Vol 28 No 22

04 November 2018

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AUSTRALIA

Still a long way to go, period
- Yen-Rong Wong
- 16 November 2018
2 Comments
Uteruses, and in particular, periods, have long been used against menstruators — to malign, to marginalise, to make us feel lesser than. In ancient Greece, it was thought that the uterus (hysterika) was able to travel throughout the body, and that a wandering uterus was a sign of mental illness. The word hysteria has been used since then to minimise the severity of women’s mental health issues.
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AUSTRALIA

Australian sports need women off-field too
- Kirby Fenwick
- 16 November 2018
2 Comments
That this attitude persists at the executive level of arguably one of the biggest sporting organisations in the country despite the role women have played in the success of the game is quite damning. That it took a woman, or women, to change it is hardly surprising.
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AUSTRALIA

Elegy for Sisto Malaspina
- Binoy Kampmark
- 15 November 2018
2 Comments
What is so urgent here is not a sense of being morbid. Nor, in the main, was there even a vengeful note. This was unalloyed grief, unimpaired by manipulation and political exploitation.
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AUSTRALIA

Embracing moral squeamishness
- Andrew Hamilton
- 15 November 2018
10 Comments
What might be effective is to strengthen support within their own and the wider community in order to help vulnerable people understand themselves and the feelings that might drive them to paranoid ideas and violent action if left unattended. If that is moral squeamishness, it at least offers some hope of effectiveness.
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INTERNATIONAL

State of the death penalty in Southeast Asia
- Erin Cook
- 14 November 2018
2 Comments
With such a wide range of crimes under the death penalty banner, what will sentencing in the new Malaysia look like? And what timeline can be expected, given the government has a diverse suite of policy priorities for its first term.
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RELIGION

Seeking a plenary council fit for purpose
- Frank Brennan
- 14 November 2018
78 Comments
What we need is a listening and inclusive Church — a plenary council at which the clergy and the laity have a proper place at the table, at which the voices of the ‘rusted-on’ and the ‘cheesed-off’ Catholics are heard and at which the bishops are respectfully listening as much as speaking.
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CARTOON

Keeping the faith
- Fiona Katauskas
- 14 November 2018
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ARTS AND CULTURE

Enterprises begun, projects explored
- Denham Grierson
- 13 November 2018
4 Comments
It feels odd to be recycled, my atoms billions of years old, stretching back millennia. What adventures they have had, enterprises begun, projects explored, voyages completed.
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ARTS AND CULTURE

Visiting a different universe
- Na'ama Carlin
- 13 November 2018
12 Comments
It is difficult for us to consider the experiences of others; our worlds a bubble reflecting our movements, our desires. One Saturday, I entered the world of another. Here, I invite you to do the same.
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INTERNATIONAL

America's new hope found in diversity
- Jim McDermott
- 09 November 2018
3 Comments
The chaos of the last two years will almost certainly continue in the next two (see: current occupant, White House). So will the deep divides between parties and between regional and urban America. But this week Americans seemed to remind themselves that even when the light grows dim, the possibility of a better day never fully disappears.
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AUSTRALIA

Latham and Hanson's marriage of convenience
- Jeff Sparrow
- 08 November 2018
3 Comments
If we say the man's lost his mind, we must, in fairness, acknowledge that he possessed a mind to lose. Bizarre as the notion now sounds, Latham brought consider intellectual firepower to the Labor leadership. His deep commitment to free market policies meant his hostility to Hanson always came as much from the right as the left.
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AUSTRALIA

The politics of asylum-seeking children
- John Warhurst
- 08 November 2018
12 Comments
The government and the opposition are prevaricating and effectively delaying the positive outcome that many in the Australian public are crying out for. The time is ripe for action, but decisive policy movement is still absent.
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INTERNATIONAL

Have your democracy sausage and eat it too
- Catherine Marshall
- 08 November 2018
8 Comments
Something strange happens to the vote after it's been gifted to us. It's the most valuable thing when we don't possess it, and the most disposable when we do. Millions of Americans discovered this when a minority of voters who showed up to the polls in 2016 managed to elect that improbable candidate, Donald Trump.
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ECONOMICS

The shareholders shall inherit the earth
- David James
- 08 November 2018
1 Comment
So here is a question. Which are you? A customer, a shareholder, a worker, a citizen, or, well, a whole human being? If you answered 'customer' then congratulations, you are in line with contemporary economic orthodoxy, and boy, have we got a society for you. If you answered 'a human being' then that really is a problem, I'm afraid.
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CARTOON

Hitting the frog and toad
- Fiona Katauskas
- 07 November 2018
2 Comments
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AUSTRALIA

Nauru children: Why did we wait so long?
- Andrew Hamilton
- 03 November 2018
11 Comments
To distant observers the hesitation and delay are hard to understand. They ask how it is possible to look on idle and unmoved at children in despair when you are in a position to address the causes of their despair. What is it that enables us to pass by damaged children, untroubled? The answer may lie in the quality of our moral imagination.
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INTERNATIONAL

The frontlines of voter suppression in the US
- Erin Riley
- 02 November 2018
3 Comments
In a year when voter suppression has become a key tactic for Republicans' defense of their majorities in the house and senate, Prairie View is once again a perfect microcosm for voter suppression in the United States. Local officials have made it difficult for students to register, and restricted their opportunities to vote.
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INTERNATIONAL

Ireland's Brexit troubles
- Rachel Woodlock
- 02 November 2018
4 Comments
It is the ordinary people — the pensioners on trollies, the sick interminably waiting on ever-increasing lists, the patients being treated in understaffed hospitals — who will truly suffer from Brexit's immediate body shocks to an already frail healthcare system decimated by years of austerity funding cuts.
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ARTS AND CULTURE

Mending man
- Julie Perrin
- 02 November 2018
14 Comments
Padraig leads the Corrymeela community in the north of Ireland. It is a place committed to healing the social, religious and political divisions that exist in Northern Ireland. Corrymeela is an ancient Irish word. Padraig says they understood it meant 'hill of harmony' but recently they've discovered it is more like 'the lumpy crossing place'.
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INTERNATIONAL

US electoral process is deeply broken
- Zac Davis
- 02 November 2018
2 Comments
To posit that the results of an election come down to who shows up at the polls is to admit America's civic life is broken. Moreover, analysis from the perspective of turnout overemphasises the will and passions of voters and ignores the structural flaws embedded in our electoral process.
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ARTS AND CULTURE

Fake news about 'fascist' Queen
- Tim Kroenert
- 01 November 2018
20 Comments
Some creative choices see Bohemian Rhapsody veer from fairytale to fake news. Displacing 'Fat Bottomed Girls' allows the filmmakers to write out the exploitative publicity stunt for that song. By skipping The Works tour, they can conveniently ignore how the band flouted the UN's cultural boycott against apartheid era South Africa.
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Vol 28 No 22