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Keywords: Stray Thoughts

  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    On Father's Day

    • David Halliday
    • 05 September 2022
    1 Comment

    There’s a modern narrative around fatherhood being about sacrifice and loss that deserves some scrutiny. New fathers are frequently heard vocalising hardships, grieving the loss of former pasttimes. But there’s something else there that’s harder to articulate and appreciate. 

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    In praise of naughty thoughts

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 29 August 2022

    The subject of this Stray Thought is not sleazy thoughts. It is rather the thought of becoming a lion tamer which might steal upon a person focused from childhood on being a musician with all the sacrifices that this choice has entailed. Or the thought that might lead a soccer goalie to leave his position and go forward to score a winning goal for his team. Naughty thoughts are secret, personal and disruptive. They defy the conventional wisdom we have accepted about career, security and responsibility.

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  • INTERNATIONAL

    Stray thoughts: Teams that run on love and joy

    • Michael McVeigh
    • 23 August 2022
    1 Comment

    Is ruthlessness an essential part of sporting success? Or are players better off  remembering how lucky they are, have fun, and allow good things to happen to them by treating people with compassion and playing with joy?

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Stray thoughts: Going doolally over a box of fluffies

    • Michele Frankeni
    • 16 August 2022
    1 Comment

    Headlines in print (newspapers and magazines) have some heavy lifting to do. They need to convey the essence of the story in as few words as possible, be enticing and hopefully be funny, clever or both. In traditional news terms, you should know what the story says from the heading, intro and first paragraph. However, the funny thing about being funny (especially with word play) is you’re assuming your audience knows the same things you do.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Alone

    • David Halliday
    • 01 August 2022
    1 Comment

    As the boat pulls away, a figure is left standing alone on the rocky beach beneath a thick wall of fir trees. The person stares out after the boat relishing the last morsel of human contact they will have for an indefinite time.    

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Stray thoughts: Living by make-believe

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 27 July 2022
    1 Comment

    In some ways this habit of association of ordinary personal life with the epic figures of literature or history marks a return to childhood. In it admired figures have a mythical status. I used to imagine that if, in my hand I had a Don Bradman bat, on my cap a Neil Harvey badge, or Mopsy Fraser’s number on my back, their skills would become mine. They never seemed to.

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  • RELIGION

    Stray thoughts: On using our talents

    • Michele Frankeni
    • 12 July 2022
    1 Comment

    Last week at the Plenary Council Second Assembly, it seems many of Australia’s bishops, for whatever reason, wanted to bury the talents available to them. They voted down motions related to the equality of dignity between men and women. The reaction according to commentators was visceral with members, not just women, upset and angry. It is likely the anger was more potent for the fact that the motions had become so anodyne that many assembly members are probably regretting the parsing and pruning. 

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  • Eureka Street Plus

    • Editor
    • 05 July 2022

    Eureka Street Plus is a place where respectful in-depth public conversation can take place in the grey area between polarities; a place to air differing perspectives, thoughts and concerns without fear of reprisals. It’s about making space to further enable the productive conversations necessary for an engaged, functioning society.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Stray thoughts: On Ozark

    • Julian Butler
    • 04 July 2022

    Ozark is, at heart, an unflinching look at evil. I’ve always known I’d come back to each new release of episodes in part because the darkness is made watchable by the likeable faces of Jason Bateman and Laura Linney. They play the couple at the centre of a family amidst sinister violence and corruption. Indeed, the juxtaposition between the content and those faces is a key part of what makes the show so intriguing.

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  • MEDIA

    On attention

    • David Halliday
    • 28 June 2022
    1 Comment

    Every day is a battle waged for our attention. Last week, I watched an episode of a new ABC series Our Brain on the nature of consciousness and the effect our tech lifestyle is having on our intelligence. Although painful at times, the revelations from Our Brain ring true. The most incisive perhaps is the degree to which social media has been successful in capturing our attention.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    On battlers

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 20 June 2022
    1 Comment

    On social media, business cards and the bottom of emails nowadays you will often find a bracket with people’s preferred pronouns (he/him or she/her or they/them). Without fanfare, gender neutrality has slipped into our 21st century speech and our unconscious, and it is only when we are confronted with the gender specific language that we realise how we’ve changed. 

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  • RELIGION

    Stray thoughts: On pronouns

    • Michele Frankeni
    • 14 June 2022
    2 Comments

    On social media, business cards and the bottom of emails nowadays you will often find a bracket with people’s preferred pronouns (he/him or she/her or they/them). Without fanfare, gender neutrality has slipped into our 21st century speech and our unconscious, and it is only when we are confronted with the gender specific language that we realise how we’ve changed. 

    READ MORE