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Keywords: Satire

  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Taking revenge on idiot America

    • Tim Kroenert
    • 22 November 2012
    2 Comments

    A teen attempts suicide after being ridiculed by the judges of an American Idol style talent show. A news anchor spouts propaganda so extreme it might make a Fox News presenter blush. A reality TV participant extracts an in-use tampon and hurls it at a rival. Appalled by this endless stream of TV trash, one man snaps. 

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Aboriginal voices silence Vietnamese war stories

    • Tim Kroenert
    • 09 August 2012
    2 Comments

    The anti-American rhetoric is direct and effective, the phrase AMERICAN WAR OF AGGRESSION a recurring, pulsating slur. Yet who would deny it, faced with this photographic account of Vietnamese suffering? There are at least two versions of any war, and this is theirs. But there are others.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    News and entertainment a difficult mix

    • Michael Mullins
    • 25 June 2012
    6 Comments

    Many Fairfax readers will miss the familiarity and romance of print. But more disturbing is the likelihood that the dignified authority of the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age mastheads will be lost when the more ephemeral, entertainment-oriented electronic edition is all we have.

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  • RELIGION

    'Jesuit' James Joyce's Church challenge

    • Philip Harvey
    • 13 June 2012
    24 Comments

    One character sings a risqué satire called 'The Ballad of Joking Jesus'. Another wanders into a church and misinterprets the liturgy to comic effect. The puritanical Catholic hierarchy were offended, but Joyce's seemingly anti-religious novels would not exist in their final form were it not for his Jesuit education.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Melbourne's Gen Y hollowman

    • Tim Kroenert
    • 16 February 2012
    1 Comment

    The 'quarter life crisis' is perhaps a Gen Y phenomenon where, despite a dedication to 'experience' and 'connection', one feels life is hollow. The greatest weakness of Any Questions For Ben? is that it offers pat answers to existential questions, where perhaps it should offer none. 

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    If Dickens were alive today

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 08 February 2012
    6 Comments

    If Dickens wished to address the deprivation and discrimination suffered by Indigenous Australians and asylum seekers today, he would need to turn to the popular media. But even though he was superbly gifted for the genre, his telly series would most likely flop. 

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Savaging sex and religion

    • Tim Kroenert
    • 15 December 2011
    4 Comments

    Three teenagers are lured into the midst of a demented cult waging a brutal crusade against society's sexual profligacy; the Westboro Baptists re-imagined as violent extremists. This is not the first time questioning Catholic filmmaker Kevin Smith has had a go at religion.

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  • MEDIA

    Abbott's budgie-smuggler blues

    • Moira Byrne Garton
    • 19 August 2011
    12 Comments

    Politicians are always pitilessly represented in cartoons. Just ask Kevin 'Tintin' Rudd and Julia 'Nose' (or 'Bottom') Gillard. Portrayals of Tony Abbott in Speedos are not part of a plot to undermine him. The public is able to recognise cartoons as exaggerated political commentary.

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  • MEDIA

    Monarchy's undemocratic war on The Chaser

    • Ellena Savage
    • 29 April 2011
    47 Comments

    Previously, monarchists and the ambivalent masses alike could argue that the British royal family was effectively benevolent and benign. The banning of The Chaser's royal wedding commentary is a jolt back to reality.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Best of 2010: The crucifixion of Christine Nixon

    • Moira Rayner
    • 05 January 2011
    15 Comments

    No firestorm of blame would be raging in the media were Christine Nixon not a woman, a decent and strong woman, a prominent woman and an ethically sound woman of an age and with the experience to possess a raging integrity of her own and, by her very being, to offer ruthless men a soft target.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Send in the clowns

    • Fatima Measham
    • 05 November 2010
    3 Comments

    For the most part, last weekend's Rally for Sanity in the USA is a stellar piece of theatre. Featuring  satirists Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert, it was staged as a counterpoint to the Tea Party rallies. When people are being massaged by politicians and media personalities to be fearful and angry, humour often flips back the covers concealing truth.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Inside the student politics bughouse

    • Ellena Savage
    • 10 September 2010
    1 Comment

    University student unions are cesspools of toxicity, sociopathy and tedium. I should know — I'm a student politician. In his latest novel, Chaser alumnus Dominic Knight strikes a balance between sardonic parody and genuine reverence for those whose political conviction outweighs their pessimism.

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