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Vol 20 No 13

05 July 2010


 

  • EUREKA STREET TV

    Deep water sounds of an Indigenous mystic

    • Peter Kirkwood
    • 16 July 2010
    3 Comments

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  • MEDIA

    Polanski's art not greater than his crime

    • Binoy Kampmark
    • 16 July 2010
    6 Comments

    The decision by a Swiss judge not to extradite film director Roman Polanski to the US has again triggered the debate about how artists are treated by the law. The case has been running simultaneously to that of Russian musician. The parallels are striking.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Charity tourists find god in India

    • Tim Kroenert
    • 15 July 2010
    3 Comments

    Sydney filmmaker Claire McCarthy spent two months working among Mother Teresa's Missionaries of Charity in Calcutta. Like many Westerners with egalitarian pretensions, the characters in her film The Waiting City arrive in India bearing a tourist's naivety.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Nauru solution a dodgy deal

    • Susan Metcalfe
    • 15 July 2010
    20 Comments

    While many are concerned about returning to processing asylum seekers in poor Pacific countries, Nauru's caretaker president is eager to be involved. Australia should never again be engaged in dodgy deals with this Pacific neighbour. For Nauru, it's all about the money.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Burke, Wills and ... Rudd?

    • Brian Matthews
    • 14 July 2010
    6 Comments

    Burke and Wills have long since attained the kind of heroic status Australians seem inclined to assign to catastrophic failure. But perhaps, in mid 2010, we might see their expedition's story as being more about the strains, perils and transience of leadership.

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  • INTERNATIONAL

    World Cup a triumph, now South Africa must keep its head

    • David Holdcroft
    • 14 July 2010
    1 Comment

    Like many emerging societies, South Africa is a long way from being truly inclusive. The World Cup experience brought it much closer to that goal. Now it needs to ensure this progress is not undermined.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    The thirty good priests

    • Brian Doyle
    • 13 July 2010
    4 Comments

    For every greedy evil rapacious liar priest .. there are thirty great and subtle men .. Who wake alone quite early and don their vocations .. Willingly like a thorny endlessly tumultuous prayer

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  • INTERNATIONAL

    Morocco's queer uprising

    • James Dorsey
    • 13 July 2010
    6 Comments

    One Moroccan organisation for lesbians, transsexuals and homo- and bisexuals, estimates that some 5000 people have been jailed in Morocco or forced to emigrate because they are gay. Mithly, the Arab world's only gay magazine, hopes to steer the debate into calmer waters.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    MySuper's justified paternalism

    • Michael Mullins
    • 12 July 2010
    5 Comments

    Channelling people into a default superannuation fund could be compared with the indignity of income management. But MySuper is geared to protect the human dignity of Australians in retirement against their own indifference, and also commercial exploitation.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Election year mental health test

    • Simon Rice
    • 12 July 2010
    6 Comments

    Advocacy from the likes of esteemed psychiatrist Professor Patrick McGorry continues to highlight Australia's mental health system crisis. If Julia Gillard wants to lead on this issue, she will need to further the Coalition's $1.5 billion electoral commitment to mental health services.

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  • INTERNATIONAL

    East Timor a not-so-simple solution

    • Jack de Groot
    • 09 July 2010
    21 Comments

    Julia Gillard said 'people like my own parents who have worked hard all their lives can't abide the idea that others might get an inside track to special privileges'. Managing similar perceptions in East Timor, where there is a tide of resentment against Australia among parts of the population, will be a challenge.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    To Kill A Mockingbird and asylum seeker justice

    • Kerry Murphy
    • 09 July 2010
    11 Comments

    Atticus works within the system and hopes thereby to reform it. He wonders 'why reasonable people go stark raving mad when anything involving a Negro come up'. Many lawyers will understand the challenge of working for the unpopular 'other': just replace 'Negro' with asylum seeker, or Muslim women in burqas.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Toy Story 3's vision of heaven and hell

    • Adrian Phoon
    • 08 July 2010
    4 Comments

    The toys are brought to a landfill, where they are dragged towards an incinerator, a fiery pit equivalent to any vision of Hell confected by Dante. It's harrowing stuff for an animated feature, but you can never tell what the toys find more threatening: death itself or the despair of becoming obsolete.

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  • RELIGION

    The strengths and shortcomings of Church apologies

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 08 July 2010
    10 Comments

    Archbishop Denis Hart's letter of apology for sexual abuse by Catholic priests drew a variety of responses. Some expressed gratitude, others found it inadequate. The letter and responses invite broader reflection on the place of letters of apology by leaders of churches.

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  • INTERNATIONAL

    Not the Pacific Solution

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 07 July 2010
    27 Comments

    Julia Gillard insists that the centre in East Timor centre would be properly 'run, auspiced and structured'. For the Australian Government to ensure that such a centre respects the human dignity of asylum seekers will be difficult. Similar arrangements with Indonesia were not satisfactory.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    The life and death of Barry and Aristomenis

    • Gillian Bouras
    • 07 July 2010
    10 Comments

    When you love, you must be prepared to die another death before you die your own. Five minutes before 19-year-old Aristomenis died, he called in at his mother's place of work to tell her he thought the exam had gone well.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Remember SIEV X before waging war on boat people

    • Tony Kevin
    • 06 July 2010
    14 Comments

    Julia Gillard has invited people to say what they feel on the issue of how Australia should manage its borders. It's worth recalling what happened when an Australian Government last instructed its defence force to vigorously repel asylum-seeker boats.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Past the letterbox, to the cemetery

    • Susan Fealy and Jamie King-Holden
    • 06 July 2010
    1 Comment

    A cracked grey angel .. shadows a snatch of brown weeds .. in a Coke bottle. .. A marble stone reads: .. 'our loving son, died too young' .. he sleeps, snug in clay.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Gillard mining deal betrays the common good

    • Michael Mullins
    • 05 July 2010
    17 Comments

    Julia Gillard is expected to exercise moral authority because she was chosen by her party to work for the common good of the nation. Her agreement with major mining companies to take the sting out of the mining tax shows a poor start.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    World Cup bid looks to Australia's self-serving aid program

    • Evan Ellis
    • 05 July 2010
    14 Comments

    We assume aid is 'helping people'. But the 2006 White Paper on Australian Aid specified its purpose to help countries 'reduce poverty and achieve sustainable development, in line with Australia’s national interest'. We'd be mortified if a church agency came out with such a self-serving clause.

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