General Discussions

[DJC]

Yes, it seems so.

But on the fringe there are some real whack jobs and they are chipping around the edges!

A great example are flags.

There was outrage that local councils had to pay to fly the Indigenous flag, then the Feds fixed that problem and the Indigenous flag was flying freely at locations all over the state.              But wait, there's more!                  All of a sudden councils had to fly the "Local Tribe's Indigenous Flag" or else it is disrespectful, apparently not everyone thinks the Indigenous flag is their flag, did you even know Local Indigenous Tribes had a flag, and if so when did they come into existence? :o

You guessed it, there is a fee for flying the Local Tribe's Indigenous Flag, who would have thunk it! :

There are whack jobs chipping away at the finges of every community, group, club, organisation, religion, etc.  Why should Indigenous communities be any different?

The local flags issue is not an issue.  Only the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander flags are officially recognised. While club pennants may be flown with National, State and the two Indigenous flags, you can't just invent a flag and have it flown on public buildings.  I have never heard of any local council being asked to fly a "local Aboriginal community flag" and they wouldn't be permitted to do so if they were.

[LP]

You can't just invent a flag and have it flown on public buildings.  I have never heard of any local council being asked to fly a "local Aboriginal community flag" and they wouldn't be permitted to do so if they were.

I never claimed State or Fed buildings were doing this, I was specific in referring to Councils, Local Councils are not constrained by the same regulations if it isn't banned like the Swastika they can fly it and will be invoiced accordingly!

There are two Vic councils were this is happening right now, today, at least while the wind isn't too brisk! Further, there are councils that have been invoiced for Tribal Flags flying over sacred spaces, spaces that the council allocated public land for such a purpose identifying it with a Tribal and Indigenous flag. The land was reserved / gifted effectively for free, in one case there was a gold coin exchange to make it legal, but the council pays to fly the flag, it's a scam!

[DJC]

I never claimed State or Fed buildings were doing this, I was specific in referring to Councils, Local Councils are not constrained by the same regulations if it isn't banned like the Swastika they can fly it and will be invoiced accordingly!

There are two Vic councils were this is happening right now, today, at least while the wind isn't too brisk! Further, there are councils that have been invoiced for Tribal Flags flying over sacred spaces, spaces that the council allocated public land for such a purpose identifying it with a Tribal and Indigenous flag. The land was reserved / gifted effectively for free, in one case there was a gold coin exchange to make it legal, but the council pays to fly the flag, it's a scam!

Local councils are bound by the flag regulations and cannot fly unauthorised flags. 

Which two councils and which ‘sacred places’ were ‘gifted/reserved’?  I’m more than happy to check with the relevant Aboriginal organisations.

[Thryleon]

Something else regarding the disingenuine media and click bait.

Recently there was a bit of a kerfuffle about China crashing space junk into the Indian Ocean near Malaysia that was potentially dangerous.  A bit of a stoush between NASA and China over whether or not it was safe or not to do so.  Mainly hyperbolic no one hurt etc.

On the news yesterday, the news presenters here on Channel 7 decided to try and loosely link these events to space junk crash landing in a paddock near Jindabyne in southern NSW.  Thing is, they initially stated on the news that it was from China, went on to describe the fins as one from the Space X rocket (Elon Musk's), only to conclude that they are yet to attribute the space junk to anyone at this point in time, and then cut to some excited space nerds who simply played the ball with a straight bat, stated no one was harmed, then stated that someone could have been harmed.

https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/australia...r-AA10adbs

Whats with the stir up of anti Chinese sentiment?

Sure, they cant be trusted politically, but they are a trading partner, last I checked the majority of space junk has been generated by none other than the USA or Russia (pick 1 it would be more accurate) and the Indian Ocean near Malaysia is a far cry from Jindabyne in NSW.

Very irresponsible reporting IMHO.  There are plenty of reasons to dislike China, and this is probably not one of them. 

[LP]

Sure, they cant be trusted politically, but they are a trading partner, last I checked the majority of space junk has been generated by none other than the USA or Russia (pick 1 it would be more accurate) and the Indian Ocean near Malaysia is a far cry from Jindabyne in NSW.

Firstly, the media plays on paranoia, distrust and hatred, they pick up on it, it is the media version of blood in the water!

In regional areas China has been buying up lots of rural property, then they close up shop and bring in imported workers, I know this because I have a contact who was just about to sign a big deal to sell a large cattle property(> 50Kha) and refused to sell to them when he found out they were going to kibosh all his long serving staff and replace them with imported workers and managers. Regretfully he had to sell to Elders which he saw as the lesser of two evils, but still very distasteful.

So I suspect the media a playing on the regional distrust of China.

[LP]

Local councils are bound by the flag regulations and cannot fly unauthorised flags. 

Which two councils and which ‘sacred places’ were ‘gifted/reserved’?  I’m more than happy to check with the relevant Aboriginal organisations.

Then read up on what is happening in Moreland and Kingston, plus similar proposals taken to council for debate in Stonnington, Mornington and Casey. Two of the affected cities are councils stacked with covert candidates, who as extinction rebellion members who were bankrolled and elected without revealing their political allegiances, they are slightly left to say the very least!

It's no coincidence that some of these councils flew the Indigenous flag at half-mast on Australia Day.

One of those councils took the same to a debate, defeated the proposal to fly the Aboriginal Flag and/or other Indigenous Flags at half-mast on Australia Day by a margin of one vote, and the councillors have been targeted by protestors ever since, labelled fascists and generally abused.

[Baggers]

Just read an article re what Edwardo Betts went through on 'that camp' when at the Crows. For someone steeped in indigenous Aussie spirituality, beliefs and culture this was nothing other than psychological abuse... IMHO.

And for someone who has undergone full-on military training (very early 70s) by Naval personnel (precursor to Seals), what Edwardo reported sounded very different to what I went through. Our training brought us together, tighter. Humiliation was minimal -- and when it did happen, it was couched in humour, the Aussie way -- mate ship, encouraging mates, going the extra to help a mate... etc., was the focus, along with extreme physical fitness, endurance, psychological pain/exhaustion management/strategies. And at the end of it we really loved and respected our trainers. The discipline and love of mate I learned during that training helped me enormously and gave me skills I still use to this day.

I recall Crows/Tiggers grand final day line-ups pre game when the Crows were lined up like a bunch of stiff, comical tough guy individual statues... and the Tiggers? Arms around each other.

[Gointocarlton]

Just read an article re what Edwardo Betts went through on 'that camp' when at the Crows. For someone steeped in indigenous Aussie spirituality, beliefs and culture this was nothing other than psychological abuse... IMHO.

And for someone who has undergone full-on military training (very early 70s) by Naval personnel (precursor to Seals), what Edwardo reported sounded very different to what I went through. Our training brought us together, tighter. Humiliation was minimal -- and when it did happen, it was couched in humour, the Aussie way -- mate ship, encouraging mates, going the extra to help a mate... etc., was the focus, along with extreme physical fitness, endurance, psychological pain/exhaustion management/strategies. And at the end of it we really loved and respected our trainers. The discipline and love of mate I learned during that training helped me enormously and gave me skills I still use to this day.

I recall Crows/Tiggers grand final day line-ups pre game when the Crows were lined up like a bunch of stiff, comical tough guy individual statues... and the Tiggers? Arms around each other.

I heard Sam Edmund describe extracts from the book, the camp was nuts and players should have told them to GAGF'd.
Amongst a heap of stupid stuff, they were asked to do the power stance and cup the nut sack of the guy next to you (some sumo ritual apparently. The players refused thankfully.

[PaulP]

All clubs are on a seemingly never-ending quest to gain a competitive advantage - it's not in any way surprising that sooner or later one of them was going to veer off course into psychological and motivational La La land.

Betts' issues were not strictly related to indigenous issues - he also took offense (as he should) to a betrayal of trust, where private details about his childhood were aired in one of the sessions, details which he believed were to remain confidential.

[PaulP]

I heard Sam Edmund describe extracts from the book, the camp was nuts and players should have told them to GAGF'd.
Amongst a heap of stupid stuff, they were asked to do the power stance and cup the nut sack of the guy next to you (some sumo ritual apparently. The players refused thankfully.

Cup the nut sack lol. Taking things out of their cultural context is never wise, unless you really know what you're doing.