Radio Australia Today Editorial
Archive for April, 2008
When Are Things Going to Improve?
30 April 2008
Some figures came out yesterday that showed that indigenous death rates in this century are still three times that of white people in most states and territories in Australia.
The average life expectancy of aborigines is still 17 years shorter than the rest of the population. Which means they will be lucky, as individuals, to reach 60 years of age, and for a elder-managed society like the indigenous one here in Australia, this can be devastating on a national as well as personal level. Fewer elders, less chance of culture being passed to the next generation.
Mick Tsikas [Reuters]
Infant mortality figures are yet to be updated, but the last set of results indicated that aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders are not faring well in this category either.
But why, is the question.
Over the years researchers have offered differing opinions. Social workers claim its the stress within the family unit; historians like Henry Reynolds have maintained its been the pushing of these people from their natural culture; governments have put it down to poor housing.
Yes, everyone seems to have an opinion, but the indigenous people themselves seem to be the last people consulted. Various governments, from the days of Gough Whitlam back in the 1970s, have tried to form representative bodies among aborigines, and each has faced their own problems. As Pat Dodson told us on the Breakfast Club, aboriginal society doesn’t operate on a parliamentary basis. But he says some representation is better than no representation.
I did a major in aboriginal studies. My lecturers were aboriginal. What they told us in those classes was shocking, including the health figures that were confirmed by the Indigenous Affairs Minister yesterday.
Things are not well in the indigenous society in this country and haven’t got better.
The one good note from the minister was a quote from a health worker who says that experience from indigenous societies in other countries shows that the age gap between white and black can be narrowed. The minister has promised to find out how.
Let’s hope that for the indigenous people of this great land, things start to improve. Now.
Potato. The Saviour of the World?
29 April 2008
Today we spoke with Charlie Crissman from the International Potato Centre (yes there is one) in Peru.
You may not be aware that 2008 is the United Nastions-sponsored Year of the Potato.
Therefore the question may well be asked: What’s all this fuss about the potato? It doesn’t have the culinary excitement of the custard apple, the contentiousness of the durian, the exclusivity of the truffle, the sweet joyfulness of the avocado, or the physical presence of..anything really.
This imitation of an oval moon does have an important function though. With the increases in the price of rice and with rice shortages around the world, Charlie Crissman says that potatoes have the nutritional capability to replace rice. Not on a permanent scale, but as a fill-in until things in the rice world are sorted out. If you want to hear the interview with the ebullient Mr Crissman, it’s on the Breakfast Club homepage for the next couple of weeks.
The thing that impresses most about potatoes as a potential staple is the fact that it takes a fraction of the water to produce a kilo of potatoes than it does to grow a kilo of rice. With water being an environmental concern of this century, this could be significant.
Kids also love ‘em. As fries. As mash. As potato scollops. As Mr Potato Head…
Potatoes. Apparently they’re the way to go.
The Cult of Sugar and Vodka
28 April 2008
I suppose it’s part of the whole growing up thing.
Just like you need to test how far you can bend a pen before it breaks, teenagers in many (mostly western) countries feel the need to see how much they can drink before they collapse, die, or regurgitate the evening’s contents.
I mentioned on Friday’s ANZAC Day blog how society was split into two extremes on this day of commemoration. Many were out partying on this holiday. Many more were out remembering soldiers who fought or fell.
This morning as I was riding into work, I passed a couple of young dudes in a work truck parked on the side of the road. One was hanging out the door and throwing up gallons of something into a gutter. Now I could be wrong here. The guy might’ve had food poisoning, and feeling bilious at the start of his work day.
But I don’t think so. It was five in the morning. If he was that ill, he would not have been up for work. No folks, they had been out boozing at the end of a long holiday weekend. Too long for this guy.
Youth drinking is a problem. These people are not just trying it out. There is actually a cult of getting blotto repeatedly. Clearly this is why these guys go home alone. Women, for some reason, just don’t find the smell of vomit attractive.
Which brings us to the alcopop issue. Alcopops are those cruiser drinks where a (very cheap) version of spirits is added to some flavouring, sugar, colouring and preservatives to make a ready-made drink-you-under-the-table concoction that has the combined charm of being cheap and tasting like metholated spirits.
For some reason the previous government here reduced the tax on these quality products, and perhaps as a result, their consumption by teenagers has shot up. (It’s probably also helped by the fact that these drinks are packaged so they look like fun soft drinks, the most serious repercussion of which is merely a series of tooth holes).
The new government here has just announced that the tax will be put back on the drinks, making them a dollar more expensive.
It may be too late though. When people get a taste for stuff, money won’t be a stopper. Just ask a smoker. Cigarettes cost twelve dollars a packet, but people still buy them, no matter how poor they are.
Latest figures show a quarter of teens binge drink at least once a month. Which means they’re getting that taste for it.
Looks like they’re having a great time.
Meanwhile our guy in the truck is probably still throwing up.
Yes, there’s nothing like having a good time.
A Day of Contrasts
25 April 2008
Today is ANZAC Day here in Australia and New Zealand.
It’s day that we commemorate the soldiers that have fought and fallen in wars across the years. We gather, we pay homage, we simply remember.
Riding into work this morning in the early hours I went past the ANZAC Day service held at Melbourne’s War Memorial. The crowds were enormous. The memorial is huge, but people still had to spill onto the road, and thousands more were still on their way there with their children and the occasional dog, all wanting to share the time and to remember people who would never be able to live in the goods times, or have children, or walk dogs to memorials on frosty early mornings.
The same scene was happening right across Australia and New Zealand. The images are stark, like in this scene in Sydney’s Martin Place Cenotaph:
The faces of the former soldiers get older by the year. I remember as a kid seeing the first world war veterans march, and they were still reasonably spritely men. Back then, the world war two soldiers were barely into middle age. Now we are almost to the last of the Gallipoli diggers, and those older faces are of soldiers from ‘modern’ wars in Korea and Malaya and Vietnam. The pain on the faces doesn’t change though. They remember the friends they loved and trusted with their lives. They remember them every year. Perhaps they remember them every day.
Back to my cycle trip. My trip to work also takes me down Melbourne’s Chapel St, and while the thousands were at the war memorial, others, the pretty young things, were using ANZAC Day to be a nothing more than a holiday, a chance to spend all night in bars and clubs. These people I saw too, dressed in their high heels and sweet little nothings trying to get into clubs past the clubbers who are leaving, intoxicated and bilious. Not a pretty sight, and watch where you step.
A contrast indeed, and only two kilometres from the war memorial.
The thing that mollifies me is the fact that the number of people at the shrine was far greater than the number in the club precinct.
I reckon the people at the memorial feel a lot better this morning too.
Osama Bin Laden. Coming to an end?
24 April 2008
Osama Bin Laden has been a name at the top of the infamy list since the 9/11 attacks nearly seven years ago.
The US forces have been searching for him, so much so that George W. Bush led the invasion of Afghanistan (Osama’s reputed home). Then of course we had the invasion of Iraq. Despite U.S. protests, 9/11 was a motivating factor in that attack as well.
Today we spoke with Steve Coll, who has researched the Bin Laden family for his new book (The Bin Ladens). What he told us was that Osama Bin Laden was actually quite a respected figure in the arab world BEFORE September 11, 2001.
But since that time he has been held in less esteem. The audacious attack on the world’s strongest military power can be related to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour in the second world war. It awoke a sleeping giant of the U.S. This time around 9/11 brought the festering tensions between the U.S. and some arab countries to the fore. Hence the double invasions.
I’m sure Osama Bin Laden intended neither of these responses. But what they have done is to bring the wrath of many in the arab community.
And if Steve Coll is right, Osama has learned little from this tactical and humanitarian blunder. Coll says Osama is behind a series of suicide bombings in Pakistan, which have had the effect of fragmenting the stability of Pakistan, and also fragmenting the stability of his own camp. Coll believes that Osama is in trouble, and that with a 25 million dollar bounty on Osama’s head, it is only a matter of time before one of his former allies gives him away.
Coll also talked about how Osama has changed in appearance. Have a look:
On the left is how he looked in 2004. The picture on the right shows him only a few months ago.
Either he’s getting younger, orhe’s discovered the joys of hair dye.
Could it be that the world’s most wanted man is developing an ego? Or maybe he just wants to be more attractive.
With 25 million U.S. dollars on his head you wouldn think he’d bother.
It’s a fascinating story, and motives for his actions are yet to be fully known. Perhaps we will find out when and if he’s captured.
