodies seen was frightening and alien. I decided that I would "protect" myself by finding a message board of other females... mothers... with whom I could discuss things, in a general way.
My first real foray into social networking was through a little Australian message board for mums. Downundermums quickly became a second "home". It was here that my proclivities for words, text and the ability to type suddenly took on momentous importance. Here were women from the far reaches of my own nation who understood what it was like to be mothers to young children and yet still feel isolated, despite the strong sense of family. We all became firm friends. I still count many of them as my friends to this day.
My thinking grew outwards. I learned so much about the possibilities of the internet through this forum. I learned how to hunt down websites for factual information. I learned from these wise and strong women how to discern a "troll" and how to sense integrity in the information presented. I learned how to "emote" over electronic media - an important skill given there is no body language per se. More importantly, I learned that it is very very possible to love and deeply admire people you have never met in person and yet can be incredibly close to despite the distances. Never in my youth could I have imagined that having "pen-pals" in this way would become such an immediate and powerful means of connecting to others. Downundermums was my sanity saver.
13 years have past and the internet has become a critical tool in my everyday interactions with people. Even people I see regularly face to face, I "meet" with online as well. It's as if the internet adds a facet to the personality that isn't obvious in person. How a person interacts in text online can be very different from their physical persona. I've learned that how a person presents online is as multidimensional as the person face to face. There is a character and shape to their persona that is embedded within the syntax and semantics they use to express themselves. Facebook, for instance, is - quite frankly - a fascinating portrait of the simultaneous simplicity and complexity of human psychology.
With exploration into virtual worlds like Second Life, the advent of Google to search for what I want to know, the calls I can make across the globe using Skype, the networks I've formed through Facebook, the checking of hoaxes and spam emails using breakthechain.org and so on... the internet is both my pen, my paper, my resources toolkit, my encyclopaedia and my diary.
Thus, my thinking has changed. Dramatically.
I think through these fingers on the keyboard. Typing out my thoughts as they occur is both cathartic and energising. I "see" the world differently now. I see endless possibilities. Ideas ripple at every corner of my peripheral attention span. Everything is mutable, changeable, less solid and it's constantly metamorphosing into difference. Life feels fluid, hyper changeable and exciting viewed through this electronic window. The limits of the collective imagination are being pushed in all directions.
Once there was a time when I believed there were only two genders in the world. Now I understand that Gender is a purely personal perception and can't be pinned onto another person like a name-tag. There are scales of gender with a moving slider that can fall at any point across 4 dimensions! How freaky is that?
Once there was a time when I believed that information by experts was irrefutable. Now I understand that that same information can be queried by the masses en masse. How incredibly democratic (rightly or wrongly depending on the information in question) is that?
Once I never even knew that such a thing as a 10,000 year clock could exist but thanks to the World Wide Web - I know this is a fact!
Only this week, I have been able to seen incredibly detailed overhead photographic maps taken during our recent floods! This technology would have been considered far too fantastic even 10 years ago! Now through the connections I have with others online, I'm immediately able to access this information for myself! Incredible!
The internet is, at its weakest, the vilest of perpetrators for misinformation and depraved thinking. At its very best, it is a collaborative tool for humans to exchange the information which builds up and edifies for the collective good. It can be used to teach, to heal, to inform, to disseminate, to query, question, critique, amuse and yes... change. It isn't so much three dimensional as fractal in its audio-visual and psycho-social appeal.
The internet will change our antecedents in ways we can barely imagine right now. I for one am just glad I saw its birth and am able explore just a few of the infinite possibilities it creates through words, sounds, images and interaction. :)
Saturday, January 01, 2011
sweeping cobwebs
It's a brand new year.
2011 sees my fifth year in this blog. 2010 bombed a bit for me in the writing game. I had little energy for much else other than work.
There's a few things I'd like to change of course as one usually does as we turn a calendar page to a "clean slate" so to speak.
Thing is I just want to clean up. At least for now. I've tidied house today and it's looking not too bad after the scuz and shambles of the past month or so. Again, I simply lacked the energy and drive to achieve much other than dragging my butt off to work every day. Weekends have been pretty much a casual slog through laundry and internet surfing and not much else.
There was a bright spot on my 2010 horizon for awhile but he has faded, somewhat, into a genteel, soft focus, tender-hearted memory. I shall always be fond of Bear and hope to remain his dear friend through the ensuing years.
2011 ushers in hopes of new horizons both within and without. I may have spent today cleaning up the house - even the cobwebs from the front door - but next and most importantly will be the process of cleaning up internal spaces, both in the physical realm and also in the psychological realm.
I'm tired of lumbering along with heavy thoughts. This will be a year of hard work - mostly on my inner bean. It will be a year of lighting the inner fires of joy and laughter and changing landscapes of the heart and mind (and maybe a few physical landscapes as well here and there :)).
2011 sees my fifth year in this blog. 2010 bombed a bit for me in the writing game. I had little energy for much else other than work.
There's a few things I'd like to change of course as one usually does as we turn a calendar page to a "clean slate" so to speak.
Thing is I just want to clean up. At least for now. I've tidied house today and it's looking not too bad after the scuz and shambles of the past month or so. Again, I simply lacked the energy and drive to achieve much other than dragging my butt off to work every day. Weekends have been pretty much a casual slog through laundry and internet surfing and not much else.
There was a bright spot on my 2010 horizon for awhile but he has faded, somewhat, into a genteel, soft focus, tender-hearted memory. I shall always be fond of Bear and hope to remain his dear friend through the ensuing years.
2011 ushers in hopes of new horizons both within and without. I may have spent today cleaning up the house - even the cobwebs from the front door - but next and most importantly will be the process of cleaning up internal spaces, both in the physical realm and also in the psychological realm.
I'm tired of lumbering along with heavy thoughts. This will be a year of hard work - mostly on my inner bean. It will be a year of lighting the inner fires of joy and laughter and changing landscapes of the heart and mind (and maybe a few physical landscapes as well here and there :)).
Friday, December 10, 2010
Seismic Shifts and Wikileaks
Julian Assange.
His name is everywhere!
Literally, everywhere!
He's on the tele! He's all over the internet. He's taking up headline space in the papers.
Facebook, Twitter, blogs and Youtube is going gang busters as the World scrambles for opinion, history, re-framing, defamation, and everything else in between.
Now, for the purposes of this particular blog post, I make the following disclaimer. The current rape case/s before the courts in Europe alleged to involved Mr Assange are not the focus of this post. Rape is a very serious crime. I do not condone it. However, I also do not necessarily know if Julian is either guilty or innocent. Under the law of most countries, he is currently innocent until he has been PROVEN guilty (forgive my shouting at you - emphasis etc).
Okay enough said on that particular conundrum.
There appears to have been some kind of seismic shift under the tectonic plates that social and political 'normality' have hitherto been built upon. The populaces living under regimes - which we have long accepted with laissez faire despondency - as being despotic and cruel, are fuming and foaming at their proverbial bits; defying the arrogance of those who have held power for far too long at the expense of liberty and the right to opine freely.
Wikileaks for all its possible naivety has given current major governments - both despotic and moderate - The Bird! You know? Middle finger extended upwards while all the others point down? That one!
It's about time! When a government decides that "Free speech" is a luxury only for those who have the currency (financial as well as social), to tweak things to their advantage... then its time for whistleblowers to go to town and blow, blow, blow!
There will probably be a whole slew of whistleblower sites springing up on the net from here on in. I haven't taken too much notice of the whole USA cables leak debacle, but it does seem they're being aired in the media on a pretty regular basis.
It is embarrassing to be caught out with your dirty little secret. But, if that dirty little secret is affecting hundreds of thousands of people around the world...it's not so little anymore. It's a collective - global - problem and one we all have to face and deal with.
Julian Assange has struck a mighty blow to American hubris and of course the government's not happy! More and more, America's empiricist brand of politics is being whittled away fiscally, socially and politically. People, collectively - if not necessarily individually - are not gong to remain tolerant of the kind of government that interferes, lies, abuses trust or lacks integrity anymore.
But the good thing - if there is one - is that the Middle East is changing before our very eyes. Well educated, savvy and intelligent men AND women have been armed with the information they needed to "prove" that what they want is not what their respective powers are offering. The force of change occurring before our very eyes cannot be underestimated.
As I watch the riots and bloody revolutions taking place in countries I've never been to, it seems to me that people are ruthlessly beginning to model the past subversive styles of their governments. Whilst it is true that Facebook, Wikileaks and the Web itself did not create these revolutions, it is certainly true that they have served to fuel them.
The Web is creating Wild Governments of its own. There are Cyber Tribal communities on the web now. They're becoming organised, politically savvy, and even militant and/or as Machiavellian as their geographically placed governments.
These are cyber tribes are made up of many cultures and even languages, but all the individuals within hold certain tenets to be of especially important value - regardless of any actual law for or against these tenets. These cyber communities are forming their own "laws" and "jurisdictions" across the globe and becoming 'as if' they were nations in their own right. To me it seems that the one overriding factor common to many of these communities is the infallible right to free expression of personal thought and idea.
This may prove to be of grave concern in the future if the pendulum swings too far towards nihilistic and/or anarchic individualism. Still, I have noticed that the Web appears to be creating a social imperative which implies that everyone is "entitled" to the right to express him or her self as he or she sees fit.
Governments, particularly despotic ones, don't like this notion at all. Hence, the bloodbaths we are witnessing all too frequently on our televisions and computer screens!
Perhaps national boundaries, long drawn on printed maps and hung on walls are going to be redrawn; this time, in the cloud?
Where will the lines be drawn to confine those of like beliefs and perspectives? Politically, this will be almost impossible to control. Socially it will be as ephemeral and quixotic as the individuals making up the cyber tribes.
I don't yet know - nor can I foresee - how this could play out in practise, but already it seems to me that cyber-social connectivity is creating a sort of Diaspora from geography to ideography.
I sort of feel as if the Julian Assange/Wikileaks story may perhaps mark the beginning of this seismic shift in human social and political history.
As always, time will tell.
His name is everywhere!
Literally, everywhere!
He's on the tele! He's all over the internet. He's taking up headline space in the papers.
Facebook, Twitter, blogs and Youtube is going gang busters as the World scrambles for opinion, history, re-framing, defamation, and everything else in between.
Now, for the purposes of this particular blog post, I make the following disclaimer. The current rape case/s before the courts in Europe alleged to involved Mr Assange are not the focus of this post. Rape is a very serious crime. I do not condone it. However, I also do not necessarily know if Julian is either guilty or innocent. Under the law of most countries, he is currently innocent until he has been PROVEN guilty (forgive my shouting at you - emphasis etc).
Okay enough said on that particular conundrum.
There appears to have been some kind of seismic shift under the tectonic plates that social and political 'normality' have hitherto been built upon. The populaces living under regimes - which we have long accepted with laissez faire despondency - as being despotic and cruel, are fuming and foaming at their proverbial bits; defying the arrogance of those who have held power for far too long at the expense of liberty and the right to opine freely.
Wikileaks for all its possible naivety has given current major governments - both despotic and moderate - The Bird! You know? Middle finger extended upwards while all the others point down? That one!
It's about time! When a government decides that "Free speech" is a luxury only for those who have the currency (financial as well as social), to tweak things to their advantage... then its time for whistleblowers to go to town and blow, blow, blow!
There will probably be a whole slew of whistleblower sites springing up on the net from here on in. I haven't taken too much notice of the whole USA cables leak debacle, but it does seem they're being aired in the media on a pretty regular basis.
It is embarrassing to be caught out with your dirty little secret. But, if that dirty little secret is affecting hundreds of thousands of people around the world...it's not so little anymore. It's a collective - global - problem and one we all have to face and deal with.
Julian Assange has struck a mighty blow to American hubris and of course the government's not happy! More and more, America's empiricist brand of politics is being whittled away fiscally, socially and politically. People, collectively - if not necessarily individually - are not gong to remain tolerant of the kind of government that interferes, lies, abuses trust or lacks integrity anymore.
But the good thing - if there is one - is that the Middle East is changing before our very eyes. Well educated, savvy and intelligent men AND women have been armed with the information they needed to "prove" that what they want is not what their respective powers are offering. The force of change occurring before our very eyes cannot be underestimated.
As I watch the riots and bloody revolutions taking place in countries I've never been to, it seems to me that people are ruthlessly beginning to model the past subversive styles of their governments. Whilst it is true that Facebook, Wikileaks and the Web itself did not create these revolutions, it is certainly true that they have served to fuel them.
The Web is creating Wild Governments of its own. There are Cyber Tribal communities on the web now. They're becoming organised, politically savvy, and even militant and/or as Machiavellian as their geographically placed governments.
These are cyber tribes are made up of many cultures and even languages, but all the individuals within hold certain tenets to be of especially important value - regardless of any actual law for or against these tenets. These cyber communities are forming their own "laws" and "jurisdictions" across the globe and becoming 'as if' they were nations in their own right. To me it seems that the one overriding factor common to many of these communities is the infallible right to free expression of personal thought and idea.
This may prove to be of grave concern in the future if the pendulum swings too far towards nihilistic and/or anarchic individualism. Still, I have noticed that the Web appears to be creating a social imperative which implies that everyone is "entitled" to the right to express him or her self as he or she sees fit.
Governments, particularly despotic ones, don't like this notion at all. Hence, the bloodbaths we are witnessing all too frequently on our televisions and computer screens!
Perhaps national boundaries, long drawn on printed maps and hung on walls are going to be redrawn; this time, in the cloud?
Where will the lines be drawn to confine those of like beliefs and perspectives? Politically, this will be almost impossible to control. Socially it will be as ephemeral and quixotic as the individuals making up the cyber tribes.
I don't yet know - nor can I foresee - how this could play out in practise, but already it seems to me that cyber-social connectivity is creating a sort of Diaspora from geography to ideography.
I sort of feel as if the Julian Assange/Wikileaks story may perhaps mark the beginning of this seismic shift in human social and political history.
As always, time will tell.
Sunday, September 26, 2010
Walk a little more
bone ache in my heart
i've lost the candour of my youth
emotional resonance is difficult
I just want
to
walk a little more
thin down mortal flesh
fatten bank accounts
and lose the blackened fog
I just want
to
walk a little more
break down mental barrier
create a finer future ageing
love ignores inspired invisibility
I just want
to
walk a little more
i've lost the candour of my youth
emotional resonance is difficult
I just want
to
walk a little more
thin down mortal flesh
fatten bank accounts
and lose the blackened fog
I just want
to
walk a little more
break down mental barrier
create a finer future ageing
love ignores inspired invisibility
I just want
to
walk a little more
Sunday, September 05, 2010
Why I culled my blogroll and other overloads
Some weeks ago, I decided to check my blogroll over at bloglines.com
Ugh!
I used to read approximately 20 + blogs on a regular basis. All of them entertained, inspired, intrigued, or taught me something.
Then I think I must have got RSS as in "Reading Sucks Syndrome" or something because I started letting my blog roll languish. The more prolific bloggers - generally those who do it to make a buck - were left unread for a few weeks.
When I went back recently to check them out - I found over 200 + posts to chug through. Needless to say - I simply baulked at that and decided then and there to stop the rss feeds on many of these formerly beloved blogs.
The amount of words generated every day on the net must be fast exceeding the word count of all the printed books in libraries around the world. That's every day! Day after day! The sheer volume of ideas, thoughts and musings must be enough to make God cringe and want to have something very strong to drink before getting out of bed! Luckily for Him, all these words don't count for prayers for "something" or he'd be right tetchy - I know I would be! I know what its like to live with demanding children eh?
Even so, publishing is obviously changing at a rate of knots that must have book editors in a flurry. Tapping into good writing is like mining a reef for gold. Much of it out there is mere Fool's Gold. Blogs are the driving force for this massive rate of change in publishing and for the emergence of new writing; new writers.
Thing is - blogging still doesn't quite have the credibility of books yet. At least not in my experience. Blogging is still considered introspective and self-indulgent. Much of the blogging world is just that - this blog a case in point! There are some damned fine writers though out there in bloggers land. Finding them requires the patience of a digger in a gold rush.
I had to cull the brilliant minds of many bloggers from my rss feed simply because I was becoming overwhelmed with the obligation to keep up with their word count. Their ideas still sway me, but there's only so much of my attention to go around and right now - that attention is being pulled in about 50 different directions and quite a lot of them are NOT online with at least two fairly major online ones which are time and focus consuming to the nth degree.
Blogging isn't going to go out of style anytime soon. At least I'm guessing so! The blogs come and they go. Some wax and wane like my own poor sorry excuse for a blog. Other blogs will stand the test of time and become like books in libraries with a long-standing value that exceeds their original purchase price. Other blogs will simply have to go by the way in my feed reader because I just don't have the attention span for them anymore.
Publishing gone transitory and ephemeral I suppose.
Word count overload. I'm as guilty of it as anyone. I don't do writing sparely. I write to please myself and given my aspirational literary snobbery - I'm wordy in the extreme. I shall forthwith not be offended if I discover that no one is reading my blog anymore because of sheer overload elsewhere.
Will the "Good Writers" of the future be as wordy - as prolific? I suspect not. I honestly think that the Good Writers of the future will say what is profound, meaningful and relevant without the word count overload. The rest of us will simply blog - for our own purposes.
Ugh!
I used to read approximately 20 + blogs on a regular basis. All of them entertained, inspired, intrigued, or taught me something.
Then I think I must have got RSS as in "Reading Sucks Syndrome" or something because I started letting my blog roll languish. The more prolific bloggers - generally those who do it to make a buck - were left unread for a few weeks.
When I went back recently to check them out - I found over 200 + posts to chug through. Needless to say - I simply baulked at that and decided then and there to stop the rss feeds on many of these formerly beloved blogs.
The amount of words generated every day on the net must be fast exceeding the word count of all the printed books in libraries around the world. That's every day! Day after day! The sheer volume of ideas, thoughts and musings must be enough to make God cringe and want to have something very strong to drink before getting out of bed! Luckily for Him, all these words don't count for prayers for "something" or he'd be right tetchy - I know I would be! I know what its like to live with demanding children eh?
Even so, publishing is obviously changing at a rate of knots that must have book editors in a flurry. Tapping into good writing is like mining a reef for gold. Much of it out there is mere Fool's Gold. Blogs are the driving force for this massive rate of change in publishing and for the emergence of new writing; new writers.
Thing is - blogging still doesn't quite have the credibility of books yet. At least not in my experience. Blogging is still considered introspective and self-indulgent. Much of the blogging world is just that - this blog a case in point! There are some damned fine writers though out there in bloggers land. Finding them requires the patience of a digger in a gold rush.
I had to cull the brilliant minds of many bloggers from my rss feed simply because I was becoming overwhelmed with the obligation to keep up with their word count. Their ideas still sway me, but there's only so much of my attention to go around and right now - that attention is being pulled in about 50 different directions and quite a lot of them are NOT online with at least two fairly major online ones which are time and focus consuming to the nth degree.
Blogging isn't going to go out of style anytime soon. At least I'm guessing so! The blogs come and they go. Some wax and wane like my own poor sorry excuse for a blog. Other blogs will stand the test of time and become like books in libraries with a long-standing value that exceeds their original purchase price. Other blogs will simply have to go by the way in my feed reader because I just don't have the attention span for them anymore.
Publishing gone transitory and ephemeral I suppose.
Word count overload. I'm as guilty of it as anyone. I don't do writing sparely. I write to please myself and given my aspirational literary snobbery - I'm wordy in the extreme. I shall forthwith not be offended if I discover that no one is reading my blog anymore because of sheer overload elsewhere.
Will the "Good Writers" of the future be as wordy - as prolific? I suspect not. I honestly think that the Good Writers of the future will say what is profound, meaningful and relevant without the word count overload. The rest of us will simply blog - for our own purposes.
Sunday, August 22, 2010
The 2010 Australian "I couldn't give a f@#$%" Election
Well here we are.
It's the day after Election Day 2010 in Australia. We still don't know who is going to lead our nation into the next three years.
To all intents and purposes, it's being called a "hung parliament". This means that the few men - who claim to be independent of the major parties - are suddenly the King/Queen Makers rather than ineffectual voices amidst a majority rule government: perhaps the most powerful men in Australia.
The deals these men strike with the minority government by the end of this coming week will determine not only the Government of Australia but also the Prime Minister. It's highly possible, we'll be back at the polls to vote again within 18 months to two years - perhaps even less.
I took such little interest in both of the major options this time around. I barely followed both campaigns and when I did try to drum up some interest, it was almost immediately crushed by the boring platitudes and the quibbling.
The Australian Labor Party actually didn't do that badly this past three years all in all. Australia survived the first onslaught of the Global Financial Crisis and kept unemployment and interest rates manageable. The economy stumbled along with vast amounts of the massive surplus stockpiled by the excessively thrifty Howard Government spent by the Labor Rudd Government on infrastructure. This kept our economy ticking along pretty steadily and it was probably the most effective thing we could have done given the financial and economic debacles happening in Europe and the USA.
Sure! Labor had a few hiccups. Note the following:
The staggeringly stupid Broadband Filtering Plan proposed Stephen Conroy.
The very swift and Machiavellian removal of Kevin Rudd from office.
The painful and ineffectual monitoring of the Home Insulation program.
The backing down from the Emissions Trading Scheme.
The Mining Tax fiasco which could have been successful if Rudd hadn't been so blimmin' obstinate about negotiating with the mining companies on the terms.
There's probably tonnes more.
Even so, Labor still dragged Australia through the first three years of massive, world-wide global financial turbulence relatively unscathed. They really could have played that one up a lot more during the electoral campaign.
I guess Julia Gillard had no choice though, except to keep saying "Let's move forward". Because the previous 2.5 years had been the work of the very man she ousted from the leadership, she probably didn't feel comfortable spruiking about the things the party had accomplished under his leadership.
This is the burgeoning problem with Australian politics. It's more and more becoming about the person at the helm, rather than about the party itself and what it offers as real choice to the Australian people. I think this is what has disenfranchised the people of Australia in this election. The informal vote was the highest in history. People couldn't give a flying fig about either major party. Telling? Yes!
The people of Australia clearly demonstrated that this election campaign was so far removed from what we wanted to know, it seems that a fair majority voted passively. The "problem" with a two party preferred voting system is that we know that the preferences attributed by minor parties will flow to either major party depending on the deals struck during the election lead-up. It means that no matter which party you vote for, your vote is pretty much likely to end up with two - three if you count the Greens - choices, Labor or Liberal/National Party. There's no genuine way to cast a protesting vote so I gather some have opted to not cast a vote at all. The sad thing is that trying to wash our hands of our political parties doesn't really solve the problem effectively.
I, myself, deliberately voted for a minor party as my personal protest at the lack of useful choice available to me between the two major parties. However, I also know its a moot point, given that the preferences will flow to Labor or Liberal as the case may be. I still however, consciously objected to the lack of choice available. My vote wasn't informal, but I, like apparently many others, didn't give a flying F@#$% about either Labor or Liberal in this election. Both parties were unremarkable, practically indistinguishable (on the surface) from the other, and appeared to be more about public smear campaigns rather than telling me what they were genuinely and ethically prepared to do with my taxes.
The crapola dished out to us through the publicity campaigns on either side was a disastrous mish-mash of hyperbole, shit-faced tantrum throwing and outright fear-mongering. It bored me. It desanitised me to listening to real commentary. I could have cared less about the fact our PM was female, atheist, and not married to the man she is shacked up with! I could have cared less for the Opposition Leader's budgie-smuggler bathers, his 'christian values', his old-fashioned views about females, his climate scepticism or his polyphasic sleep experiment in the final hours of the election. It all means nothing to this country's future. Maybe.
There are issues out there in the real Australia that are crying out to be heard and its not all terrorists and immigrants in boats either!
For me personally, broadband infrastructure is begging. If Australians don't want their major cities clogged with even more burbs and ghetto's - then just as rail and road in the previous century opened up the nation - so with efficient and effective high speed broadband in this century. Filtering content within this infrastructure is just plain idiocy of the most asinine kind. The defence of free speech is still just as paramount.
And another thing...
If Julia Gillard had been serious about this election - and don't get me wrong, she's done exceptionally well to keep Labor in the running - she'd have told the Australian electorate about the stuff that the Labor team, together, had been able to achieve regardless of who was leader at the time. I may be naive on this score perhaps.
It sucks to have a hung parliament but it may also be exactly what Australia needs to manoeuvre through the very delicate waters of the rest of the GFC. It's possible that there's a bigger financial crash to come what with the Euro teetering on the edge: so what happens now will determine how well we cope with it, if that crisis eventuates. A hung parliament may be just what we need to shake us up and get proactive. It also may be a total disaster, which we brought upon ourselves with our "Couldn't be f@#$%" attitude.
The four or five independents whose doors are now wide open for "dialogue" with either potential PM will have a massive responsibility to demonstrate courageous wisdom along with a very large dose of ethical consideration for this nation as a whole. Short-term thinking cannot suffice. This has to be long-term stuff: stuff that resonates with positive vigour in 10, 20, 50 years from now.
I mean long after Iraq, Afghanistan, climate change argy-bargy and the internet as we presently know it.
Good luck to these men is all I say! It's going to be a tough gig, even if its also lucrative for their electorates notwithstanding.
It's the day after Election Day 2010 in Australia. We still don't know who is going to lead our nation into the next three years.
To all intents and purposes, it's being called a "hung parliament". This means that the few men - who claim to be independent of the major parties - are suddenly the King/Queen Makers rather than ineffectual voices amidst a majority rule government: perhaps the most powerful men in Australia.
The deals these men strike with the minority government by the end of this coming week will determine not only the Government of Australia but also the Prime Minister. It's highly possible, we'll be back at the polls to vote again within 18 months to two years - perhaps even less.
I took such little interest in both of the major options this time around. I barely followed both campaigns and when I did try to drum up some interest, it was almost immediately crushed by the boring platitudes and the quibbling.
The Australian Labor Party actually didn't do that badly this past three years all in all. Australia survived the first onslaught of the Global Financial Crisis and kept unemployment and interest rates manageable. The economy stumbled along with vast amounts of the massive surplus stockpiled by the excessively thrifty Howard Government spent by the Labor Rudd Government on infrastructure. This kept our economy ticking along pretty steadily and it was probably the most effective thing we could have done given the financial and economic debacles happening in Europe and the USA.
Sure! Labor had a few hiccups. Note the following:
The staggeringly stupid Broadband Filtering Plan proposed Stephen Conroy.
The very swift and Machiavellian removal of Kevin Rudd from office.
The painful and ineffectual monitoring of the Home Insulation program.
The backing down from the Emissions Trading Scheme.
The Mining Tax fiasco which could have been successful if Rudd hadn't been so blimmin' obstinate about negotiating with the mining companies on the terms.
There's probably tonnes more.
Even so, Labor still dragged Australia through the first three years of massive, world-wide global financial turbulence relatively unscathed. They really could have played that one up a lot more during the electoral campaign.
I guess Julia Gillard had no choice though, except to keep saying "Let's move forward". Because the previous 2.5 years had been the work of the very man she ousted from the leadership, she probably didn't feel comfortable spruiking about the things the party had accomplished under his leadership.
This is the burgeoning problem with Australian politics. It's more and more becoming about the person at the helm, rather than about the party itself and what it offers as real choice to the Australian people. I think this is what has disenfranchised the people of Australia in this election. The informal vote was the highest in history. People couldn't give a flying fig about either major party. Telling? Yes!
The people of Australia clearly demonstrated that this election campaign was so far removed from what we wanted to know, it seems that a fair majority voted passively. The "problem" with a two party preferred voting system is that we know that the preferences attributed by minor parties will flow to either major party depending on the deals struck during the election lead-up. It means that no matter which party you vote for, your vote is pretty much likely to end up with two - three if you count the Greens - choices, Labor or Liberal/National Party. There's no genuine way to cast a protesting vote so I gather some have opted to not cast a vote at all. The sad thing is that trying to wash our hands of our political parties doesn't really solve the problem effectively.
I, myself, deliberately voted for a minor party as my personal protest at the lack of useful choice available to me between the two major parties. However, I also know its a moot point, given that the preferences will flow to Labor or Liberal as the case may be. I still however, consciously objected to the lack of choice available. My vote wasn't informal, but I, like apparently many others, didn't give a flying F@#$% about either Labor or Liberal in this election. Both parties were unremarkable, practically indistinguishable (on the surface) from the other, and appeared to be more about public smear campaigns rather than telling me what they were genuinely and ethically prepared to do with my taxes.
The crapola dished out to us through the publicity campaigns on either side was a disastrous mish-mash of hyperbole, shit-faced tantrum throwing and outright fear-mongering. It bored me. It desanitised me to listening to real commentary. I could have cared less about the fact our PM was female, atheist, and not married to the man she is shacked up with! I could have cared less for the Opposition Leader's budgie-smuggler bathers, his 'christian values', his old-fashioned views about females, his climate scepticism or his polyphasic sleep experiment in the final hours of the election. It all means nothing to this country's future. Maybe.
There are issues out there in the real Australia that are crying out to be heard and its not all terrorists and immigrants in boats either!
For me personally, broadband infrastructure is begging. If Australians don't want their major cities clogged with even more burbs and ghetto's - then just as rail and road in the previous century opened up the nation - so with efficient and effective high speed broadband in this century. Filtering content within this infrastructure is just plain idiocy of the most asinine kind. The defence of free speech is still just as paramount.
And another thing...
If Julia Gillard had been serious about this election - and don't get me wrong, she's done exceptionally well to keep Labor in the running - she'd have told the Australian electorate about the stuff that the Labor team, together, had been able to achieve regardless of who was leader at the time. I may be naive on this score perhaps.
It sucks to have a hung parliament but it may also be exactly what Australia needs to manoeuvre through the very delicate waters of the rest of the GFC. It's possible that there's a bigger financial crash to come what with the Euro teetering on the edge: so what happens now will determine how well we cope with it, if that crisis eventuates. A hung parliament may be just what we need to shake us up and get proactive. It also may be a total disaster, which we brought upon ourselves with our "Couldn't be f@#$%" attitude.
The four or five independents whose doors are now wide open for "dialogue" with either potential PM will have a massive responsibility to demonstrate courageous wisdom along with a very large dose of ethical consideration for this nation as a whole. Short-term thinking cannot suffice. This has to be long-term stuff: stuff that resonates with positive vigour in 10, 20, 50 years from now.
I mean long after Iraq, Afghanistan, climate change argy-bargy and the internet as we presently know it.
Good luck to these men is all I say! It's going to be a tough gig, even if its also lucrative for their electorates notwithstanding.
Sunday, July 18, 2010
Awareness of Perception
In 1995 Seth Godin, marketing guru of the new Millenium, created, along with his team, a website called "Squidoo" with the intention of making available a place for the masses to report on what they knew about a particular subject through a "lens". Essentially a lens is a page of information about the subject. The metaphor of a "lens" to describe this information dissemination seems logical. On each page a user shares their knowledge with others in a singularly focused way.
Wikipedia does something similar. The many sharing with the many what it is they know about a subject. Filtering, capturing and distilling information is becoming a crucial skill in this age of the digital information highway.
But my question is - how do we know that what we know is actually what it is?
Much of what I read on the net is filtered through my own personal "lens" of perception. Some pieces of knowledge I take in and absorb, integrating them into a sort of personal encyclopaedia of "facts". I accept these as truths; often unquestioned. Other things I read, I discard and relegate to the informational rubbish tip called "Crap".
Regardless if the original information was correct or not, I take on board - or discard - stuff, which through my perceptions of its accuracy - or inaccuracy - is based in large part, on a part of me which is entirely unaware I'm filtering anything at all! I am pretty much unaware, most of the time, why I accept or discard what comes at me.
What I label as fit for the Crap Tip - others perceive as entirely a Truth to be imparted to the masses! What I label as Truth has the potential to be mocked as sheer lunacy by many.
No one can always have a handle on the true facts about everything, because, the fact is... truth is distorted much of the time, by the personal perceptions of those who impart it.
The only basis for establishing hard fact is through collective acknowledgement that a larger than usual number of perceptions from other individuals concur. Or is it?
Fact is - lots and lots of people tend to concur on stuff which is hardly ever likely to be a genuine hard-core "Truth". Not on the whole anyway! People are quite mad about adopting something as truth; stuff which is unlikely ever to be a genuinely real Truth - if indeed we could spot one of those and agree! For pities sake! It's hard enough defining the meaning of Truth let alone trying to explain this queer human habit of filtering things through perceptions rather than actually knowing things. Perception changes things. All the freaking time! This whole paragraph is written from my own perception about the nature of fact and truth eh?
It makes for a rather frightening future really. Given the huge amount of information now available to us, how will we learn to discern? How will we ever know that is actual and True - trustworthy? What kinds of perceptions am I developing that I am unable to drop or keep when I read or absorb information? How do I know from what I see and hear that which I need to accept as the Truth? What do I need to toss as dross into the Crap Tip? What must I laugh at, what can I action; which truth can I sell on to others?
It's a mind melt-down!
Indefatigably, I will have to continue to master the art of questioning my beliefs and learning how to discern what perceptions exist within me and if they are actually useful for determining a Truth from the information I'm exposed to everyday.
I think perhaps - and this is purely based on my perception - that in the future, it will be those who are aware of how and why they filter the information coming at them, who will be best placed to impart that information to the masses.
Anyone can write a Squidoo page on a topic; very few will be erudite and humble disseminators of true knowledge. Even fewer will be able to perceive the latter.
Wikipedia does something similar. The many sharing with the many what it is they know about a subject. Filtering, capturing and distilling information is becoming a crucial skill in this age of the digital information highway.
But my question is - how do we know that what we know is actually what it is?
Much of what I read on the net is filtered through my own personal "lens" of perception. Some pieces of knowledge I take in and absorb, integrating them into a sort of personal encyclopaedia of "facts". I accept these as truths; often unquestioned. Other things I read, I discard and relegate to the informational rubbish tip called "Crap".
Regardless if the original information was correct or not, I take on board - or discard - stuff, which through my perceptions of its accuracy - or inaccuracy - is based in large part, on a part of me which is entirely unaware I'm filtering anything at all! I am pretty much unaware, most of the time, why I accept or discard what comes at me.
What I label as fit for the Crap Tip - others perceive as entirely a Truth to be imparted to the masses! What I label as Truth has the potential to be mocked as sheer lunacy by many.
No one can always have a handle on the true facts about everything, because, the fact is... truth is distorted much of the time, by the personal perceptions of those who impart it.
The only basis for establishing hard fact is through collective acknowledgement that a larger than usual number of perceptions from other individuals concur. Or is it?
Fact is - lots and lots of people tend to concur on stuff which is hardly ever likely to be a genuine hard-core "Truth". Not on the whole anyway! People are quite mad about adopting something as truth; stuff which is unlikely ever to be a genuinely real Truth - if indeed we could spot one of those and agree! For pities sake! It's hard enough defining the meaning of Truth let alone trying to explain this queer human habit of filtering things through perceptions rather than actually knowing things. Perception changes things. All the freaking time! This whole paragraph is written from my own perception about the nature of fact and truth eh?
It makes for a rather frightening future really. Given the huge amount of information now available to us, how will we learn to discern? How will we ever know that is actual and True - trustworthy? What kinds of perceptions am I developing that I am unable to drop or keep when I read or absorb information? How do I know from what I see and hear that which I need to accept as the Truth? What do I need to toss as dross into the Crap Tip? What must I laugh at, what can I action; which truth can I sell on to others?
It's a mind melt-down!
Indefatigably, I will have to continue to master the art of questioning my beliefs and learning how to discern what perceptions exist within me and if they are actually useful for determining a Truth from the information I'm exposed to everyday.
I think perhaps - and this is purely based on my perception - that in the future, it will be those who are aware of how and why they filter the information coming at them, who will be best placed to impart that information to the masses.
Anyone can write a Squidoo page on a topic; very few will be erudite and humble disseminators of true knowledge. Even fewer will be able to perceive the latter.
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