Category Archives: Article

Daily (Or When The Mood Takes Me) Gripe: The Contract Trap!

Article, General Interest, Opinion Piece, , , , , ,

If consumer law nerds to start tackling a major problem in service delivery, they need to do something about both mobile phone, and gym contracts. No wonder people are over the blatant rip-off, and are opting for the growing number of “no contract” options.

I recently moved from Brisbane to Sydney. In Brisbane, I had already a huge dispute with a gym I first used up there several years ago. I was getting pissed off enough with the lack of care for regular, long-term users as it was, but the crunch dame when I was accepted to do a course at TAFE – my Certificate III in Fitness – and had to start there within a week of being accepted. Perhaps not surprisingly, the couse included free use of the Southbank TAFE gym. So, not only would I no longer be using my regular gym, but would be continuing to pay for something I didn’t use. But I was tied into a contract, wasn’t I, anddespite the contract itself having expired, because I had continued I was still bound by its conditions – apparently we had been notified of this at the time of signing the contract, though neither myself nor my partner had any recollection if it. So, could I just give a couple of days notice to quit the gym? Not on your life – I had to give 30 days notice and,nof course, despite not using the services I would continue to be charged for the 30 days. I was ropable, and tried – futilely – to wreak my revenge by just refusing to pay. Naturally, they threatened kegal action, and being unwilling to get a black mark against my credit history, I eventually caved in.

Now, this is a gym! It is somewhere that I spend about 3 hours per week in! I don’t live there! I don’t work for them! Yet the conditions of the contract treat me as if I am an employee! I am required to give 30 days notice to quit – evidently it takes them 30 days to cancel your direct debit, inlike the two days it takes the non-contract gym. If I want to freeze my membership or quit for health reasons, I amrequired to supply a doctors certificate! To a gym! If I am wuitting to move, or go on a long holiday, I am required to give proof..land get this – they will then ACCESS my eligibility to quit the contract! What an infringement of rights…not to mention unbelievable abuse and manipulation of someone who is doing nothing more than using a service!

Likewise with phones. On moving into the shoebox that us called an apartment, I wanted to get wifi. I don’t use the 3G or 4G networks,  as I do everything on my tablet and wifi pretty well covers everything I want to do. I didn’t want to get tied into a contract, as we will be moving to the central coadt after our lease runs out next year, and it is eadier to just cancel the wifi service, and reconnect it at a new address after we move. For the privilege of not having a contract, I pay an exhorbitant monthly amount. They think, evidently, that by overcharging me, I will eventuall fold, and jove to a contract. I have news for them, and it’s all bad! I will continue to allow them to rip me off – the telco is Optus, by the way – because of the convenience itoffers, including unlimited data  usage – very handy when using streaming services like Netflix. As for my mobile phone – I have, despite saying I wouldn’t, optrd for a contract again, even though it locks me in for 2 years. I only use it for phone calls and messaging…and a bit of Facebook…so the low charge – and bew phone – I am paying for is still cheaper than a sim-only phone. I tried a mobile wifi modem when first arrived back so as to have access to wifi, and ut cost me a fortune in data charges. The phone companies love to rort everyone for data usage! It is so blatantly dishonest, but evetyone just lets them get away with it. There are a few smaller Telco’s hitting the sim-only market now, with better rates and conditions, but they are still piggy-backing off the bigTelco’s systems, so how they fare in the future remains to be seen.

So I land back in miserable Sydney (I really hate this city now!). I have gad two years of a no-contract gym…Jetts…in Brisbane. Ground level gyms flooded with sun, and natural light, not over-crowded with equipment, and quiet during the day, which is when I like to go. The Jetts gym in Sydney is quite a distance away, so I stipidly – and against my better judgement – opted for the closest gym…an Anytime Fitness, which is a contract gym, and at $69 a month, is not cheap! The gym is underground, so dark and oppressive. It is crammed with 7,  offers nothing in the way of space. What they consider a quiet period is not quiet, and one often has someone breathing down their heck, or finding equipment tied up, or in the case of the 12.5 kg dumbbells…just NEVER available. I hate it, and I’m not using it. Infortunstely, all these hassles didn’t present themselves within my 7 day cooling-off period. So now I’m stuck with having to pay my way out of the contract – a cheaper option than the $69 a month I am cyrrently paying. Of course, they were quick eniugh to sign me up, but now I want to quit I can’t get any help at all. 2 requests by email for a final pay-out figure have gone unanswered. The longer they stuff me around, the more money they get out of me.

It really is time for this free-ride by Telco’s and Franchisers to be looked into by an independent body. It is time to give everyone a fair deal. The continuing rise of no-contract gyms and phone companies should be causing the contract budinesses some concern. In particular, the terms and conditions of contracts shiuld be gone over with a magnifying glass, and cleaned up, and made fairer for all. Onvioysly, the more competative these businesses become, the better it will be for everyone concerned. At the very least, if they are going to treat me like an employee – as is the case with contract gyms – they can bloody well pay me a wage!

So, it’s back to the battle of breaking-the-contract! One thing I can now promise you…I will NEVER use a contract gym again. I just hope that, like Foxtel now finding itself in a competative market with Netflix…who are substantially cheaper…they will eventually be forced to reconsider how they do business. If contracts are not going to end – and they should be outlawed – then they have to ge made a lot more reasonable, and fair. I know investigations gave been threatened for a while now, but maybe it is either take action officially, or people need to talk with their feet!

Tim Alderman

(C) 2015

Dieting Myths

Article, General Interest, Health Information, Nutrition, , ,

This excellent article appeared today from  http://www.shebudgets.com/health/diet-fitness/10-weight-loss-tricks-that-are-complete-myths/55503?utm_source=facebookpage&utm_medium=luan&utm_term=shebudgets&utm_campaign=weightlossmyths&ts_pid=2

If losing weight was easy and simple and becoming thin and gorgeous was easy and simple, we’d all be thin and gorgeous. But it’s not always the case; if you want to lose 10 pounds, you have to lose 10 pounds. You can’t just sit down and hope some magic potion is going to give you a wish and then you’ll be thinner and more gorgeous than you were an hour ago. There is no magic potion or trick for weight loss. If you want to get healthy and fit and look great, you have to make some lifestyle changes. You have to stop eating like a pig, over-indulging, skipping the good stuff and hoping that the bad stuff is going to make you skinny. It’s not. You’re not going to get thin and stay thin eating nothing but milkshakes or drinking pepper water. You have to eat well, exercise and live a healthy lifestyle.
Sorry (not sorry) – this is not what you want to hear. You want to hear that you can take a pill and lose weight and all kinds of good things will happen to you without you actually having to work for those things. And it’s not going to happen. You have to work for what you want and get actual results. It’s called responsibility and dedication. Diet trends and myths don’t work because you have to keep them up forever and ever and it’s not healthy or possible to do so. We have, instead, decided that we’d tell you that all those things you’re hoping will make you look good in time for beach season will not work long term. Skip them; make lifestyle changes for the better. These diets are myths and they will not work.

Goodbye Gluten

If you have celiac disease and you have to eliminate gluten from your diet, do it. But it always makes me laugh to see people who go gluten-free as if they’re doing something good for themselves as a whole. A gluten-free diet is not a weight loss tool. It’s a way for people with a certain illness to eat food without getting sick. So if you’re using this as a way of dieting, you’re just wasting time and money buying things that aren’t doing it for you.

Juice Diets

Why would you drink just juice and hope that you could lose weight? Of course you are going to lose weight just drinking juice. You are eliminating actual food from your diet and you are not going to be able to keep that up forever. Can you go the rest of your life without actual food? No, you cannot, and that’s why these silly diets do not work.

Soup Diets

See above – you cannot live on soup for the rest of your life. Sure, it’s healthier than juice, but it’s not a way of life. You cannot just hope that you will lose weight because you are eating only soup and hoping that weight loss comes to you in many forms. You have to actually go about losing weight like a real person by eating healthy foods.

Skipping Breakfast

It’s never a good idea to skip breakfast. Of course you feel thin when you wake up; you haven’t eaten in 15 hours. So skipping breakfast is not going to make you thinner or healthier. It’s just going to make you hungrier and it’s going to make you feel bad because your metabolism is going to slow down and work on a pace that doesn’t burn any calories.

Negative Calorie Foods

Some people call this the grapefruit diet, and it consists of eating only things that have negative calories. These are foods that have fewer calories in them than it takes to consume them. While most of these foods are healthy, they cannot complete your diet. You still have to eat and use regular meals if you plan on getting healthy and losing weight for the long term.

No More Carbs

You can’t do it; because carbs are amazing. Sure, it might work for a few days and you’ll feel good and healthy, but when you eat them again you’re going to miss them. And you cannot stay away from carbs forever. Some of them are actually good for you and you need those to survive. So skip the fad and just limit your intake.

Eating Every Two Hours and Skipping Meals

Little meals are good throughout the day, but you cannot skip big meals at all in favor of snacking and grazing every two hours. A handful of nuts or yogurt every two hours does not make for a healthy day. You’re doing yourself a great disservice assuming you can eat like this in a way that’s healthy and beneficial.

Drinking your Calories

All right, so sometimes we all do this. We order a small salad with nothing on the side and then we order three glasses of wine. While it might make for a fun occasional night out, it’s not good for us on so many levels. You can’t skip food to drink – it’s going to kill you. It’s disgusting and unimpressive and not at all good for you.

Food Pairings

Did you know that some people say you should not eat certain foods together? For example, you should not eat carbs with protein because it will make you fat the way that they work together as they digest. Whatever; it’s not the truth. You can’t let people tell you that you can eat as much as you want if you just avoid eating certain things together. It’s not the way eating works.

Not Eating

Sure, not eating is going to make you lose weight. It’s also going to bloat you and make you feel awful. It’s not healthy, and it’s not good for anyone. You’re entire life will change if you stop eating. You’ll become sick, tired, anxious, stressed, grouchy, depressed and you still won’t feel as if you look good. Why? Because you won’t look good and you won’t feel good.

Some real home truths there.

Tim

Daily (Or When The Mood Takes Me) Gripe: People Who Don’t Research Before Commenting!

Article, General Interest, Opinion Piece, , , , ,

halalhəˈlɑːl/

adjective

adjective: halal

1.

denoting or relating to meat prepared as prescribed by Muslim law.

“halal butchers”

religiously acceptable according to Muslim law.

“halal banking”

noun

noun: halal

1.

halal meat.
I abhor ignorance! Followed closely by yobboism ( Yobbo is an Australian term for people who are ignirant and verbose about it, loud-mouthed, discriminatory and racist). Social media has pushed these people into the forefront of opinion, and has created pages and groups who foster and promite as common opinion the bias, hate, racism and uneducated rhetoric of these deluded imbeciles! The current debates regarding Halal Certification of food products in Australia has driven these ignoramuses into a frenzy! What is a fery simple – and in a multicultural society very fair – issue has been warped and twisted into misinformation and out and out lies.

With the likes of our local imbeciles such as Corey Bernardi (people actually vote for this South Austealianidiot!), who has called for a very expensive government inquiry into halal certification, and the so-called Halal Truthers who ignorantly inform us that the fees from halal certification go overseas to fund terrorism. Truly! There sre even thise – and I love this – who think halal is an actual dish to eat! Says it all really, doesn’t it!

Thank heaven for the voices of sanity and reason,  like Charlie Pickering.On His   weekly news commentary show last week he gave these idiots a blast, and put things into perspective. As he stated in “The Weekly”, “Luckily the only people who have a problem with halal certification are fringe people on the internet. Oh, and senators,” Pickering said. These fringe groups and extremists seem to think halal certification will change the intrinsic nature of foods such as meat, and…wait for it…Vegemite. With comments on Halal Facebook pages such as “What a crock of shit! Cease halal certification now!”, ” It is Sharia Law that says these ragheads…I loathe expressions like that…must eat halal food. We don’t have Sharia Law here”, “Screw halal and all who make it”; so they have tried to decry halal food as something to ge scared off…but that couldn’t be further from the truth! As Pickering points out, halal certification is no different to kosher certification, no things like “Made in Australia” label or the Heart Foundation tick for which small fees are also paid. 

The genefits of these dertifications is not to demonise food products, or to buy guns for terrorists! It is so the producers if these products dan increase their countries of distribution into places that orevioysly they could not sell in due to not being certified. It is really as simple as that! Why would you restrict your distribution to countries like Australia (or Britain or the US) when you vould get your products into Muslim Asian markets nearby, or even in the Middle East! To quote Pickerings statistic, Australian-made foods exported to Muslim populations brings in 13 BILLION dollars per year, and directly supports about 60,000 jobs.. Please follow this link for the whole Pickering segment on “The Weekly” https://newmatilda.com/2015/05/21/watch-charlie-pickering-takes-cory-bernardi-and-halal-truthers 

It is to our own benefit that these cettifications are put in place. It supports our industries, increases distribution of products, and supports employment in industries. What is the problem there! If you are going to comment on a subject, at least inform yourself about what you are commenting on! What Jack next door, your parents or your best friend thinks is inconsequential! Think and learn for yourself.

So, Vegemite is not going to change flavour or cost, you can still eat pork, and the Halal section in your supermarket meat cabinet is still accessible to you, and a terrorist with a “Spnsored by Halal Certification” label dangling off his gun is not going to suddenly pop up at your front door!  Halal certification is going to change nothing in your life, so stop fretting.

And before signing off, I should mention how inevitable it is that as soon as anything that involves the words Muslim  or Islam crop up, the “phobes” come pouring out of the woodwork! It is something we should not be proud of! Unfortunately, “yobboism” is alive and well in this country! Fortunately, informed, intelligent commentary outweighs the blabbering ignorancy we seem to find on docial media. 

If you can’t be bothered researching, then kerp your fomments to yourself! 

Tim Alderman

(C) 2015

 
 

Another Coming Out Story!

Article, Autobiography, biography, Gay Interest, History, , , , ,

“Life’s not worth a damn till you can shout out – I am what I am!”
Gloria Gaynor – I am What I Am

There is nothing worse than being 9 years-old in the 1960s, knowing that you are different to all the other boys around you, and not knowing how or why, or even having a word to describe it. I was just “Different”!

My father had a word for it though..poofter, though I could never quite work out who or what these poofter people were…perhaps from a country I hadn’t heard of…maybe! In the car one day with dad in the passenger seat, and Uncle Peter…a mate of dads…driving. There was a guy walking along the footpath in a pink shirt. My fathers window was quickly opened, and in unison both father and uncle screamed “POOFTER” out the window. On observing the guy through the back seat window…I could see nothing to help me define that word! However, I have a word to describe my father! It came into my vocabulary shortly after that age. Cunt! As you can already see…this was not a family who would facilitate…or appreciate…my coming out as gay!

Now let me see…what qualities singled me out as “Different”; playing with the girls in the school yard for starters. And unlike the boys, they accepted me into their girls clique with no recrimination or name-calling. I was an excellent skip-roper, and picked up the intricacies of French skipping (done with elastic) very quickly. It could have been my playing with dolls, which my mother actually bought for me…secretly of course! Or my penchant for hiding away in quiet corners and reading books…or my total dislike of sports…my keen eye for fashionable ladies wear…my creative science fiction inspired composition (essay) writing… my artistic streak…my perchant for playing “dress up” in my mothers clothes (which perhaps lead to the evolution of my gutter drag persona…Cleo…in the 1980s)…even my over-active imagination all kept me apart from the other boys I knew. At the beach I was attracted to…and stared at…guys in Speedo swimwear. This was the era of nylon Speedo briefs, and the young men hung very nicely out of them, to say the least. Even the nylon briefs with a “modesty panel” across the front did nothing to hide their manly virtues, as the panels tended to ride up, further emphasising their manliness! And I tore adverts for men’s underwear or photos of lifesavers or any other scantily dressed males out of magazines and newspapers. These adverts, for underwear such as Jockey y-fronts, or Bonds horizontal fly s’port briefs showed no real bulges…but I could imagine them, so to me they were erotic (and now my underwear fetish). I imagined a bulge on the lycra-clad comic strips heroes of the time…The Phantom, Superman, and Batman and Robin.

I also had my first orgasm at 9…and that was something I wasn’t prepared for. I can remember it like it was yesterday. I wasn’t even looking at anything that I fancied…just sitting class, gazing out a window. An erection…which I knew nothing about…just happened. Slightly moving backwards and forwards produced this pleasing sensation…and within seconds I blew. Confusion reigned, as it was such an unexpected occasion. I never mentioned it to anyone, though there was a thorough examination of my cock at bath time to make sure everything was okay. It was! I also started growing pubic hair, which I used to pull out as quickly as it appeared as I was embarrassed by its growth. A discreet viewing of the other boys in the change room revealed no hair on them, so this was obviously a freakish thing happening just to me. My parents weren’t great with the birds and the bees stuff! However, it must have clicked with them that something was going on…perhaps a discolouration in my Jockeys…or the fact that I learnt to masturbate by rolling onto my stomach, and rubbing my cock on the sheet until I came, thus unknowingly creating stiff patches on the sheets…may have been a hint that puberty had started. Nothing like a Christian sex pamphlet discreetly left by the bedside to educate you in the dynamics of sex. I was horrified! No wonder I was confused! Thank heaven for my little stash of adverts!

So I guess I just tucked all my “Different” away. After leaving school, and starting work, I hung out with a large group of people, so I came into contact with other gay guys who were included in our group, and as with many other things in my life, I accepted them on face value. However, they were nearly all in the display areas of Grace Brothers (in Roselands shopping centre), and were very effete…something I couldn’t relate to, so I guess it sort of added to the confusion I was already going through. If gay=effete…then I mustn’t be gay. It seemed logical at the time, especially with no other role models to help guide me through the confusion. So I went through the 70s dating girls, though never making sexual advances to them. It wasn’t even something I considered doing. The girls, in turn, loved going out with me because they felt safe, and knew I wouldn’t go in for the quick grope…and I often helped them buy their clothes. Jo was a girl I used to date who was kind of my “beard” (a term used to describe girls who used to act as girlfriends to stop family from asking difficult questions). She was quite a beautiful girl and I think my old man thought she was a potential marriage mate for me. She did try to seduce me one night, but when I fought off her advances…things must have clicked with her.

The next thing I know, she’s taken me out to Oxford Street in Darlinghurst, pointing out all the gay venues to me and taking me to a gay coffee lounge called “Nana’s” in Bourke St (which became a very popular Vietnamese restaurant in the 80s) where I was introduced to the owner, Nana, and his partner Cupcake.

Author in thev1970s on a solo vacation to Magnetic Island.

Yet there was one occasion when something almost happened. I would have been about 17, and worked for a menswear company at Roselands called E.L. Downes. There was a Clark Rubber store on the lower ground floor, and the manager there, named Barry, who was quite a handsome older man, served me on several occasions. I used to wave as I passed the store, and he used to sit next to me on the bus after work, as we both lived in Kogarah, though on opposite sides of the railway line. As I passed the store one lunchtime, he grabbed me and asked if I would like to go out with him. Without even a blink, I said yes! Told my workmates, and they just encouraged me…and it just didn’t dawn on me that obviously THEY knew I was gay! Talk about naive! Anyway, that weekend I met him at the station…at this time I was living with just my father (my mother left home in 1965), and there was no way I was telling him I was going out with a guy…and we cabbed it into The Cross to this VERY ritzy restaurant called “Mrs Beeton’s Tent”. I’d never been to such a sophisticated…and expensive… place, so was a bit dazzled by it all. Anyway, we got a cab to go home, and he was holding my hand in the back seat. All I could think was…what’s going to happen from here…what am I expected to do! If he asks me home, I’ll go…just to see what happens! The cab got back to Kogarah, and dropped us off at a small park in the main street. He grabbed me by the arm, and started pulling me towards the toilet block, telling me he couldn’t take me home, as he lived with his mother! A toilet block for my first sexual experience with a guy was NOT the romantic experience I was expecting, so broke his grip, said “my father’s expecting me home!” and fled up the street. Missed opportunities! Oh well, such is the life of the shy and naive! Not surprisingly, Barry never spoke to me again, and caught a later bus home from that time on.. When I think about it now, I just shake my head. Considering how outrageous I was to become…I can’t believe my actions that night!

Just after this I started renting with friends in Granville. It was around this time that I started buying bits and pieces of gay porn, and buying “Campaign” newspaper (it became a magazine at a later date). One old closeted gay guy I worked with at Pellegrini & Co knew I was gay, and he evidently wasn’t the only one. My flatmates took me to a party at the home of two gay guys they knew…John & Ray. They had me sussed out in the blink of an eye, but I ignored their innuendo and sly comments and continued to deny it. My flatmates found out by mistake when I went to Campbelltown in the latter half of the 70s to help my step-brothers (he also later turned out to be gay) wife who had had a stroke. I asked my housemates to bring up some clothes for me as I was staying a while, and…much to my horror, and despite a phone plea to ignore the magazines in the drawer (like that was going to happen!)…they unearthed my stash of gay porn mags, and actually kept hush about it until after I came out. In the interim, I had sex with one girl…Veronica…a friend of my female housemate, and who had a young daughter who actually idolised me…just to make sure I wasn’t straight!After having to fantasize about a man to get to orgasm with her, I think the dye was pretty well set…though Barry may have seen Kharma at work, as I shouted her a very expensive meal at the Millionaires Club in Darlinghurst on our first date, and she said no to sex as she wasn’t on the pill…that came after our second date. Yet I still didn’t come out, despite knowing for sure.

Me just before leaving for Melbourne at the Capitan Torres restaurant in Sydney circa 1978

However, circumstances were about to present me with the window of opportunityI needed, and the wherewithal to come crashing out of my closet!

In late 1978 my father committed suicide in bushland near his home in Vincentia, on the NSW south coast.. I am not going to go into details of life with my father, but suffice it to say it was tense. I cried a few crocodile tears, then clicked my heels and rejoiced. My sense of freedom at last was overwhelming! I don’t know what I would have done if this situation hadn’t presented itself. I could never have openly come out to him, as the repercussions could have been dire. As it was, I was moving further and further away…in a relationship sense…from all my family (I am not going into the complexities here, but…oh boy!) so it is possible that to live my own life, and be who I had to be, I would have cut them all off earlier than I did…or maybe Melbourne would have happened anyway, irrespective of anything, and I would just have cut them out of my life. I guess the simple fact was that I was an outcast…the black sheep of my family. One way or another…I really didn’t give a fuck!

In the middle of 1980, the retail company I worked for – Pellegrini & Co Pty Ltd – asked me if I would be interested in going to Melbourne and troubleshooting two stores they had down there. I jumped at the chance. So I flew to Melbourne, set up house in Cumming St, West Brunswick, and started to set in motion the cogs that would change my life, starting a whole new phase that would take me in directions I could never have imagined.

Now, this was no easy matter. Cogs can be complicated mechanisms. The two stores – one in the Myer Centre and one in Hardware Street were in a mess, and by the time Christmas 1980 rolled around, I had not even started having any social life, let alone coming out and banging my way through Melbourne! That was to come! After spending that Christmas and Boxing Day on my own with a bottle of whisky, I decided I needed to do something about it! But what? I went through the classifieds and social group listings in the gay press, mentally started ticking or crossing them out, then going through a process of elimination with the ticked ones, according to where I thought I might or might not fit in. One group seemed to stand out – Acceptance Gay Catholics. I knew not only all the ins and outs of the Catholic Church…but I managed businesses for a Catholic retailer. Seemed like a match made in heaven, so to speak! So I made a phone call, found out whose home the next First Friday Mass was held at, and the next First Friday found me heading out to suburbia to Max’s house for my first gay outing. I told no one I was not yet out, and not being from Melbourne they wouldn’t know if I was or not. Right up to the day I left Melbourne no one I knew was any the wiser.

So the guys all started piling in…and not exactly a pack of spunks, though a couple of lookers amongst them. Turns out the Servite Fathers conducted the masses for them. Not being under the jurisdiction of the local bishop, they were free to do what they liked.

A clone is born…Cumming St West Brunswick 1981.

After the mass there was a meal, then we hit Melbourne for a night out. My first gay club…The University Club in Swanston St. It was gay there every Friday and Saturday night. Started dancing with the guys from the group, and decided to play it safe by dancing with, then going home with, one of the older, plainer guys. At the grand age of 25 I was about to have my first gay sexual experience. It wasn’t the bells, whistles and fireworks I was expecting! In fact…it was a total dud!

Frank, naturally thrilled to bits to have a quite handsome bit of fluff come on to him (actually he made the first move – on the dancefloor! I wasn’t experienced enough to know that if you weren’t really interested, you said a polite “no thanks” and moved onto the next). I didn’t want to seem rude, so said yes when he invited me home, despite fancying a couple of the younger guys more. A steep learning curve here! So, Frank had a car and offered me a night at his place. I can’t remember where he lived now, but it was quite a drive out of the Melbourne CBD. No sooner was I in the car than he had my cock out, and out it remained all the way to his place, despite several near misses due to his…distraction! I often wonder what other drivers thought as Frank’s head disappeared from sight at every red light! Once we got indoors, I decided the ball was in his court and I would leave it up to him to drive proceedings. He assumed I was a young slut and would know how all the mechanisms of gay sex unfolded. Frank was also a bit old and stale, and not the most sexually adventurous person to go home with. From my perspective, I wouldn’t even be leaving the starters blocks with this one. Not an auspicious beginning to my gay sex life, having held myself back for so long. The next morning, it was breakfast, then finding out that I would be getting myself back into the city…on a train. Well, fuck you too, Frank!

At an Acceptance function just prior to returning to Sydney. Fred Diamond (left), Max (Centre) and me.

I started attending not just the First Friday Masses, but Sunday Evening masses as well, held in the Holy Trinity Catholic Church in North Fitzroy, and any of the other Acceptance social occasions that cropped up on the calendar. Thankfully, Frank attended pretty well none of these with any regularity, so it was quite a long time before I ran into him again. In the interim, I found out from Fred – we’ll get to Fred shortly – that he and the other young guys at the University Club that night were quite surprised to see me go home with him. Learn to say no is the first rule of survival on the gay scene!. So over the next few months I met the other members of Acceptance through the masses, or parties in their homes, and get-togethers in a few local eateries, and gay venues such as The Laird Hotel in Collingwood, Smarties Nightclub in North Melbourne, and Pokies, a Sunday night drag venue in St Kilda. My evil plan was working…I was starting to lead a gay life!

In the meantime, I wanted the world to know I was gay. I wrote to my ex-Granville flatmates and ‘fessed up…only to find out that they had known since the night they packed my luggage for Campbelltown. They had met my mother, who I had only just been reunited with prior to coming to Melbourne. On a visit to see her, they notified me by mail, they had accidentally outed me, thinking that I had notified her at the same time as them! They also informed me that she already suspected that I was gay, though she never brought the subject up with me. Years later, back in Sydney, I made no effort to hide my sexuality from her, though on a mother/son lunch in the city one day, she informed me that she blamed herself for it. It became a moot point between us, and she has never really reconciled herself to it. Tough shit! I wasn’t taking a step back for anyone!

After my rather unsettling encounter with Frank, where nothing more exciting than some oral happened, things went from bad to worse. I fell in love with Fred, who edited the Acceptance newsletter, and did a gossip column under the pseudonym of Jodi A Frean. Fred and I had a difficult sex life for the 6 months we were together, and being the innocent I was, I never picked up on the signals about his sexuality. Firstly, he was into light S&M…at least I knew that was, thanks to reading “The Joy Of Gay Sex” before venturing into the Gay void…and secondly…he was a beat quean! He, Danny (who was the second man to fuck me, and went to it like a rabbit on heat) and Jim (who gave me a handjob in the shower, after a swim at a beach house we went to for an overnight stay) were the only three Acceptance members I got off with. Another, Tony, who I should have been more attuned to, as he was more my type, had a crush on me, which I suspected, but unfortunately never followed up on.

At a Mass at my flat in West Brunswich, a very handsome man…Barry (I know…the same names seem to keep cropping up in my life)…caught my eye. He stayed after everyone else left. We chatted, he helped clean up, we drank some more wine, and ended up in the bedroom, where he had the great distinction of being the first man to fuck me. The sheer eroticism and intensity of getting fucked blew my mind! I took to it like a duck to water, and never looked back!

So, that was the start of my sex life. The next thing to do was to expand my horizons. A lot of thought went into it…I wasn’t a risk-taker so the beats held no appeal, no did the shadowy world of the sauna. I had been…unnecessarily… steeling and prodding myself to go to a nightclub in St Kilda called “Mandate”. It was to be another life-changing experience! I was terrified when I ventured there for the first time. It was unlike any nightclub I had been to before in that it didn’t have an entry where you just walked in. The door was closed, so I went and stood on the oppisite side of the street to see what was going on. It didn’t take long for it to dawn on me that, after watching several patrons arrive, that one knocked to gain entry. A security measure, obviously. So, over I go, knock on the door to find that a tiny window in the door opened, and I was being scrutinised by a drag queen. In my clone gear I obviously passed muster, as the door opened, I paid my entry, and up the stairs I went (NOTE: it was a good deal later that I found out that there were also under-stairs activities…though not my scene).

With Glenn W, the Sydney guy, at an Acceptance function. I foolishly allowed him to talk me into returning to Sydney…a mistake for both of us!

Here, I entered a world of men, and music, that set my heart blazing. There was a bar area to the left of the stairs, to the right was a communal area with a barred cruising area surrounding it, and to the rear was a copper dance floor that was to be pretty well my sole obsession over many, nany visits there. I loved Mandate. I loved its masculinity,  its testosterone-charged atmosphere, the pure maleness of it. If I had to imagine Nirvana in these early coming out days, Mandate was it and in the not too-distant future, the Midnight Shift in Sydney when I returned to my roots. I had my first pick-ups there, had my first public blow-job on the edge of the dance floor, met some wonderful men including a man called Brian Pryke who I had the most esoteric sexual experience with (and communicated with for a while after returning to Sin City), and some of my worst sexual experiences including a Dutch pilot who had the most disgusting dose of smegma I have ever encountered, and left me with the gift of anal warts. We live and learn! At Mandate I was introduced to dance floor filling icons such as Lime, Phyllis Nelson, Carol Jiani, 202 Machine, Shirley Lites, Tantra, KC and the Sunshine Band, Patrick Cowley, Sylvester, Divine, Paul Parker, Seventh Avenue, Peter Griffin, Hall & Oates, and many other artists who started my ongoing love for dance music. The wonderful nights I had in Mandate will live in my memory forever.

I continued my work and socialising with Acceptance (including some cross-denominational “spiritual shenanjgans” with a member of Angays (the Anglican version of Acceptance) until I returned to Sydney. They gave me a wonderful set of friends that kept me ocvupied constantly, and a rather frantic social life. I think that what disturbed me the most about being an out gay man in a Catholic social group was the “subtle” stigmatisation that we just seemed to accept. Though the Servite Fathers, who celebrated our home masses, were unequivocal in their support for the gay community, the particularly internalised discrimination and alienation that was integral within the Catholic church itself,  seemed to be tolerated more so than finding ways to support us. I always felt that much of the support came more from obligation than caring and understanding.

And while talking of the Servite Fathers, I must relate a home mass story here. First Friday Masses were shared amongst the various homes of Acceotance members. When I volunteered my flat in West Brunswick for one, I found I faced a dilemma. Confessions before mass were usually held in a private room, and the only one in my flat was the bedroom. The entire back of my bedroom door was covered in pictures of men in various poses and states of undress…mainly naked…and erect! In my wisdom, I decided that this was not an appropriate thing to have on display in a room where gay men were confessing their sins. Rather than remove all the pictures, I decided to tape a large sheet of brown paper over them.  Evidently during one of the confessions, the tape gave way, causing the paper to fall to the floor. Evidently there was a brief pause in the confession as the priest eyed off the door full of naked males, then continued on as if nothing had happened. The exposition was the cause of much hilarity for the rest of the night, with the priest commenting on my “good taste in art” as he departed.

The only other churches that catered to us were St Francis in Lonsdale St, and Holy Trinity Church in North Fitzroy. And even then we could only attend masses at certain times on Sundays. It felt very alienating, and was one of the reasons for me joining the Gay Rights Lobby when I returned to Sydney. For me personally, well….I was an Athiest disguised as a Catholic…just to secure myself a social life, though going through the actions of being a Catholic, and arguing stronly against the banality of much of Catholic belief and doctrine at every opportunity, which caused me no qualms. Only once was I dressed down regarding my staunchly held opinions, and I was stronly supported by the group I was with, as they did not believe in blind faith. There is hope yet in the world.

I went on to become Secretary on the Acceptance committee, and also a member of their social activities sub-committee. But I was about to make a really fucked-up decision that was about to yet again change my life’s direction.

It was at an Acceptance barbecue that I was to meet Glenn W, who was visiting Melbourne, and lived in Waverton in Sydney. It was a period where the Pellegrini head office in Sydney were quietly hassling for my return. Glenn quite swept me off my feet, and after several months of correspondence and with a position as assistant to the General Manager offered to me back in Sydney I rather foolishly decided to return.

So ended my wonderful, unforgettable life in Melbourne. Plans were afoot for a massed goodbye for me at Tullamarine, but to avoid what would have been a very tearful occasion, I quietly flew out the night before.

Glenn W turned out to be a psychopath! Another disastrous love encounter! Would I never learn! But that is a Sydney story! As is the early days of HIV, already being hinted at in the Melbourne gay press. Hard times ahead…and just as I was starting to enjoy the life that “coming out” was presenting to me. The Sydney story was about to begin!

Tim Alderman

(C) 2015

Political Commentary: Good Government Starts Today…Not!

Article, General Interest, Opinion Piece, Political, , , , , , ,

Well, the spill didn’t rid us of the cause of our bad government, though with 40% of his backbench voting in favour of spilling him as PM, Tony Abbott has had a big shock…though I fear not big enough! Not only is he extremely unpopular with the voters – he jeeps insisting he was voted in as PM, when in fact it is his PARTY (LNP) that is voted in, and as leader he becomes PM by default – but a large portion of his own party don’t support him! It’s a fiasco of the highest degree!

To make it worse, his Cabinet (Frontbench) have supported him, though in some cases, I would say, reluctantly! If there had been a vote in favour of the spill, it would have been interesting to see who would have pushed him into his grave – where he is toppling anyway – and taken over as PM”. So, we are stuck with an idealistic, ineffective, and unpopular PM, likewise for Treasurer, likewise for Education minister, likewise for Health minister, likewise for Immigration minister, and likewise for Welfare minister! Makes you wonder, doesn’t it! Philip Ruddock, a long serving Liberal minister going back to the Howard era, and who did nothing to halt the spill motion has suddenly been “retired” as party whip. Has Abbott seen him as a turncoat?

Despite not having the numbers to create the spill, it is touted that Abbott will not be around for a lot longer. His inability to be likeable, his low ranking in the polls, the voter backlash against him and his government, his inability to get the budget through the senate without either watering down policies, or dropping them altogether, the lack if support from his own backbench, and accusations of his lack of accessibility to his ministers, and giving his Chief of Staff, Peta Credlin, too much authority are pretty much sounding his death knell. It is being touted that the damage is so bad that this will be yet another one-term LNP government. Pass the poison chalice, please! “Captains calls”, as Abbott likes to describe any motion he independently puts forward ,without advice from his colleagues, have been nothing short of disastrous! Captains calls on the Medicare rebate (http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-01-20/shelving-medicare-rebate-cut-not-captains-call-abbott/6028376), the absolutely ludicrous granting if a knighthood to Prince Phillip – not to mention the actual reintroduction of this antiquated system of honours – which was both farcical and embarrassing (http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/newspapers-nationwide-condemn-tony-abbotts-captains-call-20150127-12yrzy.html), a “phantom” call on Renewable Energy Targets – considering how much international stick he has received on dumping the Carbon Tax, which nit only worked, but brought in revenue (http://reneweconomy.com.au/2015/labor-accuses-abbott-of-phantom-captains-call-on-renewables), and the absolutely absurd news today that he wanted to commit 3,500 Australian troops on the ground in Syria to stop ISOS advance, without the combined aid of NATO and US forces, which would have been disastrous for the Australian troops (http://www.pedestrian.tv/news/arts-and-culture/report-reveals-tony-abbott-suggested-a-solo-austra/ab72fdc7-babf-41f7-84da-ee887b87dec9.htm). Please note: this man is currently “running” our country!

Of course, we can add to this his rude and unjust attack on a report into our abuse of the rights of asylum seekers in detention centres released by the Australian Human Rights Commission’s Gillian Trigg, which caused a flood of controversy (http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-01-21/bradley-triggs-and-human-rights-why-attacking-her-is-wrong/6030256) and so it goes on.

After a week of supposed “good government” (Heaven knows what we have had since his election!), Lyn Bender, a freelance writer, wrote a piece comparing Abbott’s blunders to what Sigmund Freud (she is a psychologist herself) would have to say about them. It is humorous….but also revealing;

“1. The suppository of wisdom

“No one – however smart, however well-educated, however experienced – is the suppository of all wisdom.”
Sigmund says: I am totally fixated at the anal stage.

2. Good government starts today

“All of us are determined to lift our game and the fundamental point I make is that the solution to all of these things is good Government, and good Government starts today.”
Sigmund says: My Government has been total crap until now.

3.“We are not the Labor Party”

“I want to make this very simple point: we are not the Labor Party, we are not the Labor Party and we are not going to repeat the chaos and the instability of the Labor years.”
Sigmund says: We don’t have a clue who we are, but we are not them and anything bad is all their fault.

4.Tony Abbott’s “knightmare”

Tony Abbott awards a knighthood to Prince Phillip on Australia Day.

Sigmund says: Australia is a British colony and I am a proud Englishman; I prefer the last century – or, better still, the one before – and want to go back there.

5. The Minister for Women and the carbon tax

“… as many of us know,women are particularly focused on the household budget and the repeal of the carbon tax means a $550-a-year benefit for the average family.”
Sigmund says: Women’s place is in the home – shopping, cooking and ironing their man’s shirts – while men go out and run the world. And stuff the environment.

6. Prime minister for Aboriginal Affairs

“It is my hope that I could be, not just a prime minister, but a prime minister for Aboriginal Affairs. The first I imagine that we have ever had.”
On the morning of the spill, Abbott ignored the “Freedom Summit” of Indigenous people camped outside Parliament – as did the media – as he strode off to fight the spill. He paid no attention to the Aboriginal grandmothers protesting increasing rates of child removal.

Sigmund says: I said what I said to become prime minister — I’d sell my arse to be PM! The fate of Indigenous people means nothing to me in comparison to remaining in power. Their problems are not my problem.

7. No guilt about children in detention

Responding angrily to a damning Human Rights Commission report on the damage done by Australia to children in detention, Abbott declared:

“I reckon that the Human Rights Commission ought to be sending a note of congratulations to Scott Morrison saying ‘Well done mate because your actions have been very good for the human rights and the human flourishing of thousands of people’.”
When asked if he felt any guilt over the horrifying findings in the AHRC report, including the heartbreaking pictures of young children in locked confinement, Abbott replied: “None whatsoever.”

In fact, said Abbott, it was the Human Rights Commission that should be “ashamed of itself”.

Sigmund says: Thus spake the narcissist, in deep denial, projecting his feelings of guilt and shame.

Repressed denied impulses can break out, in spite of attempts to suppress them. That is why Tony Abbott keeps accidentally showing his true colours despite all his protestations.

The Liberal Party can now barely contain its rebellion, even as it protests its unity. The Party doesn’t need a facelift — it needs a heart transplant, writes columnist Waleed Aly.

Tony Abbott has revealed himself to be self-centred, cruel, mean, petty and concerned only with his own survival.

But he now claims to have changed, overnight. He has declared that the spill motion experience has been a chastening experience and that he has learned and is listening.

But his subsequent actions – such as blaming the Opposition for a jobs “holocaust” and using parliamentary privilege to politicise and prejudice an alleged terror attack investigation – show this up for the lie that, of course, it was always going to be:”

(https://mobile.twitter.com/lynestel)

After the sacking of Philip Ruddock as Chief Party Whip, Bob Ellis from the Independent Australia had the following to say on what nows seems the rapid demise of Abbott as PM

“With Tony Abbott sacking Philip Ruddock as Liberal Party chief whip yesterday, it is certain Tony Abbott has weeks, not months, left in the top job, says Bob Ellis.

In his film of Richard III, Laurence Olivier, felled by arrows, writhes and twitches on the ground while Richmond’s soldiers jeer him. Tony Abbott is now in a similar twitching and writhing.

The numbers on Monday doomed him, but the Ruddock sacking brought forward the day of his execution. It may occur, now, before Chan and Sukumaran’s, in ten or 11 days’ time.

What is going on in the Prime Minister’s head? If the sneered response “brain damage” can be discarded – and maybe it can’t – it has to be to do with his Catholic upbringing and the consequent abiding habits of mind.

Under Catholicism, you ‘wipe the slate clean’ by Confession, and a number of Hail Marys, and all is well. You admit, with words, your sin, and expiate your sin with words and are then, being cleansed, allowed to sin again.

And to Tony Abbott, the words matter, only the words matter, and the deeds that follow can contradict them.

There will be “no more captain’s picks”; yet the meeting was brought forward, Credlin retained and Ruddock removed. He said “good government starts today”, and a shambles ensues. It is revealed that child abuse occurred on Christmas Island, and like the Catholic church, he denies it, says he feels no guilt “whatsoever” and proposes to martyr Gillian Triggs for unveiling the truth: suicidal children, buggered by their guardians and bashed for talking about it.

And now we see Ruddock, past hero of ‘border protection’, auteur of the 2001 win, sacked.

It was almost certainly to do with his expression, and body language, when he revealed on Sunday it was Abbott, not he, who had brought the meeting forward, and it was, though he did not say is, a ‘captain’s call’.

It is likely now that Turnbull has about 47 votes, and five or six more will come across by the middle of next week.

And another spill vote will be put the following Monday, or Tuesday, or Thursday.

And Abbott and Hockey will go to the back bench and an early election occur, if the poll numbers surge, and they will, towards Turnbull, around Anzac Day, on April 30 perhaps; or soon after a well-crafted Budget comes down, and the Coalition’s numbers reach 49.

It is certain now Abbott has weeks, not months. He has tried the patience again of those who doubted him already and lost their regard forever. And now he is done and finished.

And writhing on the battleground.

(https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/tony-abbott-the-termination,7371)

The Sydney Morning Herald summed it up very nicely in this piece from the 15th February 2015

“That being said, Abbott’s ploy makes good political sense: in the face of terrible polling, rising unemployment, slowing growth, parliamentary incompetence and internal discord, the only card Abbott can play is the one marked “I’m keeping you safe from the scary things!”

The message ends with an assurance that part of that safety hinges on the successful passage of the government’s still-unpassed suite of laws forcing internet service providers to retain information on what their users do online – which, as attorney-general George Brandis has made clear, is an unfortunate but necessary step for our national security.

And to be fair, he’s half right: it’s definitely unfortunate. Luckily, it’s also definitely not necessary!”

http://www.smh.com.au/comment/view-from-the-street/view-from-the-street-tony-abbott-declares-no-more-mr-nice-guy-20150215-13fa8y.html?utm_source=social&utm_medium=facebook&utm_campaign=nc&eid=socialn%3Afac-13omn1676-edtrl-other%3Annn-17%2F02%2F2014-edtrs_socialshare-all-nnn-nnn-vars-o

But there us worse to come yet with the potential signing of the TPP – Trans Pacific Partnership, which will, inevitably, prove disastrous for Australian business, manufacturers and consumers as the big countries boss us around. There us currently a big hue & cry over it (http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-10-25/multi-lateral-trade-deal-inches-closer-with-sydney-meeting/5840762).

Details if the trade agreement have been kept secret from the Australian public, and The Greens have raised the issue in the Senate and requested the papers be made available for scrutiny (http://peter-whish-wilson.greensmps.org.au/content/media-releases/greens-continue-seek-end-secrecy-over-china-free-trade-deal)

So, I have waited two weeks for good government to start. It hasn’t! Nor, in my opinion, will it! We have a dud PM, and a good-as-dead government! Flogging a dead horse will not save it! It’s time for the voters to say enough is enough! Call another election and let true good government rule!

Tim Alderman
(C) 2015

P.S. Cartoons are too numerous to count, but here is an example:

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If you put lipstick on a pig it is still a pig.

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Political Commentary: The Spill

Article, General Interest, Opinion Piece, Political, , , , , ,

I always try to keep politics out of my blog – considering religion and sex are there, a bit pointless really – but considering the current circus in both Stare and Federal politics in Australia, it is impossible to remain indifferent. Also, as a writer, it frustrates me to have articles in my head that are not being committed to hard-copy.

So a run-down on current events. The conservative right-wing LNP(Liberal National Party) have been ousted in both Victoria and Queensland recently, and are pretty well on the nose in other stares, and likely to be voted out at the next elections held. The Federal LNP government is in total disarray at the moment. It is a mess that is slowly being cleaned up, and the lessons learned are many!

Australia tends to be a bit of a laconic country, the people easy-going, not tending towards great political experiments, but rather politicians who will just do what they are supposed to do…run the country without corruption or ridicule, with fairness and equity for all. The era of “the fair go for all” is not over yet! In my own state of Queensland, this hope of fair, equitable government was destroyed by the recently ousted Newman government, headed by Premier Campbell “Can Do” Newman, who swept into power three years ago on a massive swing against the Labor government that effectively left us without an opposition party, opening the doors to excess and self-indulgent government in the LNP almost unparalleled. One of their first actions – granting themselves massive pay increases, while regaling us with tales of what an economic mess the state was in. This was followed up – not in order – by destroying both health and education systems, trying to force doctors onto contracts, the disassembling of sexual health clinics, disability services, cuts to arts funding, withdrawal of funding to support services, the instigation of new laws without consultation, the dismantling of the state corruption watchdog, increasing police powers, proposed legislation to allow mining near our protected Great Barrier Reef, proposed dredging in the reefs to allow ships to cross the reef, and the promised drop in our electricity bills that never happened etc etc.The list goes on and on! However, the sale (jokingly referred to as renting out) of our public assets was the straw that broke the camels back! The Premier himself was an arrogant, bullying man, full of his own self-importance. Three years was enough. We gave them a hammering two weeks ago that it will take them a long time to forget. His party not only lost power, he lost his own seat of Ashgrove. An instance if kharma at work! The second one-term government to be flushed down the toilet!

The political landscape has changed. Once upon a time we gave a governing party – irrespective of what doubts we may have had – two, even three, terms to get it right. Not any more! We are all so aware of the bullshit now, that all politicians are tarred with the same brush, they never keep their promises, and they are not to be trusted! But then, we have the two-party-preferred model here, and it is rapidly proving ineffective!

So the current circus with our Federal LNP government in Canberra comes as no shock to us! Also coming into power – by a VERY small majority – after a backlash against our Rudd/Guillard/Rudd Prime Ministerial fiasco (whereby our OM changed three times in six years due to party infighting and power-mongering, and as the result of some badly to instituted policies early on after their election, due to a rush to fulfill their electoral promises. Kevin Rudd himself, though popular, was a bad choice as PM, as he loved to micro-manage, and took more portfolios upon himself than he could manage. He also liked to spend a lot of time outside the country! Julia Guillard was a hard, pragmatic woman who stood up for herself against misogyny, and an unbreakable glass ceiling) has proven himself the class clown – though on an international stage! Being leader of the opposition for a long time, he has always been hungry for the position, and having been handed it on a silver platter, he is not willing to let it go. An ultra-conservative right-winger, a Roman Catholic, a climate change denier, anti-social justice, misogynist, a follower and idoliser of the philosophies of the (nut case) B.A. Santamaria, inept, stumbling and mumbling his Speedo-clad torso from one – embarrassing disaster to another on the world stage, disliked and alienated by other world leaders (who else could have a G20 Conference for world leaders in his own country, and in his opening address complain about local policy issues that are just that…local!) he has managed to lead his Cabinet (consisting of one woman, while making himself Minister For Women) and backbench almost back to the 1950s, an era he feels very comfortable in.

So far they have managed to disassemble our Carbon Tax policy (despite the fact it worked), our Mining Tax policy (pleasing no one except mining companies), we have no Minister for Science, no Minister for ageing or Disabilities. Funding has been slashed to the CSIRO (our internationally recognised science and research institute), our public broadcasters the ABC & SBS, funding to arts and cultural groups, medical and educational funding etc etc. in their first budget, they tried to dismantle Medicare (our “free” health care system that is actually funded through an income tax levy) by introducing a $7 GP co-payment, increasing costs of PBS (Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, which gives us subsidised medicines), decreasing pensions (thus leaving many in dire poverty), changing how Centrelink and the dole works, the proposed deregulation of university fees (opening the doors to students loading themselves with $100,000 degrees and huge, unpayable HECS debts), a Paid Parental Leave Scheme tagged as welfare for the wealthy, unsustainable child-care costs, the supposed Stop-the-Boats…Operation Sovereign Borders policies, which has seen us treat asylum seekers like third world “illegal immigrants” and again the list goes on and on. Most of this stupidity has been stopped by a strong opposition and cross-bench. Their pandering to mining and big business has been truly out of control! Of most recent repute are Abbott’s reintroduction of knighthoods (the cause of much hilarity online), and his ludicrous, humiliating granting of an Australian knighthood to Prince Philip, The Duke of Edinburgh! Talk about breaking the camels back! In the face of a neverending string of farces that have reflected badly on all of us, there has finally been a backbench revolt. In recent polls, the Labor party lead (in two-party preferred) 57 to 43. As preferred PM, Bill Shorten (the Labor leader) leads by 44/27. This could not be worst for the LNP government, so a change of PM and Cabinet is strongly on the cards!

Though that it will make any difference in the polls…I doubt it! Even if he wins the spill, his name is still mud, and it is highly unlikely he will go into the next election as PM. And whether they like to admit it or not, they are highly likely to be our next one-term government. I have never seen a worst performing PM, or government, in all my 43 years as a voter! I have never seen Australia more abused or humiliated, our reputation for equality and fairness in tatters, our belief in looking after those less able – low-income, homeless, disabled, elderly, indigenous – badly eroded, our cost-of-living rising while all the time – 18-months into their election – the LNP still like to bleat on about it all being Labor’s fault, that the national deficit is all Labor’s fault despite the LNP having more than doubled it. There us one thing they have taught us for sure – when it comes to fixing budgets, you make the elderly, disabled and low-incomed pay your way out of it, as the upper and of town – banking, big corporations – and mining companies get richer and richer. A car industry…we no longer have one! Whatever they choose to do, it is never going to put money in my pocket!

So bring on the spill, though what we really need is not a change of PM, but a change of government!

Tim Alderman
(C) 2015

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Australian Icons:The Ferocious Australian Drop Bear

Article, General Interest, History, Humour, Travelogue, , , , ,

phascolarctos malum or Thylarctos plummetus, depending on what area they are from.

According to Wikipedia (http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drop_bear) “A dropbear or drop bear is a fictitious Australian marsupial.[1] Drop bears are commonly said to be unusually large, vicious, carnivorous marsupials related to koalas (although the koala is not a bear) that inhabit treetops and attack their prey by dropping onto their heads from above.[2][3] They are an example of local lore intended to frighten and confuse outsiders and amuse locals, similar to the jackalope, hoop snake, wild haggis or snipe.

Various methods suggested to deter drop bear attacks include placing forks in the hair, having Vegemite or toothpaste spread behind the ears or in the armpits, urinating on oneself, and only speaking English in an Australian accent.”

I have never really looked into the lore behind our local super marsupial…the drop bear. However, this morning – it being Australia Day here – I jokingly made a reference to them in a Facebook post, saying to be careful, as I had seen them heading into the bush with a slab (carton of beer). Then my writer instinct kicked in, and I wondered just how had this mythology around the drop bear started, and just how ingrained into our iconology had it become.

Us Aussies find the whole tourist scare “campaign” about drop bears hilarious. I have a friend – an Australian – who lives in NYC and has a lot of American friends. He gets great delight out of scaring them to death, relating stories about the dangers of drop bears if touristing here, backed up with comments from us over here. I tend to wonder about the gullibility of people.

The wonderful thing about the drop bear myth is how it has come to be backed up with some pretty credible research from believable organisations and publications. It would seem that everyone wants to be in on the joke. This from the Australian Museum:

http://australianmuseum.net.au/Drop-Bear

If ever there was an institution to give legitimacy to a subject, anything with the word “museum” in it would be right up there. Also, some “serious” research work from the “Australian Geographic”:

http://www.australiangeographic.com.au/news/2013/03/drop-bears-target-tourists,-study-says/

The research, done in a NSW drop bear Hot-Spot, has found that talking with an Australian accent helps keep them at bay.

Needless to say, spoof sights for drop bears have cropped up as well, and one has to wonder just how many overseas tourists have clicked on this link and booked a Drop Bear Adventure. Too funny.

http://www.dropbearadventures.com.au/drop-bear/

And this from Buzzfeed:

http://www.buzzfeed.com/cconnelly/10-terrifying-facts-about-the-australian-dropbear-s3x

There are also three apps to play games of Drop Bear.

Drop Bears are a great example not only of the often perverse Australian sense of humour, but is one of our endearing qualities…not taking ourselves too seriously, and liking to laugh at ourselves.

This link has someone even creating a history for them:

https://picsandstuff.wordpress.com/tag/drop-bear/

But perhaps more than anything is the proliferation of photos and graphics that depict drop bears. You can never say Australians don’t have a sense of humour!

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Tim Alderman
(C) 2015

Destroyed (or Almost) Icons: The Sad Life and Demise of a Majestic Cinema.

Article, General Interest, History, , , ,

What a sad story on the life of what was a majestic cinema. The old Mecca cinema in Kogarah, New South Wales, which was affiliated to the Mecca cinema (originally The Savoy) in Hurstville, New South Wales.

I used to go the beautiful Savoy cinema in Hurstville, as I’m sure my cousins Donna and Jeffrey would have done, as they wereliving in Riverwood at the time. My father moved us to Ocean St in Kogarah – the ugly apartment building is still there on the corner – in 1966, and I went to the Mecca there to see movies. In fact, I had a dispute with the ticket-seller on one occasion, after the new decimal currency had been introduced, and some of the coinage…I can’t remember which – had a double value until the coins went out of circulation. As a business they took the coins at the lower value. As a consumer I took them at the higher, and by law they had to take the coins at the higher value. She was trying to tell me I didn’t have enough for the ticket, and I was arguing that my handful of mixed currency was enough -to the cent/penny. I won! Lol

http://pastlivesofthenearfuture.com/2014/09/29/mecca-theatreresidential-kogarah-nsw/
That the two cinemas ended up in the hands of a “cinema Paedophile – follow the links from the first story – is indeed disturbing, though in a way adds to the colourful history of the cinemas.
Originally The Savoy in Hurstville – which became The Mecca – shows the very sad demise of the Grand Dames of Art Deco cinemas as the advent of television put a temporary halt – or rather a slowing – on cinema audiences. This was the Savoy on its opening night in 1937…

http://pastlivesofthenearfuture.com/2014/07/29/opening-night-at-the-hurstville-savoy-1937/
And this, sadly, is what it became…

http://pastlivesofthenearfuture.com/2015/01/22/intencitytarget-hurstville-nsw/
Just as an aside, right next to my home in Samford Rd, Gaythorne, there is a building that used to be a Civic cinema, but which is now a row of nearly all “For Lease” business premises. Another sad loss.

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Tim Alderman (C) 2015

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Daily (Or When The Mood Takes Me) Gripe : Let The Sydney Gay Ghetto Go!

Article, biography, Gay Interest, General Interest, History, Opinion Piece, , , , , ,

Some people just can’t let the past go, or have an inability to see when something has passed it’s use-by date! I have too many friends who keep reiterating that they wish the Sydney gay ghetto was still intact and functioning.

Let’s have a look at the (unspoken) history behind the formation, growth and death of the gay ghetto in Sydney. Historically, Kings Cross and Darlinghurst have always been protective enclaves for the dispossessed, eccentric, minority groups and the unclassifiable citizens of Sydney. Perhaps, initially, because of its foundations in working class and poverty-stricken populations, and later on the underworld, gangsters and prostitution – including transgender – it has always had its roots in notoriety!

In the 70s and early 80s in Sydney, the gay citizens were looking for a space to band together, to avoid the illegalities of being homosexual, and the social stigmatisation that happened at that time as we became more brazen and outspoken about our sexuality. I remember visiting there with a female friend in the 70s – before my own coming out – and the roots of the community were there already with nightclubs and cafes, though homophobic attacks and vitriol were  prevalent as well. It was a wall-less ghetto in the making.

By the time the 80s rolled around, it was firmly established as a gay ghetto, ambling along Oxford St and its immediate environs, from Elizabeth St through to Paddington. The legalising of gay rights in 1982 brought around a boom in the area. The ghetto formed very much as a means for us to squeeze out the undesirables by a sheer force of numbers…and it worked. Any straight troublemaker coming onto our turf would have immediately felt threatened, and though violent attacks did occur, they were rare.

At its height, you could live within the ghetto and never move outside it. We had our nightclubs, pubs, cafes, restaurants, newspapers, magazines, bookstores, supermarkets, small businesses, doctors, dentists, optometrists, saunas, post office, houses, apartment buildings. A night out would involve a meal in a local cafe or restaurant, a visit to your pub of choice – about 9 in its heyday – then off to your nightclub of choice. In the early hours of the morning you could either stagger home via your favourite takeaway, or do a trip to your favourite sauna or backroom without ever being harassed. The ghetto was a security blanket.

During the HIV/AIDS epidemic of the 80s and 90s, it was a true blessing. Once again, you could live as a HIV person within the ghetto and be safe and protected. Within the boundaries of the ghetto were established our hospital and hospice care, our HIV/AIDS specialists and GP practices, our support groups such as ACON (AIDS Council of NSW), BGF (Bobby Goldsmith Foundation), CSN (Community support Network), ANKALI (emotional support), and the Positive Living Centres, as well as our advocacy groups such as PLWHA (People Living With HIV/AIDS), NAPWA (National Association of People with AIDS), our funeral directors, our church. We did our own fund-raising, and we supported each other through our pain and sorrow. Once again, it was a safety zone where the emaciated frames of those luving with AIDS could wonder without fear of derogatory remarks, hatred and harassment. In that zone we mourned, held our wakes, and looked for material and emotional support. Those religious groups such as the Festival of Light, who preached and promoted hatred towards us learnt the hard way about the strength and communication within the ghetto.

Fred Nile’s Cleansing March in the80s was a good example. Thinking his band of supporters would march unchallenged up Oxford St, he and they were in for a rude shock! From early in the morning on the day of the march, protestors, the gay community and its supporters started lining the length of the march. By the time the Rev Fred – with his cross-on-wheels – started marching up there, the footpaths, awnings and buildings along the route were packed to capacity with his detractors! The march, from his prospective, was an overwhelming humiliation, and failure! I remember seeing a car full of Tiwi Islanders who had evidently not been warned about how unpopular their beloved reverend was. They looked terrified for their very lives, overwhelmed as they were by the booing and vitriol of the massed ghettoites. I actually felt sorry for them!

However, in the midst of all this, other changes were taking place that were to instigate the downfall of the gay ghetto. Anti-discrimination laws came into play and all-male/female venues became – temporarily – illegal. Nightclubs like the Midnight Shift had to start letting women in, and once they started bringing their boyfriends and other straight male friends, the ambience of the clubs changed forever! And not in a good way! Many ghettoites who had been in the centre of the HIV/AIDS bonfire scattered to other states or to the far north of NSW. Indeed, by the time highly effective HIV antiretroviral regimes started in 1996, it was very much a decimated community, though the epidemic itself had moved on to the straight community, to drug-users and those that had the double-whammy of HIV and hepatitis. The myth of the “gay plague” was laid to rest for good!

But perhaps the greatest enemies of the ghetto was generational changes, social acceptance, and a movement away from the boundaries of the ghetto, a realisation the we no longer needed the safety and protection of the ghetto to live our lives. We dispersed to Newtown, Enmore, Erskinville, Camperdown, Leichhardt, Annandale, Alexandria, Pyrmont, Zetland, Moore Park, Surry Hills, Redfern and Summer Hill. We transformed areas into “Trendy” and moved away, in our hordes, from Oxford St. Yet, some pieces of our lives remained there – a few pubs and nightclubs, a few medical practices, but all-in-all, we moved on.

Darlinghurst and much of Paddington are now mere shadows of their former selves. A stroll down Oxford St now will reveal dozens of empty businesses, and those that do remain struggle for customers during the day. The nightclubs and pubs are now the enclaves of straight people, and a general feeling of desolation, violence, uncomfortable vibes, and unrest permeates the air. It is now, once again, a place where unsolicited violence can occur irrespective of your sexuality.

So the ghetto has outlived its usefulness, and is, to all intended purposes, dead! I can understand nostalgia, even fleeting yearnings. What I don’t get is an inability to accept the ravages of time, the changing dynamics of an area, the growth and development of populations, indeed diaspora! To those who wear blinkers, want the past to live on, the “good old days” to be a mantra for days gone by, I say…let it go! Enjoy the memories, but don’t wish for them to return. To deny yourself the insights of living in the “now” is to root yourself in a past that can never be repeated. Allow the ghetto to be swallowed by history, to takes its place in our memories as somewhere that we lived and enjoyed IN ITS TIME…and leave it there! Never let your yearning for the past, cause you to overlook the reality of now.

Tim Alderman
(C) 2015

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