OPB (Other People's Blogs), 2nd Edition: Feminist Culture Muncher Progressive and quirky opinion from Melbourne, Australia on films, books, politics, and...

Great feminist blog, by fellow blogspotter, Catherine Magree... fuck the national broadcaster; this is the real news, imo.

And the real news is that rights for Australian women are in a recession.

And it's not solely the fault of the natural motherhood cults (although they are almost certainly not helping).

Check out her latest offering, Feminists of Australia - It's Time to Party!



Warning: possible socialist content.   ;)

In related content, I am recommending the collection of essays 'Fifty Shades of Feminisim' (2013), edited by Lisa Appignanesi, Rachel Holmes & Susie Orbach, to all my friends. Do look it up and give it a read.

Ladies - I point you in particular to the chapter by Alissa Quart on the alarming cult of natural motherhood (bleurgh).

#canwepleasestopbeatingeachotherovertheheadwithmilkladenbreastsnowthankyou

Inflammatory Una: the answer to Australia's childcare dilemma*

So I happened to catch on the teev tonight the tail-end of a story on the nightly current affairs show of a certain national broadcaster.  A fire-fighting duo, at their wits' end with the miserable childcare situation.  By their calculations, it is not "worth" the female of the couple - the "Caregiver", we'll call her - returning to work at the conclusion of her maternity leave, or indeed for the foreseeable future.

Appalling.

Slow news day?  I think not.

Childcare is expensive.  As an aside, I personally think it should be - you don't want to trust your bundle of snot... I mean, joy to any old hack, now do you?  Certainly not your mother!  And just like your post office is not open during non-business hours (what do you mean you don't have access to the internet?!), there is no formal childcare available in the evenings, when fire-fighting Caregiver may be required to attend fires and other emergencies at short notice.  As, equally, may her fire-fighting baby-daddy.

Oh dear. What. To. Do?

All those poor, poor women.

(All those cats stranded up trees.)

So anyway, I knit my brow and in a matter of seconds (I'm good like that), I came up with a solution!  Brace yourselves... it's pretty radical and left-of-field.

Girlz - let's hear it for the boyz!

Here it is: my manifesto on how to solve the childcare dilemma* in Australa.

Since people must procreate (and it will never cease to amaze me, but it does indeed seem they must), I hereby decree that the nominal FATHER in any opposite-sex, nuclear - a so-called "traditional" - partnering is required to stay at home and care for any issue (he can start a cooking blog if he really wants - so long as it doesn't interfere with the school run) and the nominal MOTHER must return to work at the conclusion of any statutory period of maternity leave.1

No, wait! Keep reading!!

If the FATHER'S wage at the time of issue is greater than the MOTHER'S, the MOTHER will be paid at the same rate as the FATHER.  It is a requirement that the FATHER'S workplace make up any short-fall.

Indefinitely.

Yeah.

Various exemptions will apply to same-sex and non-nuclear families (I haven't worked through that part yet... policy on the fly. Oh hey, Tony!).

In sum, I think this decree will place the burden of child-rearing more reasonably on the father and his workplace.  Possibly unfairly, even.  But, you know, a good swing of the pendulum might create some much-needed cultural traction.

And THAT, my friends, countrymen, is how you get women, specifically, back into the workforce after having children.  And drop the childcare dilemma* on its head.

Knock-on effects, intended or otherwise include (oh, Tones, I know you hate this bit, but you can't just make a policy announcement without working through the implications... oh, you can? Sorry, my bad...)

Well, it's over to you!

* here is an overt acknowledgement, so often neglected in mainstream media, that it's not a "dilemma" for everyone.  Like affluenza and other modern plagues, it's mainly a problem for the middle-class - you know, the ones with relative job security, awareness of and recourse to their statutory entitlements, the right to marry, Caregivers with employed partners... that sort of thing.  Not everyone in Australia (not by a long shot).  Probably not even actual child-care workers.  So I do offer my heartfelt apologies to those who read this whole bloody rant, um, policy statement... thing and got annoyed to find it didn't even apply to them anyway. I really am sorry...

1 For the record, I didn't bring up mothers, the report by Madeleine Morris (you can view it or read the transcript, here), and this recent article by Stefanie Balogh in The Australian did.  Seems we can unilaterally breathe a sigh of relief, as a recent Productivity Commission review's recommendations, if adopted, "will increase the number of working mothers by 25,000 on a part-time basis".

All, let us rejoice.

EUREKA! A new season of Irregularity! OPB (Other People's Blogs): Rain Dove - genderbender extraordinaire, accidental social scientist, conscious commentator

Look. It's clearly been aeons since I posted anything.

Not a comma, let alone a semi-colon.

Emerging from a very necessary period of aestivation (holy crap why does my spell-check not know that word? It's like 'hibernation', only, for Australians), and finding Australian politics way too depressing, I've been yawning my conscious awake most recently by having a right old perve at other peoples' blogs.

Hell, I even joined Pinterest (Australian politics - really terrible).

The apparent acquisition of blogspot by Google has, in the meantime, made it really complicated to actually get into my blog and post stuff. Which could be... interesting, but in reality will probably suit me just fine.

I know you don't need me to tell you this: there is a whole lot of - for the sake of metaphor, we'll call it 'sediment' - out there. There are also nuggets of gold. This, IMO (fuck it, sister, I'm not even gonna be remotely 'H' about it), is one of them. Eureka!

On Being A Woman

A link to someone else's post, you say. It's not much, I know... but I'm still metaphorically clearing my throat.

There's also this, ICYMI (not bloody likely, you say), just yesterday or something:

Herself. (NB Not technically a blog. I don't think.)

While I am posting the second... thing... practically entirely without comment, I think I'm gonna have to call the Zeitgeist.

2015. Rise of the Feminipster (see what I did there?).

OOAK. NIB.

#ican'tevenrememberhowtotag

Justify. Ohhh yeahhhhh.

Get, as the young 'uns used to say, on it.

Enlighten Me, Ep.1. Silent Disco? Or: Beyond Beethoven (and Queens of the Stone Age)

Welcome to Episode 1 of Enlighten Me. As you've no doubt come to expect by now, even this series is mostly about me.


I envisage Enlighten Me as something like a mini online Jerry Springer where I say or ask something stupid and a panel of people I know and some I don’t get to laugh or yell at me (possibly even punch me, cyberly-speaking – not sure what that looks like, but I can’t wait to find out!), then some experts come in and tell me what’s what, I become ‘enlightened’, Jerry congratulates us all, we all feel warm and fuzzy, and it all ends with Jerry summing things up in a few nauseatingly twee words (note: in this version, I get to play both myself and Jerry. Because it’s my blog).


Now, I know there are things I don’t know. Someone famous also said something like that once. Some people struggle to admit this to themselves and to others. Fortunately or otherwise, I’m not one of those people. I can even admit there are some things I don’t know I don’t know. Rad, huh?


So there are some things I know I don’t know that I know I have no interest in knowing. For example, you may find that aspect of me unattractive. I don’t know... and I don’t care. There are other things I know I don’t know that I really want to do something about. Maybe they happen to be things you don’t know and always wanted to know, too. Which would be awesome because it means I can cast this whole thing in a light of providing a community service. I enjoy thinking of myself as philanthrope. Perhaps that’s how Jerry gets to sleep at night, too.


Feel free to nominate other things you know you don’t know that you would like to know more about. PM me with them if you’re shy and/or don’t want to look like a wanker.



And until next time, take care of yourselves... and each other.

*****

So here we go. Bear with me – the big question is soon revealed (you just scrolled down. Didn't you? Admit it). Allow me to first establish a few Facts (just easing you into the whole apparently-random-but-actually-meaningful capitalisation thing), in no particular order and mostly about me, for context:


Fact 1. As some of you know, I am currently a student, not just of life, but also of audiology. You may be surprised to learn that audiology is not just a clinical thing, but like you will have seen with medicine on Grey’s Anatomy, actually has heaps of real life-type shit happening inside and alongside it. For the most part, I’m loving studying audiology. But sometimes, I get myself a bit quagmired in some of the ‘real life’ aspects of it. Let’s face it, I’m not always the best-equipped person you know when it comes to understanding and dealing with real life shit.


Fact 2. As some of you are also aware, I don’t have a father. Of course I have a biological father (although I and others have often had cause to suspect I was dropped onto Earth from the planet Zork or something – to be completely honest, I sometimes wish they would hurry and fetch me home), but I never knew him, and grew up with just me and my mum (underrating for the moment and for the sake of clarity the enormous input of my ‘second parent’, my maternal grandmother). Sometimes people say things about single-parent families and the kids of single-parent families, and sometimes the things they say hurt. Sometimes the things they say, in my personal experience, are wildly inaccurate, and I can only surmise that these comments stem from ignorance and possibly arrogance in assuming that they themselves are (1) 100% awesome and well-adjusted and, (2) that (1) is all to do with being raised in a family with a mum and a dad. Yup. Feel free to go for gold on that one, folks.


This Fact may seem to you like a total red herring, but I think its important in establishing where I’m coming from here (planet Zork?), and relates in some esoteric way to Fact 4, below. At least, to my only-child-of-a-single-parent-family mind.


Fact 3. I love music. I have always loved music. Of pretty much all kinds (go ahead - challenge me on that). Many – I would even go so far as to say all – of my friends love music. Granted, not always the same type of music... but the principle stands. Almost all of the people I know, love music. It uplifts us and/or assists us to wallow more effectively in self-pity when we’re feeling down. It unites and sometimes divides us. We play it at events and on important life occasions. All that good stuff. On another note (haha), I’d love to read more of your thoughts on what music means to/does for you... as a musician/DJ/listener/educator, etc.


Fact 4. I don’t want to be one of those dickhead audiologists we sometimes hear about in class and may even see on our clinical placements. You know (or perhaps you don’t), the ones who don’t acknowledge and respect other peoples’ experiences (both positive and negative) of what it might be like to live as a Deaf person, be an active parent or child of a Deaf person, or otherwise be a member of the (a?) Deaf community, and may therefore inadvertently – as a result of this ignorance – contribute to the belittling of Deaf people and the overstating of the role of audiologists and other clinical ‘experts’ in the lives of Deaf people. I don’t think any of my classmates want to be either. Shame on those medical and allied health practitioners, I say, for not making the effort to find out more (or perhaps, bully for them, for being so arrogant and happy with themselves in their ignorance +/- empathy-deficit).


So is this whole ‘Deaf-with-a-capital-D’ thing irritating you yet? I’m still getting used to it myself. So why am I persisting with it? When I use the word ‘Deaf’ here, with the capital D, I am referring to people who actively identify with and participate in “the Deaf community” (I can’t help but draw possibly unwanted and inappropriate parallels with identifying oneself as a member of the “queer community”. It seems to me the principle of ‘reclaiming’ a term that may have been or is still used in a derogatory way in general society might be at play. Or perhaps my Zork is showing).


And herein lies the rub. It's coming. This is just the bit before I ask the question where I feel extra stupid and ignorant and hesitant. I don’t (currently) know any real life Deaf people. This may be (dare I use the adverb, 'blindingly'?) obvious by now. I have read (some of) Harlan Lane’s extremely interesting and apparently insightful (understatement of the year) work exploring and examining the Deaf community. So far in my reading, I haven’t stumbled across an answer to a question that arises close to my heart. So Deaf people and friends of Deaf people, I need your help (and welcome gentle or less gentle rebuttals to anything I have written). In a spirit of wanting, even needing, some insight – which I hope you feel is a worthwhile, even noble pursuit – while understanding that everyone’s experience is personal and no-one can truly speak on behalf of any other individual (probably not even Harlan), and with me sitting in this sometimes uncomfortable space where the professional meets the personal, I respectfully put to you the following set of questions:


Does music have a place in the Deaf community?


If so, what is the nature and extent of that role? I realise vibrations can be sensed with other parts of the body (as we know, this ability is useful in other ways, too)... but are there additional ways for a profoundly and, let’s say for the sake of example, congenitally deaf person to perceive music? The human mind/body is pretty amazing (second understatement of the year), so it wouldn’t surprise me in the least (or perhaps a little, but in a good way) if there is.


If not, does it matter?


A simple yes or no to any of the above is fine. And I apologise profusely if I’ve upset anyone. And even more if I’ve made a complete wanker of myself. But I really want to know... you know? There is only so much you can learn from Google and academic texts. I would love if you could take the time to write a little more – be that through tears of laughter and/or anger and exasperation – and Enlighten Me.


References and further reading:


A Journey Into the Deaf-World by Harlan Lane, Robert Hoffmeister and Ben Bahan. DawnSignPress, 1996.


http://harlan-lane.co.tv/

boiling water - an aside

I have a confession to make. It's a bit embarrassing.

During my recent online research on the fraught topic of 'gas stovetop kettle versus electric kettle', I was horrified I tell you to realise that I was ignorant (although, I suspect I once knew but had forgotten - you know how old stuff sometimes gets pushed out by incoming new stuff?) of the fact that for the most part (in the world, and in Australia), we create electricity for domestic and commercial supply thusly: we MINE COAL so we can BURN IT so we can BOIL WATER to CREATE STEAM which we then use to ROTATE TURBINES. I think in my mind I had it that the coal is used somehow more DIRECTLY. Nothing so straightforward (one is almost tempted to use the term 'crude') as using it as fuel TO BOIL WATER (apologies for all the caps - you will perhaps better understand my consternation after the next paragraph). Now, I am a huge advocate of old technology not necessarily being bad technology - it's just that clearly in this case we all agree that Victorian-era technology (see plagiarised, paraphrased and generally bastardised Wikipedia entry, below) is still perfectly good technology (yes, I am being deliberately provocative). At least where electricity generation is concerned.

This is kind of ironic to me for the following reason. Health Departments around the developed world issue 'boil water' notices to the public on the relatively rare occasions there is, for whatever reason, a microbiological risk to health from drinking water supply (usually due to some sort of treatment failure - or even just suspected failure - at a water treatment plant). When long ago I worked at a water utility (which shall remain nameless and locale-less), I once asked, why doesn't the utility itself just BOIL THE WATER before distribution, rather than use all that other fandangled, complicated (and hence prone to breakdowns and breakthroughs) technology (setting aside for the moment that microbiological risk is hardly the only water quality issue for provision of safe drinking water... but it is why disinfectants such as chlorine and chloramine are added to the water, which NB also protects against post-treatment recontamination, e.g. via dodgy pipework, etc.)? At the time I was guffawed at and told it would involve FAR TOO MUCH ENERGY to boil THAT MUCH WATER (setting aside for the moment how much energy is involved in CREATING FRESHWATER FROM SEAWATER. I suspect that if I was a Christian I would totally be saying that desalination is 'against nature and god' or something - frankly, I'm surprised all the good Christians aren't more in uproar over it. One can only guess at why they're not... sorry, I digress).

Now, I do not pretend to be an engineer (and I hasten to add that some of my best friends are engineers... and/or Christians), or indeed any kind of expert in electricity generation or even drinking water treatment, and I am sure there are many, many valid objections to this 'coupling' that admittedly only just occurred to me (and that has no doubt occurred to many others in the past, and perhaps been dismissed each and every time out-of-hand)... and I would welcome hearing about them (at least, those I haven't already mentioned in passing). Perhaps it would be too hard to stop the by-products of combustion from contaminating the water? But even as a lay-person, I'd still be interested in seeing some overlays of local coal-or-other-fired-power-plants with otherwise reasonably 'fit-for-purpose' water sources (though there probably aren't too many of the latter category where I live that aren't already being exploited for some purpose or other...)

I also realise that retrofitting technology - particularly where disparate locations are involved - is difficult and expensive and that hindsight is a fine thing. Really, I think I am mainly just mad that I allowed myself be GUFFAWED AT by COMPLETE AND UNIMAGINATIVE MORONS, but also I am irked by how ironic it seems that in this whiz-bang, modern era we BOIL WATER OVER AND OVER AGAIN for one type of 'utility' generation at one site, but don't somehow harness that capacity to help generate (microbiologically) safe drinking water, either at the same site, or for subsequent distribution.

REFERENCE

Adapted [I think that's the correct term] from Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electricity_generation), accessed 15/04/2011:

Almost all commercial electrical generation is done using electromagnetic induction, in which mechanical energy forces an electrical generator to rotate. There are many different methods of developing the mechanical energy, including heat engines, hydro, wind and tidal power.

Even with nuclear power, the direct conversion of nuclear energy to electricity by beta decay is used only on a small scale. In a full-size nuclear power plant, it is the heat from the nuclear reactions that is used to run a heat engine. This drives a generator, which converts mechanical energy into electricity by magnetic induction.

Most electric generation is driven by heat engines. The combustion of fossil fuels supplies most of the heat to these engines, with a significant fraction from nuclear fission and some from renewable sources. The modern steam turbine invented by Sir Charles Parsons in 1884 today generates about 80 percent of the electric power in the world using a variety of heat sources.

About Irregular Una

Unlike many people, I didn't muck around when it came to deciding on a name for my blog. That came to me in a flash of inspiration, while on the torlit. The hard decisions were my 'by-line' (I knew I wanted one, but what?) and the fundamental one: to blog or not to blog? Something I had pondered, like many people, from time to time (especially while on the torlit).

I conveniently had an existing pseudonym, Una Kempt (not my real name**), that I employed when writing for my (not only 'my') zine, Hair Pie DIY (the second and subsequent 'episodes' of which may or may not ever see the light of day. I think you can still buy the inaugural 2010 Xmas special episode from Format on Peel St. And Sticky in Melbourne). And 'irregular'? Well - 'irregular' can mean so many things. Feel free to pick one that suits your purposes. I chose the current by-line because I think it sounds mysterious and hence possibly alluring. Perhaps my by-line might be written more fully as: 'because one is... full of shit'. Because while I know I'm not gonna go (metaphorical) do-do with any pretence at regularity, I seriously need to dump a load from time to time, you know? But this is not a blog about constipation. Well, at least not exclusively. I digress...

Which brings me to the next part: why b(l)og?

There are many reasons; to save everyone time and because I once studied law and thereby learned to appreciate the unequivocalness of a well-turned clause, I think I will itemise the main ones:

1) because I'm copying my friend Leon.

No, not really... because (with equal measures of shame and integrity), I don't have anything like the same zeal for a worthy cause, and because I don't seriously expect anyone to read this. But I won't pretend I won't get a buzz if you do. And especially if you respond to what I've written. But I warn you right now: my target audience is me. You can read and respond to Leon's very stimulating blog at: http://limetreeleon.posterous.com/

2) because

a) this way, I can write (mainly, as and when I choose) in the Queen's English, and not in that bastard lingua franca sired by evolving communications technologies and their restrictive character limits.

While I'm not too shabby at coining a pithy slogan to summarise what I'm thinking or how I'm feeling, I am finding restricting myself in that way increasingly soul-destroying, and

b) because there is no word limit (that I am aware of), I can digress and use parentheses, ellipses and other optional grammatical characters; lyrical flourishes, conceits and other forms of literary trickery as often as my heart desires.

And it does… and I shall.

And what was the ultimate catalyst, you ask?

3) because I should be studying. Yes, that old chestnut.

Those are the 'pros'. All those pros can, of course, be rephrased as cons. I'm sure it depends on where you're standing. The one additional con I can think of is that my girlfriend will probably kill me when she finds out I've done this. Because she already feels like a study/FB/Twitter widow. So on balance, I probably shouldn't be blogging at all. But that makes it crazy and wrong and those are two things I can't help being attracted to... so here we go.

** I will enjoy engineering in some tautologies and redundancies from time-to-time.