Abbott versus Climate Change

Prime Minister Tony Abbott has allowed himself a rare display of good science-related sense and agreed to allow climate change to be included on the agenda for the G20 meetings in Brisbane next week. It’s not a major victory though. Climate change will only be discussed as part of a broader conversation about energy efficiency, and it’s unlikely to tiptoe beyond the tightly governed scope of such meetings. 

The decision now is how to participate in these discussions about energy efficiency, given Australia’s new status as international environmental laughingstock. There is literally no obvious choice in the Abbott government: there is no Minister for Energy, or for Climate Change or 

Science or Innovation. It’s as though, in structuring his government, the Prime Minister chose to ignore the future, expecting that such practicalities as the climate and energy production would continue to tick over without governmental oversight or funding. Like a toilet roll that’s been completely used, someone else will look after it.

The current Industry portfolio includes reference to such areas as science, energy and resources, yet it is wrapped up so tightly with the fossil fuel industry that its inclusion could be difficult. Where traditional energy sources sits logically with resources, innovation – which must surely be the point of any discussion about the future of energy efficiency – is a natural fit with science.

Industry Minister Ian McFarlane, a former farmer, is not considered to be a leading voice on any of these areas other than resources. His announcement last week highlighted a material reduction in the RenewableEnergy Target was brief to the point of ignorance. 

The following day, Portland's Keppel Prince Engineering announced that it was cutting its workforce by 100 as a result of uncertainty over large-scale renewables. 

To be fair, the Keppel Prince Engineering decision to downsize would have been made well before Minister McFarlane’s announcement. Having said that, the government’s failure to support publicly the renewable energy industry would have been a factor in the decision to liberate 100 full time workers from their jobs. Treasurer Joe Hockey’s opinion of wind farms didn’t win fans anywhere, and Maurice Newman’s vehement opposition to wind farms must be considered, given that he is the Prime Minister’s senior business advisor.

When the Prime Minister chose not to appear at the UN Climate Summit in New York in September, Foreign Minister Julie Bishop delivered Australia’s presentation to a near empty room and a savageinternational response. 

On Tuesday the Pulitzer Prize-winning climate change news website Inside Climate News published a story about the "Canada-Australia axis of carbon". It suggested that not only were the two nations not willing to pull their weight, but that they were seeking to derail the binding agreement on emissions reductions at next year's talks in Paris that many view as the world's last best hope to prevent catastrophic climate change.

"Neither the prime ministers of Canada nor Australia will speak at the summit, and the subordinates they have sent will not be offering the kind of "bold" new steps that UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is seeking on the way to a treaty in Paris late next year," it reported.

"Instead, these two governments, with their energy-rich domains sprawling across opposite ends of the earth, will present strikingly similar defences against what much of the rest of the world is offering. And their stance is earning them opprobrium among advocates of strong and immediate action."

Australia’s reputation as a leader in action on climate change has been shredded, so anyone representing Australia’s position on climate change, including renewables, will have to have a solid understanding of the issues wrapped up in the diplomatic demeanour of The Dalai Lama. That rules out Tony Abbott, Joe Hockey and the obvious choice, Environment Minister Greg Hunt.

Unfortunately, Mr Hunt’s understanding of the issues in his portfolio is unconvincing. He has repealed the Carbon Tax, defunded the Climate Commission and scaled back the RET…and has regularly and publicly tripped over his message:

Press Release: "Emissions figures released today show the Carbon Tax is still inflicting plenty of gain,with no environmental pain". 

Environment Minister Greg Hunt has hosed down suggestions of a link between climate change and increased bushfire intensity, saying he had ''looked up what Wikipedia'' said and it was clear that bushfires in Australia were frequent events that had occurred during hotter months since before European settlement. 

Greg Hunt on ABC’s 7:30: At a time when the Government is asking Australians to pay more for petrol and doctors visits because of a budget shortfall, you're spending money on a review intoemissions trading schemes when you've said that you will never implement anemissions trading scheme. 

Despite these blunders, Greg Hunt has some experience in pro-environmental policy. His final year thesis as a law student was entitled “A Tax to Make the Polluter Pay.” Now that he’s in a position to drive such reforms, he’s ignoring his own history. From attempting to close down the Climate Commission, which was subsequently saved by a triumphant crowdfunding crusade, to the decision to dredge Abbot Point, a substantial risk to the survival of the Great Barrier Reef, his actions in government have decreased rather than increased Australia’s reputation as an environmental leader. The 2013-14 Department of the Environment Annual Report and current website indicate a wishy-washy approach at best.

In keeping with the reluctant inclusion of energy efficiency in the G20 Agenda, Australia will in all likelihood be represented quietly. The Renewable Energy Target is under the direction of Mr David Parker, whose experience is primarily in public sector finance. More likely, the Department of Industry will send along someone from their Bureau of Resources and Energy Economics, or possibly Australia’s Chief Scientist, Ian Chubb.

Alternately, a representative from South Australia would provide a useful contribution, given their hughly successful implementation of an RET. http://reneweconomy.com.au/2014/south-australia-hits-100-renewables-for-a-whole-working-day-86069

Whoever has the honour of representing Australia’s position on energy efficiency and climate change should be ready for a challenge. It won’t be easy when your strongest allies in the room are Canada and Russia in a battle for the future.

Nova

We awoke this morning to news that Labor Senator Nova Peris had sought government funding to pay for her male friend's trip to Australia so they could have a ten day bonkathon. Well, that’s the gist of it, if you only read the headline in the NT News.

Throw in some salacious details, courtesy of emails between Ms Peris and her Olympic medallist Ato Boldon, add the fact that Ms Peris was married, plus some vague figures, and all hell breaks loose across Australia's front pages. 

Assuming it's all true, there's no way to make this good for Senator Peris, but is it really as bad as the NT News' front page would have us believe?

In a word, no.

Ms Peris was chosen by Prime Minister Julia Gillard as a ‘Captain’s Pick’ for to run for a Senate seat. At the time of the affair, Ms Peris was an Athletics Australia ambassador and communication officer with the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies.

Did Ms Peris cheat on her husband? Absolutely. Did the planning of the affair involve some saucy emails between the participants? Yep. So far, Ms Peris's “crimes” are all of a personal nature.

The real concerns here surround the funds Ms Peris obtained to bring Ato Boldon to Australia. Here are the things we don't know:

1.       Was there any need to bring an international athlete to Australia for this purpose? Had Ato Boldon been unavailable, would another athlete have been selected? 

2.       Was Mr Boldon's visit to Australia of a typical duration for a visit of this nature? 

3.       Would the agencies that paid for Mr Boldon's visit normally fund a trip of this type? 

4.       Was the fee paid to Mr Boldon typical for a visit of this kind?

If the answers to these questions are 'yes', then it can be argued that Ms Peris and Mr Boldon took advantage of a situation she engineered, but in doing so, it didn't cost taxpayers any extra for Ms Peris to have a jolly good time with Mr Boldon. 

If he was paid more than would be usual, stayed more than a day or two longer than was strictly warranted, or somehow benefitted financially more than would be considered normal, there's a case to answer.

If Ms Peris secured a reasonable amount of funds from usual sources, the headline outrage this morning, which started with the irrepressible NT News, is nothing more than a cynical political attack designed to embarrass a Labor Senator who was hand-picked by former Prime Minister Julia Gillard. It’s also a handy distraction from the other outrage of the day – that of increasing fuel prices.

Senator Peris has denied any wrongdoing, although she has not denied the substance of the emails. Mr Boldon has stated on his Facebookpage that 

"The article recently written by the Northern Territory News, includes gross fabrications.

"I will be following the senator's lead, including, but not limited to, pursuing all legal action possible for this malicious misrepresentation of the details surrounding my presence in Australia in 2010."

For the record, Ms Peris is available for speaking engagements. Her fee starts at $5000, plus expenses.

The ABC's Commercial Imperative

Great work by The Australian this week, in pointing out that the ABC is just wrong wrong wrongity wrong to be wasting money on marketing or in bidding for the rights to telecast major sports events. It’s a big concern for The Oz, judging from their coverage this week, which includes today’s pithy editorial and yesterday’s media exclusive from Sharri Markson. 

It should be a major concern for taxpayers too. It’s our money that funds the ABC. It used to be eight cents a day; I don’t know what the current rate is, but it’s a chunk(1), probably in the same league as what the Carbon Tax was costing us.

The specifics are simple: the ABC spent some of its marketing budget to ensure that its coverage of former PM Gough Whitlam’s passing would be at the top of the Google search results. How dare the ABC flush our money down the drain, just to let us know what it’s spending the rest of our money on? Marketing? Pffft.

Meanwhile, Sharri Markson’s exclusive yesterday was explosive stuff. The ABC and SBS bid against each other for rights to broadcast some soccer games. This single act of absurdity drove the price of the broadcast rights up by $700,000. Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull has, quite rightly asked for explanations from both networks. I suspect it will be a process story about poor communication, adding weight to recommendations that the two organisations find savings through merging their operations.(2)

Bidding against each other was pretty dumb thing to do, though. It’s like the fifth floor bidding against the seventh floor.  As The Oz pointed out so brilliantly,

Under its business model, the national broadcaster gains nothing of commercial value from investing tens of thousands of dollars buying Google rankings to lure internet users to its news website. Regardless of whether one person or a million people visit the site, the corporation receives its $1.1 billion in government funding. (3)

The amount of funding is uncertain at the moment, as Treasurer Joe Hockey is still playing with numbers prior to the MYEFO, but The Oz have got the concept right. I have scoured the ABC’s Charter (again) and could find nothing to suggest that their funding is in any way tied to how many taxpayers view, listen or log in to their services. In reality, funding for our dear old Aunty seems to have more to do with how much we-the-taxpayers can afford to pay, as determined by Treasurer Joe Hockey and Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull.

Still $700,000 is $700,000. That’s 0.036% of the ABC’s current funding. Hardly insignificant.(4)

But The Oz doesn’t really care about $700,000 either. They care that the ABC is peeing in the commercial media bathtub by openly competing for audience share.

News Corporation, publisher of The Oz, want Australia’s media playing field levelled and compacted each morning like the pitch at Lords, except flat and more level. News Corp wants go head to head with the ABC in a genuine battle of commercial media-wits, pitting its multiple income streams (cover price, advertising sales, online subscriptions) against whatever the ABC and its beige-cardiganed finance team can find down the back of the couch. It hardly seems fair.

Given the vast array of news services online, however, there is no justification in forcing taxpayers to fund the corporation to operate an online service(5), especially one intent on wasting money to erode the profitability of other news sites.(6)

And this is the crux of the issue: the ABC has deliberately set out to undermine the financial viability of its online competitors, most notably News Corporation. The national broadcaster has employed to an integrated marketing campaign, but not to communicate its programming to the people who pay for it; to threaten the profitability of Rupert Murdoch’s Aussie operation. This is particularly dangerous right now, during this Budget Emergency. If News Corp’s profit slides, so too does the amount of tax it pays to the government…taxes which ultimately fund the ABC. Therefore, the ABC is relying on big tax dollars that News Corp pays(7), just to remain in business.(8)

The Oz suggests, with all the subtlety of V8 racecar on heat, that it’s past time for the government to reassess the ABC as a publicly funded entity and examine if such a beastie is still relevant in Tony Abbott’s Australia of 2014. Today’s editorial concludes:

The ABC began broadcasting in 1932 in a vastly different media landscape. Its outrageous misuse of its budget for commercial sabotage(9)(10) is a sign that the time has come for wholesale reform of its modus operandi, not just tinkering around the edges.

And there’s no better place to leave this discussion than here…except for these important clarifications:

      (1)    Based on a budget of $1.1b, a current population of 23,639,700 and 365 days per year, it’s about 12.75 cents per day per person.  (2)    The ABC and SBS are still separate organisations, and as such, have every legal and ethical right to bid against each other for broadcast rights of whatever they believe will best satisfy their charter to provide “innovative and comprehensive broadcasting services of a high standard”.  (3)    Commercial Value is largely irrelevant to the ABC, as it is the public broadcaster, and ass such, is revenue negative. The commercial imperative is part of News Corporation’s vocabulary.(4)    $700,000 is entirely significant in terms of the ABC’s budget. It would just about pay the salaries of a couple of top line national television presenters...or half a dozen mid level administrators or radio producers or content makers.(5)    There is the ABC Charter, and if The Australian wants to be pedantic, Section 6 of the charter does not specify radio or television either. The fact that an online offering is not specified in the Charter is irrelevant. If, in the view of the Board, an online offering contributes to the ABC’s ability to deliver as per the charter, then it’s a valid service.  (6)    The ABC is not interested in eroding anything. Refer to (3) above.  (7)    The ATO paid Rupert Murdoch $880m early this year. There is still debate over whether global companies pay a fair share of taxation.  (8)    Refer to (3) and (6) above.  (9)    Sweet Baby Jeebus, it’s not all about you!  (10) Yes, I'm wearing my superhero cape: Ms Sarcastic is in the house.

In case you didn't know, the current spin boss at the ABC is Nick Leys, whose resume includes a stint as Media Editor at The Australian, as well as roles as researcher at the ABC’s MediaWatch and journalist with the Sydney Morning Herald. Mr Ley’s replacement as Media Editor  at The Australian is Sharri Markson.

On Probation

The occasions on which I agree with a Liberal MP are rare, but this week, I’ll make an exception. I'm with Liberal MP Craig Laundy and his call for Senator Jacqui Lambie to resign if she won’t take her job as a Senator seriously. It’s impossible to know what goes on inside Senator Lambie’s head – if it’s a refusal to take the job seriously, if it's a matter of style, or if she’s just as dumb as a box of hair and can’t handle the more cerebral areas of the job...like thinking before she speaks. It doesn’t matter; it’s time she faced the unpleasant truth: she’s not cutting it as a Senator. Not yet, and perhaps not ever.

Senator Jacqui Lambie could be the love-child that Cory Bernardi and Sarah Palin never had, the very model of a xenophobic little Aussie battler that Pauline Hanson always dreamed of being. She is conservative talkback’s perfect listener – at home all day with enough personal phone-in material to last for months, an axe to grind and no verbal censor. 

There is something to be said for consistency. Her style of her public comments prior to the election has continued unchecked since she became a Senator less than four months ago. Now, the microphone is bigger. Make all the jokes you like about Senator Lambie; there’s an abundance to be made. Jacqui Lambie is her own worst enemy: she is mouthy, ignorant and refuses to learn.

Just this week, she declined an invitation from Liberal MP Craig Laundy to visit a Mosque with him. As part of their response to increasing anti-Islam sentiment in parts of the community – something which Senator Lambie herself is driving with her oblivious rants – many Mosques are opento the public this weekend, in the hope that non-Muslims will take the opportunity to visit, and learn more about Islam with tours of the Mosque, displays and question and answer sessions.  

But despite the invitation from Mr Laundy, it’s not forJacqui Lambie. She said that she would feel uncomfortable in a Mosque because she is Catholic. I’m pretty sure that no-one is expecting her to face Mecca, drop to her knees and pray to Allah, but ultimately the choice is hers. 

It’s a shame, because what the Senator knows about Islam would fit in a thimble, and still leave enough space for a finger.

Even Andrew Bolt has criticized Senator Lambie, reprinting her fascinating insight into what makes a man appealing. 

Bogans will cheer, but it is both shameful and alarming that this kind of woman has a critical say in the running of this country:

SENATOR Jacqui Lambie is looking for a man and she only has two requirements, they must be wealthy and well-endowed…

“They must have heaps of cash and they’ve got to have a package between their legs, let’s be honest,” Lambie said [on radio].

If Senator Lambie wants to appear on radio talking about sex, sounding like a desperate psycho-cougar-mama, that's also her choice. 

In fairness, Senator Lambie has shown an admirable commitment to Australia – well, her version of Australia – by serving in themilitary. Regrettably, that didn’t work out too well for her: a back injury, fisticuffs with a male colleague in a bar, a demotion and a medical discharge, although she says she loved her life in the army. 

Since her discharge in 2000, she didn’t work in a paid job until commencing as a Senator in July. In fact, she only coming off the disability pension earlier this year. She’d been interested in politics for some time, displaying a Kardashian-like loyalty to the Australian political establishment by joining the Labor Party, then joining the Liberal Party, then going it alone as an independent before finally joining Palmer United Party, because she needed PUP’s financial power. She wasn’t kidding – she does like men with money.

Out there in Corporate Land, almost everyone is employed on a three month probationary period in which they are expected to prove themselves to their new employer. Senator Lambie, elected with just 6.6% if the Tasmanian Senate vote, has been collecting salary of $195,130 for over three months now, and we’re still looking for indications that she can handle the job. In her interview with Gay Alcorn, Senator Lambie said 

“So it's like any job, you've got to sort of sit back for three or four months and then, all right, okay, I've figured that out. Now I'm coming in."

Clive Palmer, who promised to share his limited experience in public office to ‘mentor’ Ms Lambie on the ways of politics, might be willing to give his brazen Senator enough rope, but the Australian public, the media and Clive won't wait indefinitely. Senator Lambie has to show us what she's got – for real – or rethink this whole Senator business.

Time’s up.

Science is Not a Dirty Word

Could the Abbott Government’s determination not to send medical aid to western Africa to assist with the Ebola crisis be just the latest in the series of decisions that reject science?

Tony Abbott’s infamous statement that “the argument behind climate change is crap” should have been a warning. His words were deliberate – he was challenging the science of climate change. While he later admitted that he had been wrong, his actions suggest that he is ambivalent. The Abbott Government axed no ministry of climate change, has repealed the Carbon Tax, and when world leaders are uniting for action, Australia’s Prime Minister is refusing to discuss the issue at next month’s G20 in Brisbane.

When Prime Minister Abbott refused to attend the recent Climate Summit in New York last month, despite being in New York at the time, Australia was represented by Foreign Minister Julie Bishop, who seems to have no credentials at all in the areas of climate study, climate action or even science in general. With no climate change or science ministries, it’s puzzling why Environment Minister Greg Hunt was denied the honour of presenting Australia’s policy to the Summit.

Mr Abbott, who has not studied science since high school, has appointed high profile climate change deniers to key positions: Maurice Newman is his senior business advisor, and Dick Warburton is advising on Australia’s Renewable Energy Target. Mr Newman has called for an enquiry into the Bureau of Meteorology, citing doubt in some temperature recordings, a subject far outside his scope as an advisor on business. A few minutes of research shows that the only people questioning the figures are other high profile climate change deniers, including Jo Nova and Jennifer Marohasy. It’s an endless cycle of deniers quoting each other’s doubts to prove their argument.

Mr Warburton describes himself as a climate change sceptic: 

I am not a denier, nor a sceptic actually, of climate change per se. What I am sceptical is the claims that man-made carbon dioxide is the major cause of global warming. I'm not a denier of that, but I am sceptical of that claim.

The government’s attitude to climate change is also “sceptical”, if Treasurer Joe Hockey’s first budget is an indication. There were massive cuts to “green” science and technology programmes, including the Australian Renewable Energy Agency, the National Water Commission, Carbon Capture and Storage projects, the One Million Solar Roofs Programme, Landcare funding, and funding for research into clean fuels.

The ALP’s plan for a National Broadband Network has been all but abandoned, and yet every argument made to support the Abbott Government’s alternative network has been thoroughly debunked. Rod Tucker, Laureate Professor, Institute for a Broadband-Enabled Society (IBES) at University of Melbourne is highly critical of the Coalition’s broadband solution. 

The idea that we could use very fast broadband based on mobile technologies and existing fibre defies the laws of physics. The reality is that very fast broadband - 50 megabits per second and above - cannot be delivered to the entire population using wireless and existing fibre.

The science and technology sector also took a hit in Joe Hockey’s first budget, when billions of dollars were cut from various scientific agencies - another indication that the government doesn't consider science to be a priority.

So fundamental is science to Western civilisation that we take much of it for granted. Perhaps this is one of the reasons the government felt comfortable stripping millions of dollars from the budget of Australia’s peak science body, the CSIRO. 

As a direct consequence of the federal government slashing $111 million from CSIRO's funding over four years in the May budget, the organisation would lose 400 researchers and support staff by mid next year and another 300 positions would be cut after an internal restructure.

The budget has had an immediate impact on research into severe infectious diseases, including Hendra and Ebola.

Last month, management confirmed eight infectious disease researchers at the Australian Animal Health Laboratory in Geelong, the country's only facility for researching live samples of deadly diseases such as Ebola, would also lose their jobs.

Science is simply not part of this government’s vocabulary. A quick investigation into the current ministry shows that only one current minister has tertiary qualification in science – and that’s Scott Morrison’s degree in Applied Science (Economics and Geography) – not a test-tube or Bunsen Burner in sight. The next closest is Andrew Robb’s qualification in agriculture. The Shadow Ministry is not much better, with only Richard Marles studying science at tertiary level.

On social media, critics of the Government’s decision to refuse to send aid to West Africa have drawn comparisons with the government’s enthusiasm to send troops back to Iraq. Rather than being an expression of racist sentiments, or fear of being unable to control the spread of Ebola, it’s more likely to be a lack of confidence in the science being practiced, from biochemistry and statistical modelling to logistics and infection control protocols. 

The world’s future, our ability to feed and clothe a growing global population, fight disease, communicate, conduct business, travel and even amuse ourselves is now so completely intertwined with science that it’s unthinkable that the government of a wealthy developed country has sidelined it.  Mr Abbott needs to look past his own ignorance, beyond the limitations of his Ministry and advisers, and accept that Australia can have an important role as a global citizen. With that role comes responsibility, and as a nation, we are failing to meet those responsibilities.

Nuance

Here we go again. The rednecks have taken over the national agenda.

Woolworths has been roundly criticised for selling navy blue men's singlets, colloquially known as wife-beaters, with the Australian flag and the words "If you don't love it, leave" in white. It's one of those catchphrases which sounds benign, even sane, when read literally. Unfortunately, it's not that simple. 

This particular catchphrase* has been hijacked in recent years by rednecks and bogans, and it doesn't mean the same thing. You see it on the back of muscle cars - often alongside a silver fern, of all things. It's no longer a symbol of national pride: it's morphed into a sneering insult thrown by xenophobes at new Australians who want to preserve some of the culture and customs of their heritage.

It might be triggered by something as simple as cooking "ethnic" food, or wearing "foreign" clothes, or it might be the bigger issues of race and religion, regional wars and global politics. It's definitely the kind of taunt thrown at Muslim women who choose to dress modestly and cover their heads. The meaning behind that simple slogan is now that if you come to Australia, you must assimilate, integrate and leave all traces of your old life behind. You must immediately become an outdated xenophobic caricature of what it really means to be an Aussie.

A quick Google search for 'characteristics of typical Australians' yields a wide range of opinions, including the federal Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade,   the University of Queensland,  and the satirical website Values Australia. 

Unsurprisingly, Values Australia has summed up the position of the offensive singlet wearers in a section headed Values:

"Australians respect women, other people's beliefs, democracy, and our mates and we always give each other a fair go."

We're a tolerant society and if you don't understand that you can piss off."

Woolworths have seen the commercial light and have withdrawn the singlets from sale, claiming that it was not the style they ordered, it conflicts with their corporate values, and that their quality control processes should've identified the error before the products made it to the shelves.

And that's where this small tale of a small error should end...except that the small minds have joined in. Welcome aboard, 2GB's Ray Hadley, clumsy-mouthed audio thug and leader of the ignorant and ill-informed, preaching about the righteous "positive message" on the singlet and the inclusive nature of Australian society...assuming you follow the Ted Bulpitt rules of being an Aussie.  

"It's very simple; we are inclusive."

"If you're here, if you reside here, if you're an Australian resident, or if you're an Australian citizen, then you love the joint. It's not racist. It’s simply a fact of life, this is the best country in the world. If you don't embrace it you don't deserve to be here."

Hadley's rant does nothing more than prove how out of touch he is with a more nuanced Australian culture in 2014. In Hadley's black and white world view, to love Australia, you must not reject anything about it, or prefer any aspect of any other culture. The irony is that multicultural Australia is being rejected by Hadley's disciples - the same disciples rejecting any form of criticism of criticism.

But wait. 2GB's not done yet! Their afternoon host Ben Fordham has spent his shift giving the offensive singlets away on air...and they promoted the giveaway on social media. Wasn't that where the initial backlash against Woolies started?

* For the record, "If you don't love it, leave it" is not an Australian invention. It's part of the lyrics of a 1969 song called "The Fightin' Side of Me", by American country singer Merle Haggard. The song has been described as patriotic, jingoistic, and appeals to politically and socially conservative Americans.

Critical Thinking 101

Sharri Markson may have done us all a favour with her undercover exposé of course content at two of Sydney’s big media and communications degree courses. Journalism is important. We need to ensure that our future journalists have the best preparation possible. Ms Markson's piece has kickstarted a conversation we need to have.

Twenty-four hours ago, before social media was consumed by Tony Abbott's threat to 'shirtfront' one of the handful of men on the planet with access to a large pile of nukes, social media, and a few mainstream media outlets were consumed by the always newsworthy Ms Markson and her scant few weeks’ part time experience as a journalism student.

In fairness, Ms Markson started her career as a sixteen year old copy girl at the Murdoch-owned Sunday Telegraph, and has not had the benefit of a university education. She may have been unfamiliar with the openly challenging style and subtle expectation of some lecturers.

Lack of undergraduate experience notwithstanding, her undercover forays into UTS and the University of Sydney’s first year journalism classes armed The Australian with enough ammunition to accuse these respected institutions of brainwashing their students. Specifically, she accused senior lecturers of teaching students that News Corp - the very organisation that pays for Ms Markson’s Jimmy Choos – is dangerously biased in ways that are so obvious and effective as to damage the democratic process. 

After being shown a transcript of the lecture on News Corp, the company’s group editorial director Campbell Reid accused the University of Sydney of indoctrinating students, not educating them.

“Obviously I can’t comment on the full breadth of the content of these courses but on the basis of what has been relayed here I have to wonder if we are dealing with indoctrination rather than education,’’ he said.

Journalists, students, ex-students and commentators leapt to their chosen side of the political spectrum and displayed their colours. Lefties puffed out their chests and demanded that media lecturers be allowed to teach their students about the reality of the news media environment in Australia. The lefty reality is obviously that News Corp is as biased as buggery.

Conservatives punched back with claims of academic elitism in a news media dominated by government-bashing lefties, and counter-claims of opposite bias from almost everyone who isn’t a Murdoch employee. Commentators chimed in with warnings about biting the hand that feeds so many in the industry.

Questions, some rhetorical, volleyed back and forth: Are lecturers really teaching *that*? Is it just one or two lecturers, or are whole universities infested with the anti-News Corp bug? What impact is all this Murdoch-bashing having on the poor, impressionable students, most still in their teens? How did Ms Markson, thirty-something and worldly-wise, pass herself off as a first-year innocent?

Actually, that's an important question. Sharri Markson is a scarlet gladioli sticking up in the middle of a bowling green. Deliberately, she stands out: a former print and television reporter, ex Cleo editor, now Media Editor at the Australian and commentator-for-hire on shows ranging from Q&A to The Bolt Report. She's a Walkley Award winner, and part of Sydney's social set with a perfectly coiffed public profile. How is it possible that a group of media students, as well as their lecturers, failed to recognise that the Media Editor of The Australian had infiltrated their alleged lefty groupthink lessons? Who else would they fail to recognise?

Some students, past and present, have responded to the accusations of anti-News Corp indoctrination, insisting that they are quite able to apply critical analysis to the information presented, and sift the valid from the invalid. In Honi Soit, the student paper at the University of Sydney, media student Lane Sainty defends her institution, while former Honi Soit editor Max Chalmers defends the students in Crikey:

Notably absent in Markson’s writing was any word from actual students. Most insultingly, she seems to think we can’t tell when a lecturer is a bit of a lefty or a Tory. That’s the reason that just about every media student in Sydney is laughing at Markson this morning.

At least Ms Sainty had the grace to admit that if one of the Murdoch papers was to offer her a job, she would take it without hesitation. Of course she would! Jobs in journalism are disappearing and newly graduated beggars can’t be choosers.

Vertigo, the student paper at UTS, chose to respond with satire, portraying itself as a hotbed of communism: 

The revelations follow reports on UTS left-wing bias from The Australian. Working undercover, Media Editor Sharri Markson braved the brutalist battlegrounds of the city campus with a Macbook as camouflage and The Truth as ammunition.

Rumours suggest that Markson is in fact working undercover under the guise of a “journalist”. The reports have not been confirmed.

Ouch.

Ms Markson’s expose has ignited a critical conversation about how our future journalists are being educated. The issue should not be about lecturers teaching their students that a specific media organisation as biased or unethical or corrupt. Our journalism students shouldn’t be learning what to think; they should be learning how to think critically, how to analyse, how to tell a story...and by all accounts – including Ms Markson’s own – this is exactly what’s happening at USyd and UTS.

Ms Markson seems to have missed that point.

The Bålsgörn Husband Crate

Don't be fooled. IKEA is not a hub for reasonably priced household furniture, accessories, and doodads with vaguely Swedish sounding names. It is the dark side, the Death Star, the cause of more marital bickering than a gaggle of tipsy women talking about discontinued lipstick shades during the grand final.

IKEA is the place where couples go to prove that they really, truly love each other.

As well as being the one true test of relationship resilience, IKEA is also a retailer. In fact, IKEA is a big, successful retailer, and they have special sorcery calculated to separate you from your money while filling your home with this season’s array of furniture and gadgetry you didn't know you needed.

It helps to acknowledge that in this battle of you versus IKEA, you won't win. Ever.

Having said that, there are ways to make the IKEA experience less testing, less traumatic, though it may require committed research and meticulous planning. A half-hearted chat in the car during inevitable laps of the carpark won't cut it. But planning is covered in the second law of IKEA, so let's back up.

There are pretty nifty services at IKEA. Did you know that they will pick your order for you, so you don't have to deal with Flatpack Self-Serve Hell? It costs, but isn't your relationship worth it?

Unless your IKEA escapade is exclusively for recreational purposes* - in which case my best advice is to try something saner, like licking peanut butter off Gordon Ramsay's filleting knife - preparation is the key to success.

Manage your expectations with these handy tips:

1. 1. An IKEA adventure is not an impulse thing. At least 12 hours prior to your mission, answer these questions:

Why are you going there? Do you want to browse, buy things, or is this a recreational* visit? Have your objective clear in your mind. 

Who are you going with? Do they have to be there? Do they want to be there? IKEA is cheaper and faster when less people are involved, and reluctant tourists will slow you down and cost you money.

2. If you're hoping to buy things, get on the IKEA website. You can make a shopping list online, complete with stock numbers, which you can print out and take with you. This may not actually help, but will make you feel more in control.

3. Partners, spouses, flatmates, interior designers - take note: If there is any negotiating to be done, negotiate before you leave home. Agree on exactly what you want. (See point 2 about the website.) You don’t want to cause a scene in the lighting department because Grümpska lampshades come in two different shades of grey.  People who cause scenes in Ikea should expect to be the object of muffled whispers and pitying looks from the thousands of people shuffling past on their way to the Storage Solutions. You’ve been warned.

4. "I don't care. Get whatever the fuck you want" is only acceptable at Tiffany's. Say that at IKEA, and you might as well just head for the car park, sit in the Bålsgörn Husband Crate and wait. Nothing you do or say will be right for a very long time.

5. While you probably wouldn't take your children to IKEA, please remember that in suburbia, the number of children outweighs the number of available, affordable, trustworthy babysitters by some distance. There will be kids. Besides, kids love IKEA...until they get to the Laundry Department, when they've run out of patience and jammed one of those short Wudenstikt pencils up the baby's nose. That's another story. You can minimise the munchkin factor by avoiding IKEA on weekends and during school holidays...but you'll still have to navigate around trolleys, prams, strollers, toddlers, resentful teens and their extended families, all moving forward at a glacial pace.

6.  It takes at least two-three hours to get through IKEA . Allow at least four hours, and five on weekends, plus time to park the car, and refreshment time. Every IKEA is very cleverly set out: you have to follow a sneaky snaky path designed to maximise your exposure to every one of their eleventy billion produktärden and deny you any chance to make an early exit. (God help us all if there's a fire in an Ikea store!) Resistance is futile.

7. As you're going to be there longer than the total duration of a Girl with the Dragon Tattoo movie marathon, you'll want to be comfortable. Anything this side of wearing tights as pants is acceptable.  You won't be the worst dressed there. 

8. Set a budget. Refer to the shopping list you created (See Point 2) and multiply that by the number of people going to IKEA with you, times the number of hours you will be there. That's about how much you'll spend. Blame the Doodleskådts that you couldn't live without.

9. Approach the Restaurant with extreme caution, and a pocket full of Quickeze. The Köttbuller may contain traces of food, along with ... no, some things are better left unthought. And the hotdogs and drinks near the exit? They act as a distraction while you're looking for your car.

10. Your car will not be where you think you left it...but it doesn't matter because you've got a hot dog, a cold drink and a trolley load of flat packs and kernöckenarken up the wåzoo...and you're still married! Huzzah!

* Note - If you're really just going for fun, we cannot be friends.

Stay tuned for "The Allen Key versus the Optimism Bias" and other tales of life with Ikea. 

I Wish

Every campaign that calls for social change is hoping to be noticed, particularly by media and celebrities. That’s how to start a chain reaction: the campaign gets noticed, attracts attention and new followers, grows, attracts more attention, grows even more, and so on. Every successful crusade that has started from the ground up, including womens suffrage and GetUp’s portfolio of campaigns, has operated in basically the same way.

#WISH is getting noticed. 

#WISH is a small Australian movement in which non-Muslim women, including some celebrities, take photos of themselves wearing a headscarf as a makeshift hijab, and post the photos on social media. The campaign takes its name from the acronym “Women In Solidarity (with) Hijabis”, and was started by Australian-Muslim lawyer and activist Mariam Veiszadeh. Some men have joined the campaign, posting photos of themselves holding signs expressing their support for the crusade.

#WISH is just one of several actions taking by Muslims and non-Muslims together, to distinguish “everyday” Muslims in our communities from the Islamic extremism ripping apart the Middle East. Another high profile campaign being played out on social media is “Not in my name”, a campaign that started in the UK as an opportunity to give young Muslims a chance to denounce the actions of Islamic State. 

Dr Lauren Rosewarne is a senior lecturer in the School of Social and Political Sciences at the University of Melbourne. Dr Rosewarne has dismissed the #WISH campaign as being more about fashion than religious freedom, and on a par with tabloid television fat-suit stunts. 

There's a reason why involvement in social media campaigns such as #WISH are so frequently downplayed as slacktivism. Invariably they are examples of the laziest form of political… <cough>… participation imaginable. Incorporating a headscarf into our daily social media lifestyles isn't consciousness raising; rather, it is attention seeking and it is about a privileged delusion that non-Muslims can dress-up, partake of and then somehow protest discrimination. All using the mystical power of the selfie.

This is not how social change happens.

Social change would be nice, of course, but perhaps one of the objectives of #WISH is more modest than that, and perhaps it has met that objective by bringing a feeling of comfort and community to others. Isn't that successful social activism?

Dr Rosewarne seems to believe that social activism requires more than a selfie on social media, and perhaps she’s right – or perhaps she’s simply an activist snob who believes that her personal choice in style and mode of political action, if she has one, is somehow superior. She also assumes that #WISH participants are all white Non-Muslims who are involved in no political activity beyond posting selfies supporting the cause of the day.

Sadly, Dr Rosewarne has missed the larger point of #WISH. It is not about illuminating discrimination at all; we all know that there is a heartbreaking anti-Muslim sentiment throughout the Western world, and particularly now. Senior figures in our own government are squabbling over a burqa ban, proposed by two of the most conservative figures ever elected in this country, assisted by one shiny new Senator who wears her ignorance as a badge of honour.

As Muslim-Australians become targets for abuse on our suburban streets, #WISH lets Muslim women know that not all of us are filled with fear and hatred, that we are proud to take this small act, to give them hope. The hijab is a religious symbol for the Muslim women who choose to wear it. Similarly, it is a symbol of solidarity for the non-Muslim women who have chosen to join this campaign.

Last week, a white male friend mentioned that he had been out during the day with a colleague who was not white. The darker man attracted anti-Muslim insults launched from the other side of the street by passing bogans. The only reason for the verbal filth directed at him was the colour of his skin.

I’m not white either, and as I read my friend’s tweet, I felt sick. We were heading out shopping at the time and I was, for the first time in decades, uncomfortable in my skin. Nervous. As a young child, I attracted more attention for my colour than I care to remember. My father is Muslim and dark; my mother is white and was raised Presbyterian. These days she is not religious and nor am I, but here is our #WISH photo.

Today I wear my version of the hijab to express my mixed race, and to add my voice to those who have already joined the #WISH campaign. Islam is part of my community; it’s part of my existence. Showing support for women who are Muslim is not fashion, Dr Rosewarne, nor is it even remotely the same as wearing a fat suit for television ratings.

Meanwhile, if Dr Rosewarne wants to examine something based on fashion, I recommend she take a look at the current tendency of some cynical commentators to undermine the ability of social media to drive positive change …or perhaps she could stop criticising from the cheap seats and get on board.