There is nothing more vile or polarising than an online conversation thread about feminism.

When I was a teenager I read something wonderful and it stayed with me, the author’s name however did not. The internet attributes this vacant place in my brain to Rebecca West.

“I myself have never been able to find out precisely what feminism is: I only know that people call me a feminist whenever I express sentiments that differentiate me from a doormat.”

I am perturbed by the conflicting stories around whether Harper Lee actually consented to publication. And that plays with a bigger question in my mind about artist’s legacies and what happens to their unpublished or unreleased work posthumously.

As the irrefutable evidence of the effects of human causation of global warming through increasing production of greenhouse gasses gains traction,it seems that a new economic paradigm (other than growth) must be urgently considered. After all, it’s about the survival of the next generation(s).

When humanity becomes humane, starts listening to people, rather than propaganda, regimes that torture and control will be exposed and stopped. The psychiatric regime has been going on for over 200 in various countries, enabling genital mutilation on women who opposed their husbands, LSD testing in the 1960s, and various torturous procedures.
The people forcefully tested with insulin shock and LSD, haven’t received compensation, because our government declares the medical profession were allowed to torture people that way in the 1960s & 70s.
The people who are being currently subjected to torture by the psychiatric regime, are also unlikely to receive compensation, unless there is wide-spread condemnation for the psychiatric procedures forcefully done in our government’s name on innocent people as young as two and as old as people can be. Electroshock used on 4 year olds, pills fed daily to tranquilise two year olds. Not to mention what they do to people in their prime.
It is physically obvious what psychiatric torture does to people. It must be stopped.
How dare anyone think our country is a democracy when this is going on. How dare the organisations of festivals censor psychiatric survivors who speak out because of sponsorship deals. How dare the Australian people be so unaware of what is happening to their citizens.
The question is when? The answer should be now.

I am unable to think of a more difficult question.

Where are the Christian politicians who care for humanity rather than their own personal ambitions and pension?

This question is something that has caused me to lose sleep for many years.

We seem to be obsessed with them and I wonder if this speaks to our national character

I used to see a lot when I was a child and even though I’m in the garden a lot, they are not.

The is a unspoken assumption that questions require the mind to respond. We live in a world where the conceptual answer is no longer enough, rather the experiential or visceral response offers a different perspective .

Just a tongue-in-cheek way of getting to a productive discussion and maybe shaking some skeletons out of the cupboards and wardrobes.

In the mid 1970’s I heard a bureaucrat [Bob Lansdowne] argue that social change came from shifts in compassion or compulsion-he was discussing our relationship with Indonesia and argued that compassion was in short supply. He was suggesting that huge disparities in income and wealth in an increasingly open and global environment were a recipe for instability and conflict–and that we should be afraid of the consequences of failing to address it. His concern is even more relevant today.

I grew up in cities, but have lived in the provinces for over 20 years, and find it to be a refreshingly connected place to live. I rail against the snobbery of city folk towards ‘country folk’. We have just as many great ideas and cultural practises as cities do.