noise

Since he has the flu, we treat him to a new Thomas video and spend the afternoon snuggled up watching it. We are introduced to a new character, Sir Topham Hatt’s elderly mother. Later, over dinner, the boy takes a long look at me and says,
"Mum, you look like Dowager Hatt."
And starts laughing, possibly at the look of stunned horror on my face. Thanks, mate! Still, if he's cracking jokes, he must be feeling better...
He also makes me laugh when we see an ad for Australian Idol on the telly. He recognises the logo, if not quite the name:
"Mum, the noise show is back," he says.
Well, it probably won’t be long before he’s auditioning for the noise show himself, anyway. The other day I filmed him strumming his ukelele and ad-libbing a little song. As he 'tuned' his ukelele he told me,
"This song’s about a car, Mum. I like a song about a car."
Then he belted out, in a kind of death metal style of delivery,
ABC Kids with the ca-ar...ABC Kids with the monster...ABC Kids with the tea-towel...ABC Kids with the cow-ouch----and so on, casting his eye about our living room for further lyrical inspiration. He finished by posing, pulling a mean face, growling ROCK STAR!, flinging his poor ukelele down and stomping off stage left. I’m not sure if this means he’s been watching too much ABC Kids or too much Rage; probably both.

more red cheeks for the Liberals

Well, that kind of backfired, didn't it? Go looking for evidence that reality TV is rotting people's morals and find out it's actually making them better citizens. D'oh! Maybe Helen Coonan hoped that, after sitting on the report into the evils of reality TV for nearly six months, people might've forgotten all about it. Sadly for her, The Australian has managed to use Freedom of Information laws to reveal:

A previously unreleased Australian Communications and Media Authority report reveals reality TV may make better citizens of the 15- to 24-year-olds who constitute the principal audience.
"Being exposed to people and situations they would not normally encounter in their day-to-day lives had a positive impact on many young viewers," says the report, based on focus group research by ACNielsen.
"It made them aware of, and more tolerant of social diversity and caused them to reflect on their own behaviours and the impact they have on others."
The focus groups - shown clips from Big Brother and its adults-only version, Border Security, Jamie's Kitchen Australia, Cheaters and the Biggest Loser - were inspired by the personal growth of many participants and "found examples of discipline, commitment and hope".

Talk about adding insult to injury. It's not doing kids any harm, and it could actually be doing them some good. Looking forward to hearing what the Minister has to say on the subject sometime.

no, i have not disappeared into my navel

And I will be posting again soon, not that I think anyone believes a word I say anymore, as far as promises to blog go. I have not been writing for a few reasons which I'll try and explain soon. I haven't been sketching either, but I have been cartooning myself into a frenzy, and I'll put up a couple soon, despite the danger that they're unintelligible to anyone but myself. (Tried one out on my folks today. First I had to explain it. Then my mum goes, "Ha, ha. So, which one is supposed to be Bush?". But they're being very encouraging, actually.)
On the subject of toons, I was amazed at the Leak/Herge controversy the other day. I would've thought if anything Bill Leak would be helping to market Tintin, by reminding his newspaper's audience of the classic character. Mightn't the publishers even enjoy a sales spike in Australia from this?
I also enjoyed David's post on the Big Donor. It's not the first time BB has achieved a social purpose, as I vaguely recall there was the UK asylum seeker case but I'll have to dig out the clipping as I've forgotten the details.
And Helen had a fantastic post at surfdom. My thoughts on education are that the Howard Government's tendency to view education simply as a commodity only further entrenches disadvantage, since socio-economically disadvantaged kids can only access poor resources. I don't believe public schools should be devalued to the point where they become a place of last resort, yet the only place for anyone who can't afford to pay a premium for decent schooling. (And Helen, the thing about the Superior Mums was funny. Just recently I had a woman who doesn't like me say, "What, your son still wears nappies sometimes and he's three? Well, my daughter was completely toilet-trained by the time she was two!". To which I didn't retort, "And does it not occur to you that every child is different and such comparisons are arbitrary, you silly twit?").
Well, if anyone's still reading me despite the extended and unexplained absences, I really appreciate it and I'll be back soon. In the immortal words of the PM, trust me...

the slippery slope

Gee, only day three or four, and phony moral outrage at News Ltd already:

BIG BROTHER SWEARING DISGRACE
BIG Brother turned big blooper last night, with contestant Bodie dropping the "c" word during the daily show.

Looks like God has answered one of John Howard's prayers ("...And please God, we need more turkey slaps so we can get this immoral postmodern rubbish off the air and everything. Um..if you're all out of turkey slaps, some foul language would do. Oh, and thanks, God. Thanks a lot.").

i ♥ Big Brother

Trust Big Brother to lift my spirits after a bit of unwanted melancholy lately. It's always such a great distraction.
Top marks to BB this season. I like the missing prizemoney. I like the trendy ultra-green house made of recycled materials, with a pedal-powered washing machine, and artworks on the walls. I like the way they encouraged preliminary gender bonding (and "bagsing" of potential mates) by grouping the males and females separately at first. I like the fact that the housemates seem to be 'older and wiser'. I like the new peep-thru features of the house, creating fishbowls within the fishbowl.
I especially like the way all the housemates are extremely Nice rather than Naughty. I know this will really annoy John Howard and Helen Coonan as they spend their evenings glued to the screen desperately hunting for signs of moral turpitude. They're completely caught out by Big Brother going highbrow (or maybe multibrow).
Here's this year's bunch:
HAYLEY, 24, lawyer, bold, high-maintenance blonde, single;
TJ, 22, barmaid, Bohemian, doesn't like "plastics", calls herself "real" and "eccentric", seems a bit timid, single;
REBECCA, 24, events manager, Mormon, conservative, non-drinker evidently eager to prove she can party as hard and act as silly as the next alcoholic, single;
KATE, 25, lawyer, voluptuous, possibly bossy, potential 'love-her-or-hate-her' character, single;
EMMA, 24, fitness instructor, "black sheep of family", claims she wants to subvert the dumb blonde archetype, single;
ALEISHA, 20, hairdresser, sweet, innocent, hippy, small-town girl next door, single;
JAMIE, 29, karaoke host, cuddly SNAG, video gamer, wants to win it "for all the nerds out there", single;
BODIE, 24, model, Rod Stewart lookalike, larrkin, cheeky, self-described ADHD "shallow attention seeker", single;
ANDREW, 28, firefighter, reserved, smart, friendly, SNAG, admits to fractured family relationships, single;
JOEL, 24, restaurant manager, Young Liberal, athletic, ladies' man, joker, athletic, possibly a little machismo, single;
THOMAS, 27, real estate agent, traditionally handsome, separated from wife and from recent girlfriend;
TRAVIS, 32, truckdriver, heart-of-gold, ordinary Aussie bloke, married with kid (and I'm tipping Travis to be an early favorite).
There are two more housemates to be voted in and I think producers intend for DEMET(Muslim bellydancer) and ZORAN(romantic stirrer, admitted liar), both late-20s or thirtysomethings, to enter the house. It seems hard to imagine viewers voting in the others, who come across as naive dags, but it may still happen. And would still make for interesting viewing, especially if, as it seems, the current group are relatively well-educated and probably fairly politically savvy.
Oh, and the two 'secret relationships'? Surely gotta involve Thomas, who was introduced as currently trying to decide between going back to his ex-wife or his recently exed-girlfriend. Do you think the wife and girlfriend might be in there? I'll pick Kate as the ex-wife and either Hayley or Emma as the girlfriend.
So, let the games begin....

update OK, I was way off the mark with Thomas, but my radar correctly picked up that Hayley was involved somehow: turns out her husband is Andrew, with ex-boyfriend Billy now also sent in, to complicate the couple's attempt to keep their marriage hidden from the other housemates. I was also wrong about new housemate Susannah; now that we've had a closer look, she appears to be the polished, classy "high society" type, not so much a dag, and clearly a big hit with the blokes. I predict a match with Thomas. The other new housemate, as predicted, is Zoran. The remaining four contestants have been inducted into the White Room, a monochrome place of supposed potential mental torture; the one who remains in the room the longest may then enter the house proper. I wonder if they'll make a reality show inside the reality show, with the real housemates watching a package of the housemates interacting in the White Room for entertainment each night?

royals, flushed

Australian Princess is surely the best ad for a republic since It’s a Royal Knockout. You wonder how on earth Joe Public could ever be charged with sedition for rubbishing the monarchy when the royals and their hangers-on do such a fine job of rubbishing themselves. I’m finding it fascinating to watch these celebrity royals and affiliated society types in action on this reality show. It’s not often we get them up on stage.
I can't decide whether they take themselves seriously or not. They must be hamming it up, but then at times you appreciate their snobbery is genuine, such as when Jane Ferguson contemptuously inquires of the contestants who they think they are. Early on, when even a photo of the Queen Mother drew a series of blanks from the Aussie contestants, the royals appeared to react with genuine shock and horror.
It's a little embarrassing how the girls have to suck-up so they don't get booted from the show. On the other hand, maybe they're artfully playing the game. Keeping their eye on the prize, which includes diamonds, free overseas travel and a date with a prince of uncertain nationality (maybe Molvania?).
What strikes you is the excruciating triviality and banality of the royal world. Talk about sweating the small, anal-retentive, obsessive-compulsive stuff. Last week the former royal butler Paul Burrell, who seems to style himself on Basil Fawlty, was hopping about in yet another fury over yet another sin of etiquette. The issue? "The spoons are above the forks!". These people are loony.
The thing is, royalty and their hangers-on don’t just expect deference and reverence from the contestants on some half-baked reality TV show; they expect it from all of us. And I still don't get how a class-based system of a monarchy can be compatible with John Howard's desire for a classless nation (more on the Rat soon).
Anyway, can’t wait for Wednesday’s episode of Princess. You might have seen the promos, which feature a contestant bitching about some royal: ‘Mate, you are the biggest dickhead I’ve met in my life." Ah, you go, republican princesses.

(Elsewhere...love the bit about Burrell.)

one day my butler will come

On the new reality show Australian Princess, Princess Diana's former butler, one of the show's judges, apprehends a young female contestant. "Oh no. You've committed the cardinal sin of tea-making," he scolds. "That's what the common people do. We call them MIFs--milk in first."
Another time, he tells the anecdote of how the Queen likes to take her tea (handle at five o'clock on the saucer) standing at her bedroom window and joking about the untidiness of the rabble gawking up from below.
It just strikes me that I don't get how John Howard's Liberal Australia doesn't have class, and yet we lumber along with the enormous symbolism of being a monarchy, which by its nature can't help but divide people into classes of nobles and commoners. And the royal family: now there's a minority group for you which really gets some special benefits.
Anyway, as I'm only up to page 31 (an achievement around here) of Judith Brett's essay on Howard, I guess I may still find some answers.

the suspense isn't killing me

I've been disappointed by Big Brother this year too. It always starts with such potential, but never lives up to my expectations. They really need to do a Big Brother- The Director's Cut, with a director voting out the Housemates. That'd be much more interesting. Let's face it, teenage viewers with itchy SMS fingers might not be the best casting directors in the world.
The only storyline of interest to me this year was the Glenn & Michelle subplot. For the blissfully unaware, Glenn was publicly shamed for his treatment of Michelle in the House. It all went a little like this.*
----------------------------------
Late evening; a sauna.
GLENN and GENEVA go to (ahem) 'third base'.
A few hours later; the living room.
GLENN and MICHELLE smooch on the floor.
MICHELLE: I've heard that you've been with Geneva tonight.
GLENN: I haven't been with Geneva!
MICHELLE: I don't care if you have anyway, because you're like my best, best friend in here!
They smooch.
Some days later. GLENN invites MICHELLE into the Rewards Room and they have sex.
MICHELLE is promptly evicted. At her eviction party:
MICHELLE: "Me and Glenn are just friends...with benefits *wink*".
GRETEL KILLEEN screens some of the day's footage.
BLOKE: Whatcha gunna do if Michelle goes tonight?
GLENN: I dunno. I should probably crack onto Kate, shouldn't I? Give it a week and then crack onto Kate, yeah.
GLENN is promptly evicted. At his eviction party, GRETEL KILLEEN invites MICHELLE up to give him a piece of her mind. GLENN cringes and squirms.
--------------------------------
So Glenn might've erred in delivering the wonderfully Clintonesque, "I haven't been with Geneva!". But I believe Michelle gave him his get-out-of-jail-free card when she said she didn't even care if he had. Of course, women sometimes say these kinds of things and don't mean them. It's meant to sound lofty, carefree, secure. But it's a dangerous pretence, because a man like Glenn can always choose to interpret such comments at face value and rationalise to his mates and himself--and in this case, to Australia--"But she said she didn't care. I thought she knew it was just a bit of fun."
And it's interesting that Michelle continued the charade of 'not caring' when she sat on the eviction stage and said she and Glenn were "friends with benefits". That's a bit different to the image she ended up portraying of a woman scorned, of someone who really thought she and Glenn were an item and that their relationship would continue outside the House.
Well, that's my last post on BB as I stopped watching when there were only five people left and the group dynamic died and I had to put it out of its misery early.
Good timing too, as the baby's just woken and I'm off to start my second shift. (I can't believe the baby finally has a daytime nap and I blog about Big Brother. Good grief.)

(*from memory--and yes, i know that is sad).

boys meet girls

Has feminism failed? Elizabeth Meryment thinks it has, and draws on Big Brother to prove it:

"[T]he reality is that the failure of feminism, and the failure of young women to take up the cause of feminism, is beginning to have an impact on society; the behaviour in the Big Brother house is one piece of evidence of this.
...
"It hardly should be surprising that sexual harassment, racial vilification, poor manners and abuse should be common in the [Big Brother] house given that such behaviours are common in the community. One might believe that young people would know better, being the recipients of good generalist educations, having access to information via the internet and living in an open-minded society. Yet decency and respect for minorities and women seems to be regressing."

It's important to remember at the outset that this is not a random sample of individuals. These particular people are sampled from a small, statistically insignificant group of people--those who audition to appear on a show in which they will go to the toilet on camera, shower nude, get pissed alot and possibly engage in sexual activity. Extroverts and exhibitionists, these people are hardly a representative group of their cohort and we can't generalise.
Still, this group has shed some light on relations between the sexes. I think a lot of the problems in this year's House stem from the fact that most of the males appear to be extrinsically motivated to be there--they are interested in scoring booty of the traditional kind and keep their eyes on the prize. After any sexual pairings that were going to happen had happened, and it became clear it was unlikely for other pairings to succeed, the males separated off into a pack, led by the most dominant and self-interested male, and appear to lie around waiting for (a) the end of the game and the prize-money to happen; and (b) meanwhile, the arrival of female 'intruders' to pass the time.
The girls, who are apparently more intrinsically motivated to be in the House ("I'm there for the experience, to have a good time, to make friends, etc"), have responded by turning to each other for their emotional needs and by disliking the men.
But still--we're talking about a pretty 'abnormal' group of people, so it's impossible to infer that all men are sleazy assholes who sexually harass women. I also think you can't argue, as Meryment does, that this show reveals that women generally are still oppressed.
Are the girls in the House oppressed? They seem to be more than anything confused by the men's lack of emotionality, but you still see them try to work it out in the way women are socialised to do--by analysing relationships in alot of detail, by openly talking to about how they feel, by directly confronting the men, and by being very nurturing towards each other, in the absence of any "compassionate men". They don't curl up in a ball just because these men won't listen to them or be kind towards them. I don't think they are cowed by the behaviors of the men, even if they don't like it. It just seems to make them think less of these men.
I disagree with Meryment when she writes,

"These young women are more concerned with being sexually attractive and available to stupid men like Hotdogs than with standing up for their rights."

First, I think the women often pragmatically take the route that causes the least conflict, maybe because they figure they're only in the House for a certain time and don't have to put up with it for long. It's impossible to know how they would act if they were stuck with living with these blokes in real life. I also think it's wrong to criticise the women for flirting and seeking romance--normal for people of their age group, and geez, it's not the 50s. Young people have sex, big wooop.
However, it is sad to hear that the girls in Meryment's university lectures are clueless about feminism, unaware their grandmothers had to fight for what they now take for granted...but maybe that's a win for feminism anyway. If girls have internalised feminism--if they take for granted that they can go to university--then aren't they equal to men, who also take it for granted? It should be a given, so it's not surprising that women now expect that it's a given. But I do agree that something's probably been lost in the translation as far as how feminism has been explained to the new generations. It probably is crying out to be re-imagined and re-told.

PS. If anyone's wondering how my namesake housemate fared, well, she got booted early. This was a good thing, because she had my name and she was really wearing it out. (And she pronounced it wrong too.)

almost real

I meant to blog more often about BB05 but have only been managing to catch about one in five episodes, enough to keep track of the score but not enough to seriously analyse the group dynamics.
Still, I can hereby admit I have a hopeless crush on Big Brother housemate Tim--the token "intellectual leftie journo". Anyone who will sit and patiently explain the war in Iraq to a bunch of apparently very Right-Wing young Australians (e.g., the prototypical new "sexy Conservative" Kate, whose response was an irritable flick of a ponytail and a whiny "God, who cares?") is a hero; for me, anyway.
Wonder what he's doing when he get's out?

smells like twentysomething spirit

Now that BB has replaced Home & Away in my affections as preferred soap to watch while I cook dinner, I should warn everyone that I'll probably blog about it from time to time. Not everyday though, I promise...
For those of us who have a genuine interest in social and personality psychology, and like to think BB is a big social experiment, it's shaping up to be a good season.
For starters. Confiscating everyone's toiletries on day one (replaced by a bare minimum of basics to share) is a master stroke. Almost every girl is a high maintenance chick! One has already been to the Diary Room pleading for her foundation. It's going to end in tears, you just know. But you know why they're doing this, don't you? Not just to stop people hiding behind artifice, but to give everyone's pheromones a chance to work without the interference of fragrance.
Another thing I find funny is how you see some of these "don't-hate-me-cos-I'm-beautiful" girls complaining how girls often don't tend to like them, and then you watch them in action and think, "baby, maybe that's why". They're falling over each other in attempts to secure the most alpha of males, and meanwhile ignoring the girls who aren't a threat to them, while being competitive and fake with the girls who are.
We humans so stupid sometimes.

the house of love

Was that Paris Hilton hosting Big Brother or Gretel Killeen? Really, why do some women think hair that looks like ironed yellow nylon is a good look? If you're going to be a bottle-blonde, at least pick a good color, for god's sake.
Well, correct me if I'm wrong but this year all 15 housemates are "alpha males" and "queen bees". They're all dominant, confident, assertive and classically attractive. Most tellingly, all are single this year (except one guy, who was apparently single when he was selected but has since found lerve). They've all flagged their interest in finding love and/or shagging someone in the house. Sounds like it's gonna be some lovefest. (Children, do not try this at home.)
I'm happy to report that "Gianna" did me proud. She's only a short-ass who comes across as sweet and demure, but underneath the bimbo exterior it turns out she's a black-belt in karate, races horses and motorbikes and runs her own business or something. And cheeky. For example, she's reclining on a bed and some bloke comes in.
Bloke: "Hey, you're on my bed!"
Gianna (gives naughty look): "Would you like me to get off?"
Ah, nothing like a bit of innuendo....that's my girl.

hot air

Did anyone else read Shelley Gare's article (no link available) about the rise of "airheadism" in our culture in the Weekend Australian magazine?
A lot of what Gare writes is probably true, but one thing that struck me was the irony of the Oz magazine editor putting a picture of coquettish Paris Hilton-as-Barbie on the cover. Um, why do airheads rool? Hello? Could it have something to do with the fact that we're letting them? I mean we're not splashing a picture of Dr Joanna Blow-who's-working-on-a-cure-for-cancer on the cover, are we? Instead, we're happy to use airheads to sell the newspaper.
Another thing I didn't agree with was Gare's claim that shows like My Restaurant Rules are proof of a cultural obsession with idiots. I think that's a little unfair. True, it's a reality-TV gameshow, but the contestants on MRR do actually have to build and run a profitable restaurant. Sure, it's not brain surgery, but surely we all agree there is is a certain amount of skill and nous and business acumen involved in running a restaurant.
Personally, I think it's a no-brainer that people love airheads, because that's entertainment. But it's not new--what about old shows like "I Love Lucy", or the Marx Brothers, and all that kind of stuff?. It's just higher profile now, because the media is more pervasive than ever before. Maybe it's all just an example of that saying "empty vessels make the most sound". I don't know that I think civilisation is in danger of falling over because of Paris Hilton and Jessica Simpson. Or is it?