Was a new government really needed or were we just in want of novelty?

Recently I listened as a fellow talked about how governments, good or bad and even if they are of the former variety, reach the end of a cycle.

Is that the case or is the idea of novelty is so entrenched in modern communities that people reach out, and vote for, a new government just as they search for a fresh novelty?
The success of our modern consumerist world hinges on our raging desire for novelty, a concept that underpins the new models of widgets each year paradigm, although the changes may only be cosmetic.
Our drive for novelty is helped along by our insatiable need for new, whether that be a new widget or, as the case in Victoria just recently, a new government.
This conversation is not about our displaced government being good or bad, or whether that which replaced is better or worse, rather it is about entropy, the fact that everything we know and understand is subject to depreciation and, ultimately, death.
The Second Law of Thermodynamics explains entropy, but here is not the time or place to discuss it, rather simply consider the decay of all around you, including yourself, and in accepting the reality of entropy, live with it rather than attempt to forestall it.
Governments that have reached the end of their “cycle”, assuming they are still operating relatively successfully, have simply not refreshed their image sufficiently to underpin their novelty.
It is a sad state of affairs when the future wellbeing of our communities hinges on our distorted, and often perverse, need for novelty, something fresh and so something new, not necessarily better, rather just fresh and new.
Also, it is worth noting that the word “new” is considered to be the most powerful word in advertising lexicon, followed closely today after decades of mass produced foods by the term “fresh”.
New and fresh appear to be antidotes to entropy, a concept most might not think about too much, but which are instinctively reassuring to people who are presently wrestling with the possibility of their demise brought about by human induced changes to our climate.

As it will be for all of us, a winning streak ends

Future Christmases for many extended family members will not be seasons of joy.

A niece’s husband, whom I did not know too well, died just two days before the annual celebration after failing to recover from a heart attack.
The father of two, only in his mid-forties, had collapsed while making deliveries and by the time he had been found, attempts, made to resuscitate him and then taken to hospital, his brain had suffered lasting damage.
His family knew he had wanted to donate his organs and so after it was determined that his brain was irreparably damaged and recipients were organized, his life support equipment was turned off.
Brian lived in another part of Victoria and so I had little to do with him and strangely knew more about his kids as my wife kept me abreast of their movements through Facebook.
And so although he was somewhat of a stranger to me, his final scene was unexpected and sudden, he was family and his death was a shock.
I can’t imagine how traumatic it will be for immediate family next Christmas, the Christmas after and I can only guess at how difficult it will be in following festive seasons.
There is a strange finality about death that seems to escape our understanding and every time we encounter such a moment involving family or friend, promises of living a better life erupt, but in the maelstrom that is life, rarely, interestingly, are those promises ever kept.
Life, no matter our approach, is a vibrant affair and that, alone, outside whatever affiliations we might have or superstitions or addictions we have, warrants care and respect for it is a fragile thing and our time here is limited.
Poet and songwriter Leonard Cohen (above) discussed the vibrancy and fragility of our lives in his poem, “A Thousand Kisses Deep” when he wrote:


The ponies run, the girls are young,
The odds are there to beat.
You win for a while, and then it’s done –
Your little winning streak.
And summoned how to deal
With your invincible defeat,
You live your life as if it’s real,
A thousand kisses deep.

From a muted sunsent to the outbreak of good sense

The muted sunset of 2010 gathers in the west and then we turn to look east in the hope of seeing a spectacular sunrise marking the beginning of an equally breath-taking 2011.

Hope will be insufficient if 2011 is to be something better than the year about to end, as more than that along with good intentions is needed.
The latter, it has been said, pave the road to hell and so if the year ahead is to be pivotal for humanity we will need to abandon our expansive way of living; the seeming dislike we have of the other; our misplaced distrust in science; our love for addictions that are blatantly fallacious, along with disturbing superstitions many abide by that contribute nought to humanity’s wellbeing; and the perverse belief that force will resolve any disputation.
We simply cannot allow 2011 to be a year of more of the same – the time for chat, research, reports, talk-fests and the seemingly never-ending referral of matters to committees is gone.
The year ahead needs to be one of commitment; we need to commit to limiting our greenhouse gas pollution; we need to commit to a more restrained way of living with our governments leading the way to help us to build self-reliant communities; we need to commit to learning about, understanding and introducing a steady-state economy in which we abandon the growth ideology and embrace a paradigm that is about quality as opposed to quantity; we need to commit to thoughtful reasoning about humanity’s place in the universe accepting that we are here by chance and that in itself being such a beautifully wondrous thing that we should celebrate life and stop the perplexing passion we have for slaughtering each other.
Other things I’d like to see here in 2011 – an understanding and embrace of true equality; a serious move toward republicanism; the erosion of misogynistic religions, in fact the complete shift away from religions allowing for a genuinely secular state; and the outbreak of good sense to see alcohol, our most socially damaging legitimately available drug, take the same route as smoking.

Bill has never flinched and retreat is not in his vocabulary

Bill Hickford, the fellow I knew, never flinched.

And that trait was on show again just the other night when he confronted a knife wielding burglar in his Shepparton home.
Bill led the GV Centre Committee through difficult times when I was involved, maybe 20 years ago, and although circumstances made his role both challenging, and often controversial, he never flinched.
That admirable way of living is what our community needs more of and although the positive aspects clearly outweigh whatever might be considered negative, Bill, sadly, felt the sharp edge of the downside early Friday morning.
Bill had an acute sense of right and wrong, although such an instinct was unimportant when unusual noises led him to investigate, followed by his confrontation with an armed intruder and a subsequent struggle in which Bill was stabbed 13 times.
No instinct was needed; Bill would have simply known it was wrong to have an unknown fellow, armed with a knife, roaming about his darkened house.
Was the break-in planned or was Bill’s house simply chosen by chance?
Nothing points to the former and so it would seem the latter prevails, however the intruder had not accounted for the fact that inside was Bill, a fellow who does not have “retreat” in his vocabulary.
The passion for right a wrong is a personal power that Bill will need to enlist as he draws on reserves to repair the damage wrought as wrestled with that intruder to his Kialla Lakes (above) home.
For long I have wondered why bad things happen to good people and this seems to the epitome of such a dynamic, but I’m still mystified.
Law and order protagonists will use this to again beat their drum, but the issue is broader and deeper than a simple argument for more police.
Rather it is a symptom of an ill-society, one that is rich in inequality, promotes ideals unattainable for most, makes violence attractive and appear as an avenue to success and suggests that gratification is there to be taken.
Bill is one of the good people, who now struggles after encountering one of those bad things.

Christmas offends, but I just love it

Christmas offends my sensibilities – but I just love it.
Christmas was born with the birth of a myth that invokes Christianity and became a marketer’s dream when the idea of gift-giving captured the modern mind.
Christmas, in its present form, worsens difficulties the world faces with the exhaustion of resources and encourages a way of life that is the antithesis of a sustainable world.
Christmas and climate change, or global warming if you prefer, seem unrelated, but are inextricably linked with industry working overtime and ploughing through resources to churn out what it is we want, rather than need, for this festive season.
Christmas does, however, have a positive dimension in that it encourages altruism throughout December, a generousity that is largely in retreat for the rest of the year.
Christmas is for many, wrongly and yet understandably, a real or imagined deadline for tasks ranging from the completion of projects to decision time about relationships or other personal moments of consequence.
Christmas gives oxygen to a lie that may seem innocuous and fun, but in a subtle manner illustrates to those at the heart of the deception, our children, that they should treat those in authority with some suspicion, bringing on an uneasiness that has the potential to surreptitiously trouble them throughout their lives.
Christmas, despite its Christian underpinnings and its consumerist overtones brings about brief moments that point to the richness of humanity and in so doing unearths the warmth, connectedness and collaboration that will be essential if humanity is to find the capacity to dispense with its differences and stand as one, rather than many, in confronting emerging difficulties.
Christmas for me will be particularly enjoyable as it will be the first I have spent with my one and three-year-old grandsons, something about which I often feel distress for long have I believed that we should all live where we live, meaning families should not be in disparate parts of the country, or even worse, overseas.
Christmas brings its dilemmas, but for me it is a particularly special time and I trust it is exactly that for you – season’s greetings!

Addicted to pointless beliefs, we fritter away the understanding of our true worth.

Our innate human need to believe, in something, is distracting humanity from understanding its true worth.

We fritter away our intellectual capacities on hollow beliefs and yet largely ignore scientifically demonstrable contrary values that underpin the scaffolding of life.
The former are, almost without exception, rooted in emotion while the latter emerge from a rational, reasonable and thoughtful approach to life.
Reason, ration and thought, despite what we say, demand that we take responsibility to sustain life in all its fragility as against indulging in pointless and frivolous beliefs that when exposed to close scientific examination desert us to make no contribution to the enrichment and wellbeing of life on earth.
Scientist and author, Marcelo Gleiser (above right), helps us understand that through the happy collision of various inanimate substances, chemicals and circumstances, life evolved on earth about 3.5 billion years ago and its resultant asymmetry produced, ultimately, our universe’s most intelligent life form, you and I.
Late in the 17th century humanity experienced the Age of Reason and then, in the following century, came the Age of Enlightenment that was really more about values than ideas and ignited a questioning of traditional institutions, customs, and morals, and a strong belief in rationality and science.
Humanity glimpsed freedom, but never did it escape from the shadow of superstition and it was only recently that those at Sydney’s Festival of Dangerous Ideas heard that Western modernity is threatened by a population expansion of the religious, an accelerating decline of liberal secularism and the rise of religious conservatism.
Gleiser argues for a new morality aimed at preserving life, noting that the most amazing fact about existence is that we are aware of it. “The most sobering is that, as with our ancestors, we remain alone as we contemplate creation.
He encourages us to come together as a species to fight for life and in closing, “Imperfect Creation”, Gleiser wrote: “We have a chance to change the course of things and salvage the world we grew up loving.
“Even if some have doubts as to how severe the upcoming storm will be, there will be a storm”, he wrote.

Murray-Darling boss resigns - understandably

Many would be celebrating this week’s resignation of Murray-Darling Basin Authority boss, Mike Taylor (right).

His resignation ambushed many, including the Federal Government whose Water Act he and his authority had attempted to interpret with the intent of salvaging the integrity of the Murray-Darling Basin.
A guide to plan for the basin released earlier this year was greeted with hostility and argument that Mr Taylor and his authority had ignored social and financial implications for all those who lived in and depended upon the basin’s water.
Mr Taylor and others from the authority canvassed many basin communities over recent months to explain the intricacies of the guide, but instead of thoughtful deliberation those many meetings were received with mostly unreasoned, emotional anger.
Mr Taylor repeatedly told the thousands at the public meetings that he and the authority had done nothing more, or less, than interpret, and apply the Federal Government inspired Water Act.
In launching the guide, Mr Taylor stepped into the cauldron that was ablaze with raw nerves set alight by a ten-year drought and here was he, simply the messenger, telling the communities that they would be living and working in a future with even tighter water supplies.
Like the scientists trying to help the world understand the difficulties we face because of human induced climate change, Mr Taylor found himself in what had become a political struggle about something that was clearly understood in terms of facts, figures and undeniable realities.
Being a fellow grounded in latter, Mr Taylor was uncomfortable with the former and although I suspect he understood the plan to the guide to be correct, he was not prepared to sacrifice himself for the greater good, which he could sense was slipping away.
I’m saddened by this week’s development and do not stand with those who rejoice as I feel emotion insulated from reality has stolen the initiative and the long-term sustainability of the basin has been sacrificed on the altar of populism and a sense of what feels right today with little regard for tomorrow.
I fear his resignation will delay proceedings, allowing doubters to call for further reviews and consultations that will again delay of process that is already cumbersome and wordy and needed, beyond anything else, a speedy conclusion.