Thursday, August 23rd .....

We had the editor of the Launceston Examiner as our guest speaker at Rotary on Tuesday evening.  He gave us twenty minutes of the party line and then, foolishly, asked for questions.  Of course, we all wanted to know about media bias, how do they choose which Letters to the Editor get printed, if someone came with half a million dollars of advertising and wanted a specific editorial printed, what would happen, and so on.  Sturdily, he held to the fiction that his newspaper is independent (it’s part of the Fairfax stable and if Gina Rinehart took control, she would have him for dinner.)

One thing he did say was that he believes the centralisation of reporting staff would lead to better articles and, as if by magic, I had read one the previous Sunday in The Sunday Examiner.  Written by Sam de Brito of Fairfax Media, it set out to debunk some of the treasured little Aussie myths which bolster our self esteem and help us to understand our place in the world (the little Aussie battler, punching above our weight.

He starts on our athletes and the myth that they make great sacrifices and ‘do it for Australia.'

‘Please.  How many people get the taxpayer-funded opportunity to put their adult life on hold, cocooned in a state of arrested development while they fly around the world chasing a dream?’  It’s the parents of those ambitious, single-minded and selfish people who make the real sacrifices – of energy, time, money and fossil fuel.

He then takes a swipe at some other myths: We’re egalitarian ‘despite the vertiginous gap between rich and poor, the most concentrated media ownership on the planet and the fact we’re home to the richest woman on earth and still think she deserves a widdle tax break.’

We’re laid-back, yet we work the longest hours of any nation in the developed world’ (is this true?)

We’re bronzed aussies, yet 61% of Australians are either overweight or obese and we’re ranked the fifth fattest nation on earth.

We believe in a fair go, except if you’re a 13-year old Afghan boat person .  Or you’re a gay couple who wants to get married.  Or you’re disabled.  Or Aboriginal.  Or Muslim.

We get on with it, and don’t complain, yet perpetuate one of the most vexatious, self-centred talk-back cultures in the Western world.

I haven’t copied the whole article but you get the idea. I suppose people might say it’s easy to be negative but I’m enough of a cynic to enjoy when someone pricks the smug bubble in which too many of us seem to live.