Jeez, what does one have to do? Put a big green tick next to the Star of David and a big red cross through the Israel flag?

Least politically active Frenchman

Only reply to comments posted before 2024

I don’t like any of the Liberals but Ley was one of the few remaining ones that seemed at least partially human. Taylor gives the ick.

I hope the people of Sydney keep protesting today after this. Every one of these policemen need to be held accountable, there is no justifiable context for this.

The media is one thing, but the silence from politicians is deafening. I haven’t checked in the last day but on the 27th I only saw 4 representatives from WA even mention it.

Roy Morgan polling found ~70% support for for ‘celebrating Australia day on the 26th of January’, but only around 59% for ‘Australia day should not be moved from the 26th of January’.

Sigh… peak culture wars.

The IPA is a right-wing think tank that pretty much exists to mislead the public, so take this data with a grain of salt. As a side note, that article really sounds like it’s written by a teenager haha, the wording is so weird and cringy and not certainly not befitting a statistical report.

It is true that the vast majority of Australians support celebrating on 26th January though, even if the extent may not be as large as portrayed here (pollsters generally seem to show ~60-70% support). But still, to have 30-40% of the population not keen on celebrating the national holiday is extreme (hell, even 10-20% would be pretty noteworthy). The notion that “the debate is over” is pretty flawed for that reason alone.

Ultimately, even though I haven’t really heard any strong arguments for keeping the date, I don’t think there’s enough public willpower to change the date until we one day leave the monarchy, and hopefully pick a nice date in summer to recognise a new level of independence as a nation.

Well I tried…

This has been such a good workout album, i love something that’s heavy af but also filled with earworms.

Keen for new music this year, will be curious to see how their sound evolves without Charlie and Conner.

How dumb does an arts organisation have to be to still be doing shit like this? Melbourne symphony orchestra’s reputation is still hurt (and they’re still missing out on gigs, too) from cancelling that soloist that dedicated a piece to the journalists of Gaza, and that was a good two years ago.

This place is so remote, the average bloke from WA doesn’t even know it exists.

Get vaccinated ya bloody hippies

Glad it at least appears to be amicable. They’re going to be tough to replace but I’m excited the band has some more music in store, keen to see where they go next. And hopefully Charlie and Conner keep releasing some music through Tiktaalika.

It’s far too late to prevent climate change but the EXTENT of change matters just as much as wether there is a change at all. Every fraction of a degree of warming counts for so much.

We absolutely need to be investing in adaptation alongside our reduction of greenhouse gasses, but I worry the narrative of “it’s too late” sends a counterproductive message (I.e. we failed, may as well continue polluting an enjoy our lives). Even if we have 2 degrees of warming it would still be worth fighting to avoid 2.1 degrees of warming imo.

Not super familiar with Resolve polls but I do find this pretty difficult to believe, that only 16% of the country would OPPOSE a ban on Palestine protests. Would definitely need to see similar polling independently reproduced to take it seriously.

That said, I’d wager a non-trivial chunk of the country is apathetic and would be against all protests, full stop.

I try this so often yet I remain terrible at these haha

Favourite (voting lifetime): Albanese (slim pickings for me lol)

Favourite (lifetime): Gillard

Favourite (all time): Whitlam

Most hated: Morrison (honourable mentions to Abbott and Howard)

I find it difficult to imagine a future in which humans aren’t making fun of impaired cognition.

I think the context is what’s most important, if anyone actually directs such language (be it retarded, idiot, etc) towards people with genuine mental impairment, that constitutes a slur. But the word ‘retarded’ literally means ‘slow’, and is still regularly used (including by myself) in scientific and technical contexts (compared to racist or homophobic slurs, which are only ever really used in a ‘slur’ kind of way).

I wouldn’t really have a problem with calling people ‘slow’ in jest, and I don’t think many would. Imo if not ‘retarded’, it’ll be something else with the same meaning.