Pelican Edition 6, Volume 85

Ed iti o n 6 Vo lu me 85

Wa r / Peace

PELICAN

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ASCOT’S

Get in super early, with Gates open from 9am!

• Sideshow alley • Prize giveaways

• Live bands • Dress up for FREE ENTRY

PLUS, join forces with the real superheroes of the day - WA’s best jockeys racing in an action-packed 8-race programme!

O FAV

It’s a supercharged race day with entertainment kicking off at 11am, including;

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FOR

FREEY ENTR

ER O

DR

UP AS Y S O S UR

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RACE DAY

H RI TE SUPER

Call Perth 9277on 0777 CallRacing Perth on Racing 9277 0777 or visit www.perthracing.org.au or visit www.perthracing.org.au Like us on Facebook Follow us on Twitter Like us on Facebook Follow us on Twitter +18 event

Picture by Tamara Jennings

REGULARS 5 6 7 9 46

what’s up on campus credits editorials PSA where’s pelly

FEATURES 10 feminism 11 TERFs 12 McDonald’s 13 DRM 14 selfies 15 anxiety 16 refugees 17 wars 18 fantasy 19 clarity 20 volunteers 21 ISIS 22 aid

SECTIONS 23 politics 26 film 32 music 36 books 38 arts 42 culture

WHAT’S UP ON CAMPUS UWA PAW (UWA People for Animal Welfare) Are you passionate about animals?

Then you need to join PAW!!

We stand for animal welfare and rights and support ethical treatment of animals of all species, shapes and sizes!

Through our fun events such as veganfriendly BBQ’s, public lectures, movie nights, quiz nights & e-letters (and more!), we facilitate education and awareness of animal rights, ethics and welfare issues at the same time as supporting community animal welfare organisations through fundraisers.

If you think you belong, join us at https://www.facebook.com/ groups/131830273672010/ and grab a membership for only $5 at any of our upcoming events!

What would we do without language?

The UWA Linguistics Society is for all ☺ language lovers Come and play word games, follow our series “ULS Talks TED” and participate in our exciting linguistic projects around campus!

You can also follow news and events at our Facebook page: https://www. facebook.com/uwalinguisticssociety

UWA Amnesty International The UWA Amnesty International group meet fortnightly on the Reid Lawn (or Reid café if it’s raining) at 1-2pm on Tuesdays. If you’re interested in human rights in Australia and internationally, do come and join us.

Find out more at https://www.facebook. com/AmnestyUWA UWA Society for Creative Anachronism Known as the College of Saint Basil the Great, we are part of the international Society for Creative Anachronism, dedicated to recreating activities of the medieval world. We uphold the values of chivalry and honour and practice armoured combat, rapier fighting, archery, sewing, costuming, dancing, music, feasting, cooking, brewing and armouring. Join us for College Training on Oak Lawn from 5pm on Wednesdays and Thursdays to learn about swordplay, dancing, get ideas for garb and costumes, or even just to chat about history.

Overseas Christian Fellowship OCF is an interdenominational student ministry that seeks to spread and share the good news with international student

in our university. We are a fellowship (not a church or small group) that meets regularly on Fridays (7pm, Social Sciences LT @ UWA) for bible studies, public meets and other fun events as well as prayer meeting ons Wednesdays!

Follow us on Facebook (Overseas Christian Fellowship (OCF) Perth 2014, or email us at perth1@ocfaustralia.org UWA Italian Club Our ever popular coffee and conversation event has returned once again!

Join us at UCafe for a fantastic opportunity to practice your Italian language skills and meet new people, all over a delicious cup of coffee, Italian style of course!” https://www.facebook.com/ UWAItalianClub UWA Catholic Society ‘The UWA Catholic Society (UCS) is an organising body for young Catholics and other interested persons on campus. We aim to serve Christ and the Church, and to help everyone grow in fides, spes and caritas. We believe in the dignity of all from conception to natural death - as Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI says “We are not some casual and meaningless product of evolution. Each of us is the result of a thought of God. Each of us is willed, each of us is loved, each of us is necessary”. Mass is 12pm, Tuesday and Thursday in the Law Link chapel.’

ALUMNI ANNUAL FUND GRANTS NOW OPEN! Grants of up to $30,000 are available for innovative projects or activities that aim to enhance the UWA student experience.

Apply today at www.uwa.edu.au/aafgrants 5

CONTRIBUTORS CONTENTS IMAGE Tamara Jennings CONTRIBUTOR IMAGE Wade McCagh DESIGN Kate “Hannibal” Hoolahan ADVERTISING Alex “Pyrrhus” Pond Karrie “Karrienina” McClelland EDITORS Wade “Scipio” McCagh Zoe “Kitschener” Kilbourn

SECTION EDITORS Arts: Laruen “Washington” Wiszniewski Books: Elisa “Caesar” Thompson Culture: Lucy “Boadicea” Ballantyne Film: Matthew “Ghengis” Green Music: Simon “The Bruce” Donnes Politics: Hamish “Hadrian” Hobbs

CONTRIBUTORS Somayya “Dictator for Life” Ismailjee (Words) Natalia “Stonewall” Verne (Words) Kate “Odysseus” Oakley (Words) Matthew “Leonidas” Bye (Words) Eleanor “Bonaparte” Bruyn (Words) Chloe “Iron Duke” Durand (Words) Brad “Garibaldi” Griffin (Words) Mason “Robespierre” Rothwell (Words) Anna “Zedong” Saxon (Words) Sophia “S. Grant” van Gant (Words) Emily “Commander-in-Chief” Purvis (Words) Matt “Fidel” Farsalas (Words) Leah “Roosevelt” Roberts (Words) Samuel “Crazy Horse” J. Cox (Words) Kieran “Killing in the Name of” Rayney (Words) Callum “Cortes” Corkill (Words) Kevin “Che” Chiat (Words) Bridget “Roosevelt Jr” Rumball (Words) Kat “The Great” Gillespie (Words) Liam “The Conqueror” Dixon (Words) Dinuka “Mussolini” Muhandiramge (Words) Dan “Fresh Kill Dan” Werndly (Words) James “Mughal” Munt (Words) Jett “Mission Accomplished“ Broughton (Words) Grace “McNamara” Mckie (Illustrations) Cat “Patton” Pagani (Illustrations) Holly “Hotspur” Jian (Illustrations)

Picture by Wade McCagh

COVER IMAGE Holly Jian

GODS OF WAR! MAY YOUR HAMMER BE MIGHTY! Do you hate Frank? Do you want to beat him to death? Is your spirit guide also the bottlenose dolphin? Then you should totally join our crew! Pelican is always looking for new writers, artists, contributors, and pyrotechnics to help bring glory to our octogenarian student magazine. You can get in contact with Pelican through our Facebook page, through our email at pelican@guild.uwa. edu.au, or you can come and find us on the 1st Floor of the Guild Building. We host monthly Writers Nights during semester in the Guild Council Meeting Room, so keep a look out for our Facebook events and come down for free pizza and lots of giveaways! Don’t even ask, just bring it!

DISCLAIMER: The views expressed within are not the views of the UWA Student Guild or the Pelican editorial staff.

For advertising enquiries, contact karrie.mcclelland@guild.uwa.edu.au

offer applies to large pizzas only

WWW.GUILDTEXCHANGE.COM

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PREZITORIAL

My fellow Americans. I come to you from the new Guild wing, where a Bauhaus-style chair costs more than an arts unit, and your student representatives hold court (Pelican and asbestos can still be found in the old wing). If you need to find me for whatever reason, feel free to come on up. Take the elevator in the lobby in Guild Village to the second floor, where someone will come and take a teeny, tiny part of your brain, and then walk on through.

Week Four is upon us and the Guild continues to work hard to ensure we continue to twirl ever towards freedom. Winston Churchill once said, “be the change you want to see in the world”, and I think that’s true. That’s why it’s so important to get involved in your student magazine. Pelican has been around longer than my degree is going to take to finish, which is a really long time. Even though, as an engineering student, I am functionally illiterate, I encourage all students who like to write or illustrate or make fun of the Guild President to come to a Pelican writers night. At the end of the day, people won’t remember the cost of a flat white, but they will remember that cracking joke you made once in the pages of Pelican, vol. 85 ed. 6. And remember that if you don’t contribute to Pelican, someone else will do it for you.

Namaste, Hendo Hendo’s Quote of the Week (HQOTW) “What goes around comes to those who wait” – BrainyQuote.com

WADITORIAL

One of the reasons I jumped at the opportunity to live in Tunis for a year was because of its historic position at the centre of seemingly every major power for the past 3000 years. I’d spent countless weekends getting into small buses and cabs, seeking out what I began to refer to as Ozymandias moments. For you could pretty much walk in any direction in Tunisia and stumble upon the ruins of a onetime dominant world power.

I stood in the ruins of a Phoenician trade port, touched the last remaining stone pillars of the city of Carthage, read the inscriptions with my school boy Latin on the bases of headless status in a temple dedicated to Augustus. I’d peered into the Great Mosque of Kairouan, the most holy site in Islam outside of Saudi Arabia, and stood in the throne hall and concubine baths of the Bey of Tunis at the Ottoman Palace at Bardo. I’d seen the neo-Gothic cathedral and the Arc of Victory built by the French in the centre of the city, surveyed desert battle sites from WWII, and walked along the fences of the seaside palace of the recently deposed dictator Ben Ali. The common aspect of all of these places was how solemnly isolated they all felt. Thick layers of dust over everything, bathed in silent except for the sound of the wind blowing through the halls and windows. I was shocked to discover that the Bardo palace, which has been converted into a museum housing the world’s largest collection of Roman and Carthaginian mosaics, was practically empty and unguarded. I was free to wonder the halls alone, and frankly I could have easily walked out with an artefact or two, were I that way inclined. For all the cunning of Hannibal, for all the glory of Rome, for all the brilliance of the various Islamic caliphates and emirs, for every war over this cradle of the Mediterranean, the same fate awaited them all; isolation and solitude, sand and dust. Standing in those great halls and ancient temples evokes a feeling of humility and insignificance that places the history of the human race and its struggle for greatness in cold perspective. We all meet the same fate. Look upon our collective works, ye Mighty, and despair.

ZOETORIAL

By the time I was fourteen, I was convinced I was going senile. I kept breaking my glasses, forgetting my locker combinations, losing my smartrider (in the smartrider drawer with seven of its defunct smartrider friends). Given my adolescent neuroticism about my poor memory, comically overdone blinking and pre-hipster Specsavers due to Piggyesque shortsightedness, Piggyesque ass-mar, and a penchant for wandering aimlessly, it’s not really surprising the self-diagnosis gained a little traction.

My grandmother, for one, took it seriously. Few weeks went by without a genuinely concerned “Zoe, how is your memory?”

- sometimes even a “When you talk to yourself, do you think that there is someone there?” My manager at KFC, a job I was desperately treading water to keep, even gave me an impromptu reading test a couple of weeks into work (“It says ‘Small Chips’”).

Nowadays, I’m a little more realistic about my intellectual shortcomings. I don’t have Alzheimers’ yet (but when I do, I told you so). What I do have is the usual string of student failings - extreme procrastination, mad over- and undersleeping, an abandoned law degree, an inexcusable and unjustifiable affection for Redfoo (soz, Lucy). What I’m trying to say is - sorry and thank you to Wade for picking up the slack when I haven’t been able to. This guy is an editorial god. Just between you and me, DFAT, you should definitely considering given this dude an ambassadorship, pronto. Also, big love to the Pelican community - our dearly beloved and super dedicated section editors, the writers and artists who keep coming back, no matter what deadlines we throw at them, and to every single person who picks up the paper - even if it’s for mousepad purposes (lookin’ at you, HYPE DC). You keep student writing, student thinking, student engagement alive. Special mention this edition to Claire B, who let us know when my editorial oversight erked her - you’ve got me on my spellcheck toes, and that’s a very good thing.

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APPLICATION FOR A POSTAL VOTE I,

(Student number)

(Family name)

(Given names)

APPLICATION FOR A POSTAL VOTE

would like to apply for a postal vote for the 2014 UWA Student Guild Elections.

Postal address:

I, (Please complete the following details)

Home phone number: Email:

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Mobile:

(Surname)

(Christian or Given Names)

Contact No: (H)

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Pur s 636 uant t oR UW eg A Ele cto Stude ulatio ral R n n egu t Guil …. lation d September 2014 -s25th

Student No: (M)

Email: I note that polling will take place on the UWA Crawley, Nedlands and QEII campuses from 22nd September 2014, and I am applying on the that on tothose I willin be Please sendgrounds to me Ballot Papers enabledates me to vote this (please Election, tick appropriate box): my postal address is:

(I)

An external or part-time student;

(II)

Disabled or incapacitated;

(III)

PLEASE TICK APPROPRIATE BOX (I note that Polling will take place on the UWA Campus from 23 Sept 13—26 Sept 13) Undergoing study vacation/exams;

(IV)

(ii) polling place Disabled or incapacitated; Not within 8km of the campus throughout the hours of polling;

(V)

Ill, infirm or approaching maternity;

(VI)

Caring for a person who is(v) ill, infirm or approaching maternity; ill, infirm or approaching maternity;

(VII)

Precluded from attending a polling place throughout the hours of polling or throughout the greater part of those hours because of membership of a religious order or religious beliefs; Precluded from attending a polling place throughout the hours of polling or throughout the greater part of those hours because of membership of a

(VIII)

Serving a sentence of imprisonment for an offence or otherwise being in lawful custody or detention;

Postcode

(i)

An external or part-time student;

(iii)

Undergoing study vacation/exams;

(iv)

Not within 8 kms of the campus polling place throughout the hours of polling;

(vi)

(vii)

(viii)

Caring for a person who is ill, infirm or approaching maternity;

religious order or religious beliefs;

Serving a sentence of imprisonment for an offence or otherwise being in lawful custody or detention;

(IX)

Travelling under conditions that will preclude attendance at the polling place; Travelling under conditions(ix)that will preclude attendance at the polling place;

(X)

Required or on call for emergency duty or employment.

(x)

Required or on call for emergency duty or employment.

Signature of Applicant:

Signature of Applicant:

Signature of Witness:

IN PERSON:

The Returning Officer 1ST Floor, Guild Administration Guild Village UWA Student Guild

IN PERSON:

BY MAIL:

The Returning Officer 1st Floor, Guild Administration Guild Village, UWA Student Guild

The Returning Officer 1st Floor, Guild Administration UWA Student Guild - M300 University of Western Australia Crawley WA 6009

Signature of Witness:

Date:

Date:

BY MAIL:

BY FAX:

The Returning Officer, 1st Floor, Guild Administration UWA Student Guild – M300 University of Western Australia Crawley WA 6009

BY FAX:

BY EMAIL:

The Returning Officer UWA Guild Elections 6488 1041

The Returning Officer ALL ENQUIRIES TO: UWA Student Guild Elections 6488 1041

The Returning Officer Mr Ron Camp

The Returning Officer UWA Guild Elections Ron Camp (dda1@iinet.net.au)

BY EMAIL:

Please Note: The application form must be scanned and forwarded with your email

The Returning Officer - UWA Student Guild Elections returningofficer@guild.uwa.edu.au

M: 0408 900 147 All enquiries to: H: 9384 3846 The Returning Officer - Mary Petrou E: dda1@iinet.net.au

Phone: 0414 895 196 E-mail: returningofficer@guild.uwa.edu.au

FOR POSTAL VOTES DEADLINE FOR APPLICATIONS:DEADLINE Friday 19 September 2014, 4pm Thursday 26 September 2013, DEADLINE FOR RETURN OF BALLOT PAPERS: Thursday 25 September 2014,4pm 4pm Application for Postal Vote

PSA, UWU: TUMBLR, GENDER, AND GAGA

by Zoe Kilbourn It’s becoming increasingly common knowledge that gender doesn’t exist on a binary, that it never has, and that there are thousands of clear examples of historically respected gender identities that don’t fit clearly into a male or female category. What you might not be aware of is the sudden upsurge in new, entirely constructed genders: nonbinary folk who go beyond the well-established fluid, queer, adrogyne, trans, neutrois camps and jump straight into a bizarre and rapidly expanding world of gloomgender, alexigender, earthgender, mirrorgender - a world where people can develop and claim entirely new categories of selfhood.

Talking about Tumblr takes a level of selfconsciousness (and, honestly, embarrassment) that doesn’t accompany discussions about soberer social networking sites like Twitter or Facebook. With its neckbeard cousins, Reddit and 4chan, it’s an online platform that rejects functionality and connectivity in favour of closed community culture, unaccountability, and anonymity that bleeds into avatar construction. If you know about Tumblr, it means you’ve spent far too much time and energy examining an unashamedly realworldphobic platform. Conceptually, linguistically, Tumblr textpost discourse doesn’t translate well to outside life - you don’t, or at least didn’t, win friends with Meyer-Briggs personality scores, Harry Potter headcanon, or soft grunge.

For all its shortcomings, Tumblr has become a juggernaut source of 21st century thought.

It’s helped spread on a mass level immensely important ideas like cisgenderism, privilege, kyriarchy, nonbinary gender identity, pansexuality as an alternative to a bisexuality that’s appearing increasingly limited, transgender representation, trigger warnings and neocolonialism. It’s made the cloyingly tokenistic but incredibly significant rise in popular feminism possible. It’s exposed an entire generation to a feminism that could’ve died with the Third Wave and Grrl Power - a feminism that, admittedly, is still vapid enough to be a permanent staple of clickbait powerhouses like Buzzfeed, Upworthy and Junkee. It’s also spawned reactionary movements of all kinds - #notallmen, Women Against Feminism, TERFS, white people who fight “reverse racism”. Whether or not you’ve

ever used the site, Tumblr is an enormously influence on the Way We Live Now. Without referencing Tumblr in his work or having a microblog presence, UCLA assoc. professor J. Jack Halberstam could easily be a representative of the best kind of Tumblr gender politicking, including its quirkier subcultural trappings. Fiftysomething, genderqueer, and obsessively enthusiastic over every pop cultural goldmine he strikes, Halberstam’s flurry of a manifesto reads much like an enlightened SJW blog post - chaotic reimagining of queer theory through a lens of movies he’s seen, music videos he’s stumbled upon, and a string of frenzied exclamation marks. Gaga Feminism, written in the wake of 2011’s riots and Bad Romance, is an endearingly effusive call for genderfuckery, PoMo marxism, and Little Monster outlandishness.

Amongst a hyperactive string of ad hoc analysis - of being grumpy about gay marriage, of Judd Apatow’s unfair celebration of the cishet loser, of Stone Butches and heteronormative social security - Gaga Feminism hits home when it takes a playful populist stick to gender performativity. The book calls itself a manifesto, but really, the movement Halberstam describes is far bigger than UCLA, Stepanie Germanotta, and academic feminism.

It’s something that’s been gaining traction since web 1.0, and that’s gained traction through the tireless work of easily the most misunderstood First World demographic - teenage dirtbags with internet connections and a penchant for radical introspection.

Halberstam celebrates a new identity politics defined by “an unusual mix of whimsy and fierce purposefulness”, by “passive resistance and loud refusals”. That, in summary, is the tone taken by the very recently developed factions of quote unquote social justice warriors, trans and trans* activists, truscum, radfems; members of an LGBTI spectrum that spills into the broadest reaches of Q, A+, and potentially an entire alphabet; the practitioners of gender construction couched under the derisive term “genderspecials”; it extends to the non-gendered reinvention of selves developed by furries (who invent anthropomorphic animal ‘fursonas’, sometimes sexual), otherkin (who spiritually identify as animals), users who self-diagnose, who roleplay, who address privileges as deceptively normative as able-bodiedness, thinness,

extroversion, neurological and cognitive normativity. There’s an entire spectrum of DIY scholars, writers, and activists who, for better and for worse, take marginalised, scorned, sometimes previously non-existent ideas and defend them territorially, excessively aggressively, whimsically, and/or deeply empathetically - sometimes in the same virtual breath.

Halberstam’s book meanders from personal anecdote to political plea to summation of romcom trends, and he hits a few nails on a few heads (and comes pretty close to hitting several more). One particularly interesting detour in the context of the pronoun explosion, though, is his musings on innocence, childishness, and play. He describes his partners’ children and their curious and unaffected attempts to place Halberstam on a gender spectrum: they develop their own satisfying explanations (“boy-girl”; “inbetweener”) and leave it at that. Gender operates on a plane completely divorced from sexuality, with non-heteronormative results that are, frankly, just practical: Finding Nemo’s agender, aromantic Dory is Halberstam’s model for a child’s queer alternative. Spongebob, too, gets a mention: these undersea independents are too physically, mentally, emotionally slippery to pin down in a relationship or a nuclear family.

When you think about the proliferation of “demi” identities - demigirls and -dudes, demiromantics and demisexuals - it seems like these are perfect, if possibly unnecessary and generally unspoken, terms to describe the sort of tentative explorations that most people experience as they mature and continue to experience into adulthood. There’s a recognition of growth, of a permanent period of learning, developing, and a kind of extended adolescence in a lot of genderplay - the idea that you keep changing, that you don’t necessarily wind up married and heterosexual at 30, that, as aware and as positive as you can be about sexuality and reproductive rights, sex is complicated and difficult and predicated on a string of sometimes arbitrary requirements - that reflects the sort of informed imaginative play that Tumblr users engage in. Also the fact that these guys never got over Disney.

Disclaimer: Zoe Kilbourn is a failed microblogger and a big fat cishet.

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WOMEN AGAINST FEMINISM One of the exciting things about the internet is that it has given people the ability to unite with others who share the same views and organize and campaign for them on a scale and efficacy that was once unimaginable.

Some pick social justice issues; some pick others, like ‘Women Against Feminism’.

Of course women against feminism themselves have always existed but with the help of a Facebook campaign with a sizeable amount of likes, they have formed a movement reasonably well-organized to gain enough traction to go viral on various outlets, and then predictably be seized upon by the mainstream media for the opportunity to bash a movement that is growing faster than they can control, and because of course, there is nothing more entertaining to the media than when the women-folk get all worked up and at each other’s throats.

But to the disappointment of the sections of the mass media itching for some sort of catfight, and because I do not believe in silencing, mocking or demonizing women simply for having the audacity to express their views - that is, after all, patriarchy’s job; I am more interested in measured, rational, and civil discussion on the matter. And nor is it my job or in my place to ‘convert’ anyone. The need, or lack thereof, of feminism can only be found out for yourself, perhaps when you find there is a 17% pay gap in this country between men and women because the work women do is valued less, or how women are multiple times more likely to be assaulted or abused, or, even, if you are like me and cannot walk a hundred metres in your own neighbourhood without being leered, jeered, or catcalled at by men practically everyday as part of a rabid culture of male entitlement. And if it feels tiring hearing the same statistics recited again and again, perhaps it’s time to try and make them go away. But even if, after all of that you still think feminism is unnecessary or objectionable, that’s ok, because it will nevertheless carry on anyway, despite the best efforts of some, and hostility of many.

It’s important to define what it really means to be “against feminism” because

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it’s important to note that it can actually be quite legitimate to be ‘against’ feminism, or at least certain aspects of it. There are many women who feel alienated by the brand of feminism that prevails today: what is known as ‘White Feminism’. White feminism does not mean every white woman who is a feminist; rather, as writer Cate Young puts it, it refers to a set of beliefs that centre issues specific to white middle-class women in feminism while ignoring and excluding issues specific to women who experience other forms of oppression. It is the brand that not just ignores but often blatantly refuses to acknowledge the issues of transgender women, poor women, sex workers, disabled women, and women of colour, all the while purporting to support women’s rights.

The brand of feminism that gets the most attention in the mainstream champions the rights of only one group of women at the expense of all others, and as such, it’s understandable why many women might feel repelled by such a movement.

The discontent with mainstream feminism is neither new nor uncommon and feminists of colour have done much work to address it. To articulate the reality that for many women the analysis of gender oppression is incomplete without the analysis of other issues such as race and class, Kimberlé Crenshaw, a legal scholar, coined the term intersectionality to describe the experiences of women caught at the ‘intersections’ of multiple forms of oppression.

Since then, the concept has predictably been under attack by mainstream preachers of white feminism, who have repeatedly labeled the concept and the term “too academic” or “divisive”, when all intersectional feminists have sought is merely the de-centring of white women’s issues and

for the inclusion of other women’s issues in mainstream feminist discourse. Despite this, the movement continues to gain traction, as more and more women feel marginalized by mainstream feminism.

Women Against Feminism however, seem disenchanted and repulsed by feminism altogether, and for entirely different reasons, or perhaps just one giant reason, which appears to be the total misunderstanding of what feminism is. You can see in the handmade signs denouncing feminism as some selfish plot and the consistent need to mention that they don’t hate men that Women Against Feminism are working off a tired stereotype of the movement. The fact seems to be lost altogether that feminism has nothing to do with animosity towards men, and rather everything to do with the way society is structured and how women fare under that. It can be difficult to see that when such structures are designed to appear as the norm. Not being able to see oppressive systems at work can be harder yet when like the majority of Women Against Feminism, factors such as race and class shield you from many of them. But these are not excuses for perpetually wearing blinders on such matters.

Picture by Jessica Cockerill

by Somayya Ismailjee

THE THIRD-WAVE FIGHT: TERFs vs trans women

by Natalia Verne

A battle has been brewing across the ages – a fight of feminist ideology!

A brawl between the likes of Sheila Jeffreys, Janice Raymond & Mary Daly against Laverne Cox, Janet Mock & Sylvia Rae Rivera. A battle – of TERF vs trans woman.

For those not in the know with the latest queer lingo, a TERF is a Trans Exterminationist Radical Feminist.

A lot of people seem to think the term refers to Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminists – but TERFs themselves changed this definition because it made them seem “too mean”. Of course, nothing is really too mean when you are trying to “morally mandate trans people out of existence”, but I digress. TERFs have been a part of western feminism and western feminist discourse for approximately 50 years now, and their attitudes haven’t really changed much over the years. They first sprung up in the second-wave, when feminists started making real headway into claiming legal rights to become more empowered in society.

At the time, there were large groups of lesbian feminists who really started to mobilize and campaign on rights of sex and sexuality. Some of these feminists advocated platforms of “political lesbianism” – that is, that sexuality is a choice, and advocates that women identify as lesbians instead of heterosexuals. This group of feminists eventually split off from other radical feminists in 1973, after they refused to allow a performance by a transsexual [an old term for someone who is transgender – considered antiquated and offensive by many] woman. This group of feminists believed that because trans women had chosen to be women, that they were incapable of understanding what being a woman is really like.

This, of course, is utter hogwash.

Trans women don’t “choose” to be female, because to “choose” otherwise results in mental illness, self-harm and potentially suicide. 42% of trans women have attempted suicide, with over 60% of trans women currently alive having attempted suicide at least once. Sheila Jeffreys, one of these so-called feminists, believes that transness is akin to blackface performers in the 1920’s. This was then slammed by Indigenous trans people, among other trans women of colour.

A BATTLE HAS BEEN BREWING ACROSS THE AGES – A FIGHT OF FEMINIST IDEOLOGY! A lot of trans women also experience heightened levels of assault, rape, and murder as a result of being trans. Trans women have a 8.75% chance of being murdered, and a 33.33% chance of being raped – but when you are a trans woman of colour has a 12.25% murder rate and a 50% chance of being raped.

But it isn’t always so bad – despite what the statistics say. Trans women can have some really good experiences in queer and women’s spaces – but these are often few and far between.

TERFs tend to sink their claws into queer & women’s spaces [especially those who advocate “political lesbianism”] and rip them to shreds for any trans women who want to get involved. Cathy Brennan [or Transgender Political Enemy #1] is another woman who launches constant attacks on the queer community.

Following in the footsteps of her ideological mother, Janice Raymond, Cathy & Elizabeth Hungerford [another transphobic lawyer] wrote a letter to the U.N. that basically said “trans women shouldn’t use bathrooms because they are men”.

Bathroom bill rhetoric has been something that has been constantly used to attack trans women – by assuming that trans women are men, TERFs argue that bathrooms should be sex-segregated between “penisbearers” [apparently all men] and “vagina-bearers” [apparently all women]. I feel that it is important to note that making trans women and cis men use the same bathroom is even more dangerous to trans women. The argument against trans women, you know, using women’s bathrooms, is that they are uncontrollable creatures who rape all cis women they see.

Personally, I don’t do that, and neither do any trans women – there is not a single report of trans women attacking cis women in bathrooms. Alternatively, cis women like Cathy & Elizabeth attack and demean trans women – they have even written articles about me and outed me online.

TERFs fight trans women because they perceive us to be male, but trans women are female - a woman’s body is a female body. The idea that trans women are going to assault cis women in bathrooms, or that we are “subverting and destroying feminism from the inside” is ridiculous & insipid – besides completely ignoring the work that trans feminists like Laverne Cox & Janet Mock have done. Unfortunately, this creed of transphobia is unlikely to die out anytime soon – and so the war wages on. Trans women are constantly gaining ground, however, and will soon be able to claim victory and assert ourselves on history’s page.

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SUPERSIZED PEACE

by Kate Oakley

Is McDonald’s the solution to end all war? The initially eerie McDonald’s Peace Theory – countries with McDonald’s do not go to war with other countries that have McDonald’s – seems to suggest so.

The McDonald’s Peace Theory has proved entirely legitimate until the 2008 Russia-Georgia conflict, and has been accurate ever since. However, the theory would also work with pretty much any major company like McDonald’s, because they are all a metaphor for capitalism, which tends to occur most often in democratic countries (who are also less likely to go to war with each other). Countries that have a McDonald’s within their borders are often more economically prosperous, making them more willing and able to negotiate trade relations with each other, and are hence less likely to have to resort to war. Being economically stable prevents many causes of war – most significantly, poverty and extremism – from taking hold within their borders.

Does this, then, suggest that if McDonald’s were to branch out into yet more countries, it is possible to eradicate war altogether? It is a compelling idea: countries that do not have McDonald’s will go to war, and when it is against those more prosperous countries who do have McDonald’s they stand a fair chance of losing. In theory, if all countries had McDonald’s, it would be a sign of a more balanced standard of living and economy, creating a more equal playing field that in turn leads to less war. Go, capitalism!

But here is where the paradox comes in: capitalist thought promotes desire for individual gain, and greed creates poverty for those who miss out.

Effectively, then, capitalism is the cause

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of war. And yet, we need capitalism to boost trade relations with other countries in order to prevent war. We need capitalism to fix the problems that capitalism created.

That particular Catch-22 scenario aside, the McDonald’s Peace Theory offers a tempting solution to war. If countries that have McDonald’s are less likely to go to war, then, how do we make countries more attractive to large companies such as McDonald’s?

The most obvious solution would be to fix the economies of the countries; capitalist companies can’t resist a rising economy.

A more long-term solution presents itself, however, which would not only attract mega-company business but could offer a solution to war itself: end poverty. Easier said than done, yes, but the fact remains that poverty breeds extremism, and so the nonexistence of impoverished societies would put an end to the majority of extremist support. Throughout history, major wars have been fought due to the rise of an extremist group within an impoverished country. China suffered immensely from poverty under the Kuomintang (GMD), starting a war that resulted in the rise of the extremist Communist Party (CPC) government and entering into a period of extremist Communist rule in which most of China followed devotedly and blindly. The fall of the Weimar Republic combined with hyperinflation and ensuing poverty saw the rise of the extremist Nazi Party, who promised to fix the broken economy and also secured blind devotion from a large part of the German population. More recently, Syria and Iraq have found themselves in severe financial turmoil, and wars featuring groups with extremist beliefs are almost constant. Al-Qaeda, one of the most notable extremist groups in this area, has gained significant support from the populations of both these

countries and been a major player in the wars. This year, the particularly worrying rise of a breakaway AlQaeda group, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), now simply known as the Islamic State (IS), appears to be gaining support by the desperate populations of these two countries despite its violent methods. All of these countries have or do suffer from extreme poverty and the fix-all solutions promised by the extremist groups mentioned are designed to appeal to most, if not all, inhabitants of the country. However, all, in history at least, have mellowed and rejected extremist thought during times of economic recovery and the resulting reduction in poverty.

Ending poverty allows for better trade relations between countries, increasing both willingness to trade and resources to trade with, and with trade relations comes a reduction in war – war is an expensive undertaking that is treated by prosperous countries as the last option. To have a McDonald’s store, or a store from any large global company, is to have a symbol of the economically stable, democratic and less war-prone country you live in. The McDonald’s theory effectively leads back to the same solution that we have all been taught: stable countries make less war.

So before you rage against the proverbial machine the next time you see a new McDonald’s store, just remember: they are aiding world peace.

DIGITAL RIGHTS MANAGEMENT

by Matthew Bye Like every other entertainment industry, the video game industry is concerned with the issue of piracy. Their answer? Digital Rights Management, or DRM. Now, every media industry has DRM in some form or another. Various forms of encryptions, standards, and systems work to secure various digital assets against piracy and from being used on a competitor’s technology. But, for the most part, you never really notice the limitations of DRM whenever you use the product as companies tend to streamline the process and make it all work out of sight. Sure, certain players might not be able to play certain movies or music, but for the most part the overall system will rarely stop you from outright being able to use the product you paid for, you just might have to find a different way to use it.

Before I launch into my rant, I’ll be fair to the game industry. Many parts of it use very discreet methods of DRM, systems that you’ll rarely notice and don’t intrude upon your experience too much. One of the most popular management systems, Steam, requires you login to their server to be able to play, but an offline mode does exist and you’ll be able to play the various games you have installed on your computer. Other games only require online authentication for the install, and then you’re free to play as you like. As far as I’m concerned, if you’re going to have some kind of required authentication as your DRM, these are the examples that should be followed. Hell, follow the Serious Sam 3 model and make your game become unplayable if it detects it’s been pirated, that’s completely acceptable as it doesn’t impact the paying customer.

Sadly, a number of companies aren’t big fans of these ideas and are constantly trying to experiment with different ideas. Said ideas are often quite shit in concept and then implemented in such a way that really shows how little some companies care about the customer.

One of the worst offenders is the enigmatic duo of Maxis and Electronic Arts. Of Maxis’ last three major release games (discounting DLC and expansions), all three received criticisms for their DRM. Over the course of six years, Maxis and EA have dabbled in various forms of online authentication, moving from requiring only when a game is installed and when online segments of a game are used, to requiring persistent online authentication just to play the game. They also have played around with a system wherein the number of times you could install a game off a serial key was limited to 3 (they later caved and modified this system after immense public backlash).

If this wasn’t bad enough, with their most recent game, SimCity, which is typically single-player, they pushed the persistent online system with the rhetoric that it benefited the game by allowing for communal regions that neither really required for the connection to be persistent and completely ignored much of the public opinion, making it obvious it was more about the DRM. The cardinal sin though? This system that was required for people to play the game did not work at launch, and was plagued by bugs for quite a while after launch, making a lot of paying customers angry.

And they’re not alone in this kind of failure.

Blizzard, the makers of several games that rely almost completely upon online servers for legitimate reasons, released Diablo III, which also

required persistent online authentication and also suffered a number of bugs with this system upon launch. Ubisoft had a similar issue with their Uplay system upon the launch of Watch_Dogs, where servers simply were not ready for launch.

What these games highlight is that there is often a complete disdain for the paying customer over the issue of piracy. By creating a product that can be rendered unplayable for the paying customer by internet or server outage purely in the name of preventing piracy, you’re completely ignoring the paying customer. I mean, they’re practically punishing the customer for doing the right thing and forking over money to them because somewhere, someone would rather torrent than pay upwards of $70 for a new game.

And what’s worse is that these DRM measures are often defeated soon after launch, leaving the pirated version with a far better single-player experience as it is capable of offline play out of necessity. When the illegal version is better than the legitimate version by design, you know there’s a problem with your business model.

And even worse, it limits the experience to people who can get access to adequate internet.

I personally rarely have issues, but every now and then the line will drop and I know it’s the same wherever you are in the world, even worse in some circumstances. It’s just such an ignorant business model when the customers are seemingly the last thing considered when you build in these DRM systems.

So I say this to you, game industry. Please stop trying to ram DRM down our throats in a way that hurts the customer. If your game is single-player and does not require internet access for said single-player, please stop trying to make persistent online authentication a thing. IT’S NOT A GOOD THING!

TIME FOR A SELFIE OR SOME SELF-RESTRAINT?

by Eleanor Bruyn We live in a society that is becoming increasingly obsessed with photo sharing as a method of documentation and communication. The rise of this photo sharing culture has bolstered the growing popularity of the selfie and in 2013, Oxford Dictionaries named selfie the word of the year in recognition of this. It did indeed seem to be its year with Ellen DeGeneres’ Oscar selfie also becoming the most re-tweeted post in history. Whilst celebrities get the most attention and validation for their photos, it’s something that has become common to almost everyone with a forward facing camera, even if it’s only to send a stupid snap to a friend.

Picture by Tamara Jennings

But selfies aren’t just a method of selfpromotion, exhibitionism or expression from your bedroom or in front of the Eiffel Tower anymore. The ‘Selfies at Serious Places’ phenomenon has emerged and with it heavy

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criticism and disdain for what many view as a lack of respect and sensitivity. It occurs in settings deemed serious or inappropriate for taking photos of yourself including funerals, memorials, graves and places of historical trauma like Chernobyl, Auschwitz, the September 11 Memorial in New York and Holocaust Memorial in Berlin.

The ‘Selfies at Serious Places’ blog is dedicated entirely to sharing people’s inappropriate selfies and there’s really no shortage of them. Whilst some people argue that there’s nothing wrong with them and that it’s just a way for people to respond and to deal with mixed emotions, I call bullshit.

Some of the individuals featured may feel upset about where they are or appreciate its significance but the captions of others suggest little more than indifference and selfcentredness. My favourite examples of this are ‘Killing the selfie game at pop’s funeral’ and ‘Love my hair today.’ Now any sympathy I had for the view that this is a medium to express your unhappiness or mixed emotions completely flounders with the photo of a guy beaming and giving an enthusiastic thumbs up at the Holocaust Memorial in Berlin. Interestingly enough, after his photo was picked up by the blog and he received his share of internet hate he asked for it to be removed because the onslaught had made him realise that he looked like an “idiot” and apologised for being such a “dick”, so maybe there’s hope after all.

Just like selfies themselves, taking them in inappropriate settings isn’t unique to those of us mere mortals as demonstrated by Barack Obama last year. Obama’s photo with British Prime Minister David Cameron and Danish Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt received plenty of attention but for all the wrong reasons. A journalist captured the trio taking a cheery selfie at the Nelson Mandela memorial in Johannesburg with even Michelle Obama looking less than pleased in the corner of the picture.

This trend has received even more media attention recently with an eighteen year old American teen taking a selfie

inside the Auschwitz compound in Poland.

This particular incident has received a lot of coverage because the photo she uploaded to Twitter shows her grinning and the caption ends with a smiling emoji. Had she looked more sombre, left off the happy emoji at the end or simply taken a picture of the infamous gates then it would have been a very different story. I can understand her wanting to document the experience and share her travels but looking so gleeful is perverse and her grinning face is so out of place in a setting where so many people lost their lives.

She responded to the criticism by explaining that her father had died and that history was an interest they both shared but she should understand why people would be upset about her seeming so cheerful and taking selfabsorbed photos in such a place.

The location of many of these ‘Selfies at Serious Places’ are some of the bleakest places on Earth and sites of immense historical significance. The AuschwitzBirkenau complex was the biggest Nazi death camp and the site of unbelievable atrocities.

As soon as you see the gates with that sick and hollow promise it chills you to the core and it’s the most dispiriting place I’ve ever been. From walking through the gas chambers to seeing the mountains of children’s shoes it was hell on Earth and I cried most of the way; so I struggle to understand how someone could muster up a smile much less a grin in such a nightmare of a place. The ‘Selfies at Serious Places’ creator Jason Feifer commented that “there’s a lot of youthful stupidity on display here” and that it captures people in “moments they haven’t fully thought through” and so even the blog’s founder appreciates the inappropriateness of these photos.

Whilst taking travel photos and selfies is something that’s become almost natural to us, there needs to be a limit to when and where we take them. We should be able to use a little common sense and realise that there are some places where we should restrain ourselves to show respect for the horrors that have occurred and the people who’ve suffered as well as those who still mourn their loss.

FEAR IS THE MIND KILLER

by Chloe Durand Breathe, relax. Breathe, relax.

Fuck, please just relax. Breathe, breathebreathebreathe. No, now you’re breathing too fast. Run your hands up and down your thighs. Breathe, relax.

This isn’t working. Hands still running up and down your thighs. Stop. Stop.

Breathe, relax. Flex your fingers out.

No don’t do that, you can see them shaking now. Ball them up into fists.

Better. Better? I don’t know. Breathe, relax. Your heart, oh my god, should it be beating that fast? Sweat blooms down your spine. Waves crash behind your eyes. You’re trapped in headlights burning harder than the sun.

Anxiety, especially anxiety attacks, will often be narrated like this; really choppy and overdramatic verse poetry that pulls you into a rhythmic panic.

It’s a war you wage with yourself physically and mentally. The lines are constantly being redrawn down your body, cruelly remapping what you can and can’t do with your life.

Anxiety means many things for me.

Anxiety means internalising the expectations of everyone without ever asking them what they actually want.

More importantly, without asking myself what I want. Anxiety means having no off switch, no way to disconnect from twenty years of disturbingly accurate autobiographical memory and self defeating tendencies. Do you remember what you were wearing and how you felt during almost every embarrassing moment of your life? I do.

Do you still beat yourself up about it today? I do.

Anxiety is a word thrown around a lot and like most emotional states, there’s a spectrum. This ranges from feeling trepidation about big things like exams or job interviews (fairly common) to being unable to breathe or move because you have to leave the house or open your email inbox (not so common).

Anxiety is your body’s fight or flight response adapting to your surroundings.

It can keep you alive, or keep you from living.

ANXIETY MEANS MANY THINGS FOR ME. ANXIETY MEANS INTERNALISING THE EXPECTATIONS OF EVERYONE WITHOUT EVER ASKING THEM WHAT THEY ACTUALLY WANT. MORE IMPORTANTLY, WITHOUT ASKING MYSELF WHAT I WANT. There’s often a lot of fear and, unsurprisngly, anxiety, surrounding psychotherapy and medical intervention for mood disorders. I think it’s possibly an example of perfect irony that the thought of going on anti anxiety medication gives most people with anxiety more anxiety.

One of the biggest fears behind this is the lack of control over the side effects and therapeutic benefits of medication.

When anxiety has been part of your life for so long, you can become fearful of

throwing the baby out with the bath water. Sometimes I make a worrying comparison between anxiety and excitement. After all, there are many similarities to how they feel.

Physiologically and mentally it’s almost exactly the same process, just that anxiety takes a self destructive and obsessive turn at some point. And if I get rid of the bad, will I get rid of the good? And just like that, anxiety has used some kind of old timey war technique (like a trojan horse or a trebuchet or something) to plant the idea that it’s somehow better for me to live with it in my brain. The line is redrawn in anxiety’s favour with these thoughts, but it doesn’t always have to be this way. Various people around me with generalised anxiety or extreme anxious tendencies hare finding ways to reclaim their bodies in the name of peace. From herbal remedies to prescription pharmaceuticals, spending more time with others to spending more time alone, gym memberships to BDSM. Some people want to feel more control to reassure themselves that chaos isn’t about to rain down, others want to hand the reigns over to someone else so they can avoid the need for control that can set off panic and obsessive thought cycles. Some people need a mix of both.

Self care is the ultimate defense to anxiety. Take time to interrogate your wants and needs, be harsh about being gentle. Vocalise to yourself and others what you need to feel safe. Never be afraid of being afraid. Seek help and know you are in control of your body and your treatments. No one can take away your good emotions or regulate your postivity. If one treatment doesn’t work, you are always free to try something new. Permit yourself to feel fear but do not let it make a base in your body. When it has gone past you will turn the inner eye to see its path.

Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only you will remain.

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SCOTT MORRISON AND THE ART OF (FAKE) WAR

by Somayya Ismailjee Australia’s war fetishism extends to finding wars and pursuing them fanatically even where there aren’t any. The current government has taken it to an art form, reaching into the imagination of the paranoid, white supremacist, colonialist siege-complex to produce “Operation Sovereign Borders”, and then selling it with a narrative of war. “If we were at war,” Tony Abbott said on a breakfast TV show in January this year, “we wouldn’t be giving out information that is of use to the enemy.”

Operation Sovereign Borders is what White Australia’s dreams are made of. It is white nationalism, chauvinism, machismo and militarism stitched up into a monster and unleashed on the men, women and children who have the temerity to turn up on our shores and ask for protection. It is using the military to literally tow ‘those’ black and brown people ‘back to where they came from’ as the Australian proverb goes.

I wish any of this were exaggerated, leftist hyperbole. But the only extremes here have been pushed by the government.

The theme of white nationalism is not to be understated. When Scott Morrison says ‘sovereign’, whose sovereignty is he talking about? White Australia still wants to be reassured of its so-called and illegitimate claim to sovereignty over a land that was stolen by settler colonialist invaders in 1788, the sovereignty of its Indigenous owners abrogated and usurped using brute force and genocide. It’s an obscene hypocrisy that goes unchallenged everyday because white Australia’s cosy national narrative depends too heavily on it. Scott Morrison is there to legitimise it for them.

As such, the language of war has crept in to the official discourse on asylum seekers by no accident. Tony Abbott’s war analogy on breakfast television was no gaffe. Rather, pushing a war narrative

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is a neoconservative tactic that serves the government’s political agenda in a number of ways.

For one, it helps cover for the brazenly anti-democratic secrecy and censorship measures imposed by the Coalition over what it calls “operational matters”, i.e. every aspect of the policy. In the name of ‘national security’, the only information provided to the media and the public regarding boat arrivals and turn-backs is in the form of Scott Morrison’s “media briefings”, formerly held weekly, and now only as he sees fit.

The government’s excuse for the media blackout: that they don’t want to provide the “enemy” with useful information.

Funny that, since just before the last election the Coalition were all too happy to broadcast such information, including plastering a massive billboard over in West Perth stating the number of “illegal” boats that arrived under the previous government. One wonders why it is seemingly okay to apparently put the country in danger and aid the enemy only at certain times.

Scott Morrison knows that by restricting information he gets to have full control over the message. He knows that it only has to look like he’s ‘stopped the boats’.

And he knows that national security is the perfect cover for anything you want to evade scrutiny for, even if it has absolutely nothing to do with national security. It also comes with the added bonus that anyone who disagrees with you can conveniently be labelled a traitor to the country.

Peddling a war-like narrative and rallying the nation around an ‘enemy’ also helps the government justify its own self while it delivers a series of savage and unpopular cuts to things like healthcare, education, and welfare. The anger and blame at the state of affairs can all be directed instead onto asylum seekers, demonised by the government with the shrill use of the utterly meaningless term ‘economic migrants’. Calling asylum

seekers ‘economic migrants’ only works as a smear because of racism, because of white Australia’s entrenched belief that non-white people are not worthy or entitled to the apparent economic luxuries that come with living in a firstworld country, that only whites are.

Asylum seekers are painted as coming here in hordes to leech off the wealth that white Australia has supposedly generated all by itself (and all by sheer hard labour, nothing to do with a resource boom). The government, in stopping them, gets to appear in control.

All the talk of war also gives Abbott and Morrison a chance to opportunistically flaunt a truly nauseating display of hypermasculinity. The rhetoric, all the propaganda involving army men, and Tony Abbott’s desperate attempts to portray Scott Morrison as some macho, alpha male patriarch figure are all deliberate, so that the average chauvinist can sleep at night, apparently. “We only sleep well in our beds at night because of rough men on our borders”, Tony Abbott said in July last year. More directly, Abbott has described Morrison as “strong and decent”, and stating, “You wouldn’t want a wimp running border protection.”

The government’s treatment of asylum seekers is in part designed to tell us all that Abbott and Morrison are Really Tough Guys.

And finally, calling it war serves to disguise the fact that only one side is fighting, only one side is waging it, and one side is committing all the harm.

Calling it a war attempts to make the violence the government is meting out to the most vulnerable people in the world simply for practicing their legal right to seek refuge look just, necessary, and in the eyes of some, even honourable. But this is no war; it is abuse.

WHAT IS IT GOOD FOR? LISTICLES. BRAD GRIFFIN walks us through wars you probably don’t know about but should 1. War of the Triple Alliance Beginning in 1864 and ending in 1870, the War of the Triple Alliance remains the bloodiest in South American history. Like most suicidal wars, this one is a tale of a paranoid dictator. Certain of his fears about Brazilian expansionism, Paraguayan dictator Francisco Lopez declared war on Brazil.

When Argentina refused him passage of his troops to attack Brazilian forces in Uruguay, they declared war on Paraguay. By the time the Paraguayan forced reached Uruguay, the Brazilian intervention there had led to a government friendly to Brazil and Argentina.

Suddenly, Paraguay found itself in a war with three other nations, two of which were considerably more powerful. Despite having a much better army on paper at the outset of the war, attrition ground down the Paraguayan forced, and despite some surprising military feats, such as their crushing victory at Curupayty, the Paraguayan war effort was doomed. Now he’s the devastating part. Lopez refused to surrender, promising execution for any officer who suggested it. The capital was taken and the countryside infested with Allied troops, but Lopez continued the fight.

It was not until The Battle of Cero Corra, during which he and his son were both killed that the war finally came to an end. Estimates are hard to confirm, but the most respected figures give 60-70% of the population dying, with ~162,000 surviving, only ~28,000 of which were males.

2. Great Northern War Oh, grand old Sweden! Long ago the Swedish Empire was the preeminent power in Northern, Central and Eastern Europe.

Following on the coattails of the legendary Gustav Adolphus’ campaigns in the Thirty Years’ War, Charles XII dreamed of similar glory. Crowned in 1697 at the age of 15, he had just three years as king before DenmarkNorway, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and Russia all declared war (yep, another triple alliance), each seeking a piece of the Swedish pie. Undaunted and confident of the superiority of Sweden’s military system, the young warrior king (Robb Stark eat your heart out) defeated Denmark and Poland

in turn before doing that thing that you should never do – invading Russia. He set a precedent for the French and the Germans and, in 1706 his army was crushed at the Battle of Poltava, in present-day Ukraine.

Charles managed to escape to the Ottoman Empire, and after eight years there finally returned to his homeland and to new enemies including Great Britain, Prussia, Denmark (again) and Poland (also again). In 1718 Charles was killed during an invasion of Norway. Leaderless and exhausted, Sweden surrendered in 1721, ending twenty-one years of nonstop warfare. Importantly, this war marked the end of Sweden’s dominance of the Baltic Sea, and the start of the rise of Russia, which would continue, with setbacks, until 1989. Additionally, Prussia gained important territories from the peace treaty, leading to greater Prussian expansion and its eventual formation into the German Empire in 1871. Voltaire is reported to have quoted Charles XII as having said: “I have resolved never to start an unjust war but never to end a legitimate one except by defeating my enemies.”

3. Australian Frontier Wars This is what you definitely didn’t learn in school. You probably heard about Yagan and the journey of his head, and about a few scattered skirmishes between Indigenous Australians and British settlers. But by and large, you probably grew up, as I did, with the basic view that the Indigenous population gradually and peacefully retreated while the settlers cleared their land and set up their European farming practices. Sure, there was a little bit of blood spilt, but nothing too bad, right? Well, Australia, like most countries, is pretty bad at acknowledging our bloody past.

From the beginning of settlement in 1788, large-scale battles between British police and Indigenous Australians took place. Perhaps most famously, especially from a Western Australian context, was the Battle of Pinjarra, at which

the Governor of the Swan River Colony Captain James Stirling personally led the attacking force. In this battle, the Indigenous group, including women and children, were massacred.

Unfortunately I lack the space in this article to go into depth, but I strongly suggest looking into Australia’s unspoken Frontier Wars.

4. The 40-minute War More widely known as the Anglo-Zanzibar War, this is a conflict that epitomizes the European colonial domination of Africa during the Scramble for Africa at the end of the nineteenth century. On the 25th of August 1896, the incoming Sultan of Zanzibar, Kalid bin Bargesh, refused to seek the permission of the British consul to take power, as was agreed in a previous treaty. Bargesh then barricaded himself in his palace at surrounded it with 2,500 Zanzibari soldiers. The palace was also defended by machine guns, antiquated artillery pieces, and the Zanzibari royal yacht, the HHS Glasgow. The British reacted in the way that any European empire did at the time: Sent a polite letter, and then promptly opened fire.

On the 27th of August at 0900, the Royal Navy ships present in the harbour opened fire, sinking the royal yacht, disabling the artillery defending the palace, and setting the palace itself on fire. This bombardment concluded at roughly 0940, with different sources suggesting marginally different times. Bin Bargesh was granted asylum in German East Africa, never to set foot in Zanzibar again. In drawing attention to this particular conflict, I don’t by any means intend to glorify the colonial period, but merely to present an insight into the way bilateral diplomacy between superpowers and vulnerable nations was handled back then. You might say that not a whole lot has changed.

Picture by Cat Pagani

by Brad Griffin

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EMBRACING THE FANTASY

by Wade McCagh In the winter of 1979, a young journalist and editor lay awake on a cold New England night and missed baseball. He missed obsessing over the numbers and the details, the precision of a sport where every single act is recorded. But in the dead of the winter, there was no outlet for this obsession, just the long, empty hours of boredom and the banality of everyday life. And then, from the depths of this “desperation and psychosis” in the middle of the night, it came to him “like an opium dream”.

A new game; a game of numbers and statistics, of auctions and trades, of knowledge and analysis. A reimagining of America’s favourite pastime that would place the fan, not the franchise, at its core. A game that would allow the spectator on the sidelines to go beyond merely watching the games and studying the box scores, but to actually possess the game, to control it and own a piece of it, without having to spend the millions required to actually own a professional sports team.

And so the young man studied almanacs to determine the key ingredients that made a good team, and he decided on eight statistical categories to represent those elements, including a new statistic he invented called WHIP. He then went about recruiting other baseball fans he knew in New York, pitching his invention, throwing down the challenge to prove who amongst them was the smartest baseball fan in the room. And so it came to pass in mid-spring in 1980, a group of magazine editors, journalists, illustrators, publishers, and college administrators, various people stuck in work that generated little pleasure and immense boredom, gathered in a terrible French restaurant in New York called La Rotisserie Française and created the first fantasy sports.

The young man goes on to edit many prestigious publications, eventually becoming the public editor of The New York Times.

He writes books that are shortlisted for Pulizter Prizes, and appears in award winning documentaries. But in over 30 years of trying, he never once wins a fantasy sports league.

How to explain the appeal of fantasy sports?

How did this self-described “silly little game”

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go from a small group of New Yorkers to becoming a $4 Billion worldwide industry across all sports? A 2006 study showed that over 1 in 5 North American men aged 18-49 and with Internet access played fantasy sports. How did fantasy sports become for so many the dominant vehicle for their sports fandom?

The answer lies, in my opinion, in the inherent division between the importance our respective cultures place on sports and our own individual connections to those sports teams and leagues. For many of us, we are initiated into the world of sports through our families. I can remember weekends at my grandparents’ house as a child (long before I had any interest in the AFL) and the reverence and solemnity that would take over when the West Coast Eagles would play. Witnessing the passion and the tension that these events produced, my grandfather cursing as if he was Mick Malthouse himself, even then I understood that this wasn’t just a mere game for some people.

The cliché of sports replacing religion in modern society has some merit. Entire communities herding together on weekends into specially built temples to worship our teams, decry our opponents, and revel in the majesty of the game. Communities united and divided by the colours of scarves and guernseys. Coming from a non-religious family, I saw more pictures as a child of Glen Jakovich than Jesus on various living room walls. Children learn to revere the game not because of some obvious brilliance that emanates from the field of play, but from the reactions and praise those actions evokes from our elders. And so we take up the passion for ourselves; we learn the game, learn the players, learn the history and the folklore until it too becomes a part of our identities and our very beings. To this day, I can remember being paralysed on a couch, in complete disbelief as Leo Barry stood tall and took that mark in 2005. To this day, the words Leo Barry cause a feeling of intense pain and woe in my chest. Such is the power of sport on a young child.

But for many, age and understanding brings with it a loss of the passion and sense of connection to those communities.

Adolescences spent memorising player stats and team rosters suddenly have no obvious purpose. You don’t get the same feeling of connection and togetherness when you sit in the stands on a Sunday afternoon as you did as a child. Rosters change, coaches leave, idols retire. It’s never quite the same as when you were a more simple and innocent observer, when the game is young and new and enough to sustain you tenfold.

That is how I would explain the appeal of fantasy sports. Some become disillusioned with sports fandom and turn their backs on the game. But for those of us not quite willing to shut the door on the games that gave us such joy and purpose and that sense of togetherness as children, we double down and commit anew. We find others who still want to obsess and devote copious amounts of time and energy to players and games that have no other impact whatsoever on our lives. We want to take back the game, to own it in a way that mere spectating could never quite fulfil.

We want to prove that our devotion is still real, and furthermore, is superior to our friends and our rivals. We crave the connection to the players and the game that we felt as kids.

In the winter of 2011, a young copywriter and editor sits behind his desk at his first full time job in a foreign land and misses basketball.

The city is unfamiliar and the hours are long, empty, and full of waiting. Then, in December, news breaks that the NBA lockout is over and that basketball will begin again on Christmas Day. The young man takes his laptop to an Internet café, and begins to join fantasy leagues. Weeks later, on a bright and crisp Sunday afternoon, he sits in a crepe restaurant and watches the first game of the season.

The young man goes on to return home the next year and edit a local student magazine.

He finishes his degree, buys League Pass and starts watching more basketball than he’s ever done before. He still plays in several leagues every year, but in three years of trying, he never wins a fantasy sports league.

He knows that for years of his life to come, stuck behind desks in office jobs and within the banality of everyday life, hours will be spent contemplating trades and checking box scores. And he is OK with that. Because it makes him feel like a kid again.

MOMENTS OF CLARITY

by Mason Rothwell To me, living life as a functional adult is a matter of ignoring the truth of things. That holds true whether you’re dealing with fact that your income is not enough to sustain living in the style to which you are accustomed (go ahead, buy that milkshake with lunch anyway – the rent can wait), or that niggling feeling that maybe you just didn’t give enough thought to those lectures on determinism in PHIL1101 and maybe there is something you’re just overlooking.

Moments of clarity both help and hinder.

Some can cause an inner turmoil, where I’ll wonder if I should continue down the path of realisation and hella fuck up society or if I should play on Easy Mode by society’s rules. Some, on the other hand, provide an inner peace and a valuable break from made-up concerns.

Each is unique, and I’m here to proscribe arbitrary values to the most common.

3am, Reid Library – ‘This assignment doesn’t matter’ Fuelled by caffeine, the stress of not giving up that third floor window seat behind the bookshelves, and more than one guilty binge on listicles, this moment is beneficial in the short term but has long-term consequences if not quickly squashed. Having been awake in front of a laptop for twenty-two hours, this realisation can provide our brain a necessary zen-like relief, usually reserved for a chance encounter with a Sri Chimnoy quote.

5/5 Stars – Assignments can be difficult when not approached with the right ironic enthusiasm, and when in a pinch moments like these are a life-saving morale boost.

12:34pm, walking to the train station – ‘Nothing is real’ It’s a beautiful day, wow! Oh, the sky is so blue, and it seems like there are birds chirping everywhere. Nothing bad could happen, because no matter what occurs I’ll still always have nature. Wait, isn’t

that blue sky just the way my optic nerve interprets light waves? And that birdsong in reality just some molecules swirling around in my cochlea? Everything I experience is filtered through my sensory perception, and even that is just some electrical impulses firing away together.

My mother is just a collection of atoms giving the impression of life and thought.

Nicole Richie is a social construction. I’m a social construction. Oh, shit, there’s the train.

2/5 Stars – Its utility is terrifying, and the potential for sociopathic self-gain is rarely seized.

3:45pm, payday – ‘Currency is evil, the system is evil’ You still haven’t been paid and rent is due yesterday. Shit shit shit. Also there’s a shirt you really want to buy and if you don’t get it today you’ll realise it’s not worth it and thus will not own the shirt that will fix your mess of a life. Isn’t it a sick joke that in order to have a place to live you need to sell the majority of your time and effort in order to transfer imaginary electronic numbers? Most money isn’t even real now anyways! It’s all just numbers ticking over! Why do we even need money? Money only has the value we ascribe it. God, this is sick. Just disgusting. Maybe I should do something about it!

1/5 Stars – While probably true, this realisation either leads to a massive rebellious spending-spree or a Socialist Alternative meeting. Don’t indulge.

9:45am, hungover breakfast – ‘Wait, egg isn’t dairy?’

Woah, why did you drink so much at the Scotto last night and make those bad decisions? It’s almost like you drink to make bad decisions. Hey, no, don’t get so down on yourself. Just make a big breakfast of bacon and eggs and toast to recover. It’s got protein and dairy in it – it’s so healthy! Wait a second, eggs aren’t dairy. Dairy comes from cows. What the hell does that make eggs? Do people

know eggs aren’t dairy? Should I tell them?

No stars out of no stars – this realisation has no scale to be reviewed on. It is a scary moment of true clarity and one we should not dwell on. Eggs are eggs. Do not think about eggs too much. They’ll know if you do.

4am, your bedroom – ‘I hate The Mindy Project’ Mindy Kaling has been speaking for about six hours and roughly 21 episodes now, and you’re not really sure if she’s said anything yet. Then the sweaty man speaks, but you can’t understand his Brooklyn dialect. Hey, benefit of the doubt – maybe it was funny. You can definitely go another episode. The scene changes and Mindy is in her office. Oh, riiiiiight, she’s a doctor.

Why are they doctors? It’s completely pointless – it’s never used! Why are they OBGYNs for that matter? I hate this show, why did I watch so much of it? Why do I want to watch more?

5/5 Stars – It doesn’t feel good, but believe me it’s better this way.

WAIT A SECOND, EGGS AREN’T DAIRY. DAIRY COMES FROM COWS. WHAT THE HELL DOES THAT MAKE EGGS? DO PEOPLE KNOW EGGS AREN’T DAIRY? SHOULD I TELL THEM? 19

BE THE SMALL CHANGE YOU WANT TO SEE IN THE WORLD

by Anna Saxon

You might have a White Saviour complex.

Much like an STI, you could have White Saviour complex right now and not even know it. You can catch WSC at any time, anywhere, and it’s always when you least expect it. You can get it from your friends, partners, classmates, even celebrities. Symptoms of WSC include wanting to help build a school in Africa, paying to look after elephants in Thailand, and spending six weeks at an orphanage in China - then having coffee with friends specifically to show them carefully choreographed instagram photos of you holding a vaguely ethnic child in front of a dirt hut. Animal sanctuaries are good, orphans are better, refugees are the mother-load, and you gotta collect them all. “Not me!”, you protest, “I travelled to a less developed country with no relevant skills to participate in activities I had no training for, without any knowledge of the language or culture, to help transform the lives of some kids before going on a month long safari - I changed lives!”. Believe me, I know, I saw your slide show. You’re idealistic, you’re naive, and you want to transcend your artificial and privileged existence and connect with real humanity and the ‘noble poor’. But it’s time to face the facts guys - voluntourism might just be normcore colonialism.

I remember hearing a story about a group of female high school students who went to Tanzania as part of a ‘mission trip’. Their job, while staying at a small orphanage, was to build a library.

Sounds simple enough. So I’m sure you’ll be shocked to learn that this group of highly educated private boarding school students, who had never done any manual labor in their lives, were so bad at the most basic construction work that each night the men in the nearby village had to take down the structurally unsound walls they had enthusiastically

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laid the day before, and rebuild the structure so that, when they woke up in the morning, these school girls would be unaware of their complete and total failure. So why were they even building? Well, because they’re white and because they wanted to.

Many voluntourists have similar stories about coming to the terrible realisation mid-leper bathing that they were in fact just impotent cash cows, rather than the heroic aid workers that non-profits, documentaries and service programs had coached them into believing they were. This is a pattern fairly consistent around the world when it comes to paid voluntourism - white people throw money at charities who let them halfheartedly work on projects that have no real impact just so the ‘customers’ walk away from their holidays feeling spiritually and emotionally fulfilled.

This becomes problematic when, after finding out that the orphans don’t really need that new library, voluntourists feel cheated in some way. The experience wasn’t legitimate! They were tricked!

And they’re definitely not coming back next year!

This delusional, narcissistic mindset used to be attributed purely to the celebrity A-List. Also known as ‘The Rockstar’s Burden’, it was the Angelinas, Madonnas and Bonos of the world who were donating millions and publishing obviously posed photos of them weaving friendship bracelets with the rightfully grateful masses. Now this mind-set comes in the form of the girl in your Shakespeare 101 unit who’s hit up 5 international charities in as many months, collecting as many short term ‘feel good’ experiences as possible like they’re Pokemon badges, and thinks she’s superior to you because of it. Poverty has gone through a kind of Disneyfication, where you visit the theme park once a year, do all the rides, and go home with the souvenir photo. I met a girl in a Vietnamese hostel who had bankrupted herself paying for her voluntourism addiction.

She was literally dodging borders and hitchhiking her way to a Chinese orphanage because she was broke after paying the $1000 participation fee. She could only justify her traveling when she was getting ‘something’ (waves hands vaguely to represent spirituality/ personal growth/enlightenment etc) out of it. For her it was a transaction - her money and expertise as a white woman in exchange for access to the authentically disadvantaged.

Problematic, much!

There are good things about voluntourism. Enormous amounts of money flowing into worthy causes.

Connections being made between individuals and charities that develop into dedicated, lifelong support. A new tourist industry creating jobs and strengthening communities. Let’s just be more realistic about the role we - clueless westerners - play. I’m not trying to say that no one should ever volunteer overseas, however before you book your grand charity adventure, consider whether or not you might have the specific and useful skills to make the trip successful. If so - awesome! If not, remember that taking part in international aid where you aren’t really helping is not benign.

It’s detrimental. You are not qualified simply because of your skin colour or economic advantage. It’s this thought process which slows down permanent positive growth within communities and perpetuates the White Saviour complex that has in most cases haunted the countries we are trying to ‘save’. Take a course of antibiotics for that nasty case of WSC, and maybe consider working closer to home instead. It’s not as exotic, but the poor people will be just as poor, I promise.

ISIS

by Alex Griffin

If there was ever a time to crack Archer jokes about ISIS, it has passed. The emergence of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria is a game-changer in the Middle East of horrific proportions and the situation is likely to get much, much worse before it gets better. As Israel garrottes Palestine and Syria disintegrates, who are they, what are they doing, and what do they want?

New Caliphate If you thought the US-led invasion of Iraq would lead to long-term stability for the country, you were dead wrong.

Here’s looking at you, Mr. Blair! Though the removal of Saddam Hussein came as a great relief for the Shia majority of the country, it didn’t wipe the slate clean. Having suffered for decades because of the dominance of Hussein’s Sunni regime, the balance of power swung hard in the other direction, and it wasn’t long until Sunni elements within the country began to feel aggrieved and targeted. Much of the conflict during the American invasion involved Sunni splinter groups, and ISIS is the final form (the Ultimate Cell, if you like) of a combination of Sunni jihadist groups that have existed for over a decade, gaining significant influence and power in pre-democratic Iraq. Abu Bakr alBagdahdi, the state’s mysterious leader, even spent four years in an American prison camp after being captured in 2005. Now though, ISIS is far more than simply a violent group spoiling against the Shia, though. In June, ISIS declared itself formally a caliphate; a term that connotes the creation of a Muslim empire concomitant with the regimes of a bygone era, involving the strict application of sharia law, the creation of global jihad and a return to a premodern Islam state – a similar feat of clockturning to the one attempted by Pol Pot. Bagdahdi claims to be a direct descendent of the Prophet Muhammed, and thus claims legitimacy over all Muslims, everywhere. The Salafist style

of jihad makes the first priority the ‘purification’ of Islam, which means that if ISIS gets a chance to consolidate, the rival Sunni group Hamas might be their first target. Heck, check ISIS’ flag; there’s nothing else going around that looks as much like the Jolly Roger. Even Al-Qaeda has disavowed any responsibility to or relationship with ISIS. Essentially, your jihadists don’t get more hardcore than ISIS, and their mission from here on out can be best summed up by their motto: “remaining and expanding”.

Brutality The record of totalitarian regimes in the Middle East, like anywhere else in the world, are not good. ISIS is no different, notching up crimes against women, dissenters, religious groups, and ethnic minorities at a horrifying clip.

Putting the rapidity of the force that ISIS is applying to innocent citizens and opponents to one side, the style of their violence has struck horror and loathing into pretty much everybody. The literal interpretation of the bloodiest and most allegorical parts of the Koran has been borne out in beheadings, amputations and torture, with defeated tribal commanders and Christians often forced to dig their own graves before filling them. In the Sinjar region, the Yazidi minority are being persecuted to the point of extinction; the assault has been described as a genocide of Srebenica proportions. Despite being one of the oldest continuing religious groups in the world, ISIS regards the group as devil worshippers and enemies of Islam. At the time of writing, fifty thousand Yazidi are hiding in the mountains dying of hunger and thirst; these are the lucky ones who escaped. Their brutality isn’t just limited to thou shalt not kill, though; when ISIS took Mosul, they also nabbed US$429 million from banks in town. The group has relentlessly crushed populations, pillaged their resources, and targeted ethnic and religious enemies with no compunction, and their power is spreading.

Twitterati Aside from setting their sights globally, there are several things that set ISIS apart from its jihadist predecessors.

The organisation has a slick, fully integrated and virulent social media presence. Though finding people disaffected and unhappy with the West in the Middle East isn’t much more difficult than finding a beard on the streets of Tehran, = converting ordinary people into committed jihadists takes a propaganda machine of extreme proportions. ISIS may well be the only jihadist organisation to have their own app; the Dawn of Glad Tidings, which is a platform for sharing information and co-ordinating activities. As ISIS moved towards Baghdad earlier this year, the daily number of tweets being sent out by the organisation nudged 40,000. A large part of their social media presence involves sharing videos and images of brutality, and using hashtags to ensure their content trends even where it’s unexpected; footage of a policeman’s head being used as a soccer ball began to trend during the World Cup, simply through the organised sharing of the image with the hashtag #worldcup2014. ISIS’ social media presence has also been a key plank in its recruitment strategy, particularly of fighters from the West, who make up an estimated 25% of their overall fighting force.

The Future Ultimately, Iraq has fractured, and it seems unlikely to ever return to the shape it was in a decade ago. While equally opposed to ISIS, the ethnic Kurds in Northern Iraq have also taken the opportunity to fight for selfdetermination and independence, and it seems unlikely that Baghdad will be able to control them either. In less than two months, ISIS have cut a swathe through the Middle East and Western conceptions of future peace, and it hardly seems like they’re close to being finished.

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FOREIGN AID IN WAR AND PEACE

by Sophia van Gent

Type “Foreign Aid” into Google and you’ll get a whole bunch of different messages.

You’ll get links to Australia’s foreign aid page at australia.gov.au, to a Wikipedia entry, news articles, and headlines like “Foreign Aid Overhaul To Squeeze More Value For Money”, “Who Profits From Our Foreign Aid?” and “The shame that is Abbott’s foreign aid policy”.

Foreign aid is a topic that has different opinions vying for prime position on the Google results page. Foreign aid, or Official Development Assistance (ODA), is money, food, or other resources given or lent by a donor country to a recipient country (Bilateral) or to a multilateral development agency like the United Nations (Multilateral).

Criticisms of foreign aid include its ineffectiveness and its inability to overcome an unjust international economic system.

On the other hand, you have defenders passionately rebutting the critics’ claim.

At the core of things, no one denies the importance of aid in humanitarian crises.

The history of foreign aid is an interesting one. Australia’s aid programme started before World War II when the government gave grants to Papua New Guinea, then administered by the Australian government.

When Commonwealth leaders met in Colombo, Ceylon, in January 1950, they launched the Colombo Plan as a venture for the economic and social advancement of the South and Southeast Asian region through bilateral aid. Australia also hoped that the Colombo Plan would allow the United States to be involved in the region, cultivate diplomatic and commercial relations, support Japan’s rehabilitation and allow the US to play a part in the Cold War. This isn’t the first time that a country used their foreign aid plan to promote diplomatic and political aims during times of conflict.

Countries often use foreign aid in times of conflict to promote values of “democracy, human rights, and development”, with the belief that if these values are promoted, then the more stable and peaceful the world

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will become. This was an underlying theme of American foreign policy during the Cold War when foreign aid was used to promote democracy and the idea of free-markets.

America was concerned about the “expansive tendencies of the Soviet Union”, and felt that to help regional security within western and northern Europe was to promote the integration of Western European economies.

By promoting the integration of Western European economies, it backed US State Department official George F. Kennan’s call for “long-term, patient but firm and vigilant containment of Russian expansive tendencies” and America’s political interests in the region.

Theories underpinning development and foreign aid have changed quite dramatically over the years. The 1950s and 60s saw a focus on modernisation through a ‘one size fits all’ linear, economically centred development philosophy. The 1970s to the present time saw it change to widespread structural economic packages applied to the ‘developing’ world by global economic institutions to a more complex and culturally sensitive human-rights based approach. These changes have been largely in response to a significant increase in the amount and sophistication of empirical evidence from poverty-stricken regions of the world detailing success and failure of various programmes. Our understanding of poverty and its underlying factors has improved immeasurably.

In our modern age of nontraditional security actors and concerns in a post 9/11 world, the political stability and security within our Asia-Pacific region is critical. As Australia lies geographically close to areas of conflict, it is not surprising that our foreign policy, including our foreign aid programme, focuses on conflict prevention, conflict reduction and humanitarian relief, as well as post-conflict recovery and peacebuilding.

We only need to look at our close neighbour Timor-Leste’s (East Timor’s) history to see how successful foreign aid can be in helping fragile countries build up infrastructure and establish peace through community development. Timor-Leste was a Portuguese

colony from mid-16th Century until 1975. It was then independent for only nine days before being invaded by Indonesia. After four centuries of occupation, Timor-Leste was internationally recognised as an independent nation in 2002. Timor-Leste’s turbulent history, marked with violence, led to 75 percent of its population being displaced before the UN peacekeeping force could arrive in 1999. Because of this, today 75 percent of East Timorese live in rural areas, and 37 percent live on the extreme poverty line of less than US$1.25 a day.

Since its independence, Australia has been Timor-Leste’s biggest development partner. Our foreign aid has assisted TimorLeste in improving governance allowing its administration to take increasing ownership for poverty reduction efforts. Through helping Timor-Leste invest in strong governing infrastructure, as well as helping them to build a level of resilience to financial, social and emotional effects of disaster, the aid program is helping to minimise conflict and provide support in restoring the basis for development post conflict.

Foreign aid helps rebuild communities after conflict and sustainably develops communities during peace however Abbott’s drastic cuts are undermining success. The Government’s decision to go through private contractors, Coffey and GRM International, has meant that NGOs overseas have to undercut each other in order for their bid to win funding from the Australian government.

By undercutting and undermining each other, the quality of programs enabling the extreme poor to get out of the poverty trap through vocational training, secondary and primary education suffers in a race for efficiency.

Foreign aid will always play a role in times of war and conflict, but for it to be effective, foreign aid cannot be tied to domestic political concerns and policies but rather consistent and sustainable. As a relatively rich and stable country, Australia needs to show leadership in investing in the security, stability and development of our region. This means keeping to the once bipartisan promise of 0.5 percent of GNI for foreign aid.

GOLDEN DAWN: the Neo-Nazi Party Spearheading Fascism’s Resurgence

by Matt Farsalas In the clutch of economic depression, a political party began to emerge. Seen as a saviour for many, it garnered support through its radical right wing views, racist commentaries, and nationalist ideals. This is not Nazi Germany, this is modern day Greece.

Neo-Nazi party, Golden Dawn, was recently catapulted into parliament for the first time, with almost seven percent of the popular vote. After two international bailouts and years of economic turmoil, it seems most Greeks have been growing desperate, with radical times sparking radical measures. Golden Dawn has capitalised on this desperation, using anti-government sentiment and public anger to justify its controversial ideology.

Unemployment, economic instability, and drastic wage cuts had Greece searching for a scapegoat, and this scapegoat came in the form of illegal immigrants.

Illegal immigration has long been a problem for Greece, a country often seen as a gateway into Western Europe. However, the utopia pictured by recent immigrants has been far from reality, with little work available and even less for those without papers. As a result, many immigrants end up living on public funds, utilising government schemes to help find their footing. Such welfare has become the flagship for Golden Dawn propaganda, as the group likens immigrants to leeches, draining the Greek economy.

“Everything that has to do with the public sector, illegal immigrants are using it for free,” said Golden Dawn MP Ilias Panagiotaros, “Greek people have to protect themselves.”

And protect themselves they do, with Golden Dawn thugs regularly inciting street fights, unafraid to use violence to advance their political goals. Aggressive assaults are commonplace as immigrants are targeted by packs of Golden Dawn youths, seeking to spread their message verbally and physically.

“I was looking for food in the garbage and they [Golden Dawn affiliates] stabbed me. I spent ten days in hospital,” said one Syrian refugee who preferred not to be named.

“They yell things like go back to your own country, and leave Greece. If I could leave, I would, but they don’t understand that…I would not spend one more minute in Greece if I could leave.”

The most concerning fact about the violence is that little has been done to remedy the situation. Javed Aslam, president of the Pakistani Workers Association, alleges that victims of racist attacks are often ignored, dismissed by police and other government entities.

Recently the Racist Violence Recording Network presented a report, which illustrated a sharp rise in the number of victims of racial violence. In his introductory remarks, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, George Tsarbopoulos, pointed out that the report’s conclusions highlight an explosive growth in racist violence across Greece.

It seems the current turmoil has given the Golden Dawn an almost free pass to act as the ‘long hand of the law’, taking it upon themselves to restore order to Greece.

This violence is compounded by the sharp rise in political violence, with riots between fascists and anarchists occurring daily. “It’s like a championship, every day they have fights,” said Sokratis Smairados, head of Golden Dawn security. The threat of danger is real, both for Golden Dawn affiliates and their rivals. The Golden Dawn headquarters has been bombed ten times.

In addition, two Golden Dawn members were recently killed in a drive-by-shooting outside an Athens office.

However Golden Dawn has also been linked with a number of incidents, including the death of Pavlos Fyssas a.k.a Killah P. Fyssas, an anti-fascist rapper who’s lyrics condemned Golden Dawn and the far right.

He was stabbed to death on September 18th, during what’s believed to be a premeditated assault by a Golden Dawn supporter.

So why has this paramilitary regime been allowed to subsist? The short answer is chaos.

Greece was ground-zero for the global economic crisis, and as such, has been a breeding ground for ultra-left wing and right wing parties. The latter, Golden Dawn, understand that the current coalition in government is weak and has been profiting off this weakness with free reign. Out of necessity, not willingness, the government has turned a blind eye to the activities of the party, focusing on a plethora of more pressing issues. This has allowed the organisation to run rampant, spewing their hate-filled philosophy and fascist dogma.

Ironically, the party disputes any claims to Nazism or fascism, labelling their organisation as ultranationalist. However this begins to seem somewhat absurd when we observe a party founded on a hatred of immigrants and keeping the Greek race “pure”, which carries a flag remarkably similar to the Swastika and which still practices the Nazi sieg heil salute. In addition, they distribute books by Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels and tend to wear black shirts like the fascists under Mussolini.

There is however one saving grace for Greek rule of law. Certain Golden Dawn MP’s currently stand accused of joining and directing a criminal organisation, among an array of other charges including connection to the murder of Pavlos Fyssas. Three party members have already been placed behind bars, including party founder and leader, Nikos Michaloliakos.

Recently there has been talk of banning the party from the polls. Golden Dawn MP Ilias Kasidiaris hit back at the proposition stating that Greek nationalism will be represented at the polls next election, even if they have to create an entirely new party to do so. The future of Golden Dawn, for the time being, remains unclear. They remain at the fringe and in the minority. But once upon a time the Nazi party were also in the minority.

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PEACE OF MIND

by Emily Purvis

Western Australia’s mental health care system is in crisis. For too long the State and Federal Governments have ignored the need for an increased number of beds and improved psychiatric care for adolescents suffering from mental illness in our public hospitals. Currently, to seek assistance for mental illness from a public hospital as an adolescent in this state there are two facilities: one in Princess Margaret Hospital and one in the Bentley Adolescent Unit, with a collective ward capacity of 20 beds. Plans for the new Children’s Hospital include 20 beds, but remove 6 of the 12 beds available at the Bentley Unit and close all 8 of those in PMH. Considering that from 1952-1994 incidents of suicide in young adults and adolescents have nearly tripled, these numbers clearly fall short of current and future mental health needs in our state.

The State and Federal Governments’ complacency and negligence in this issue is having fatal consequences.

The new Children’s Hospital in Perth will be the only government funded organisation in Western Australia to admit young people with mental illness. They will have 20 beds. That is, a state which has a population of 482300 people under 14 years of age- of which prevalence rates show between 14-18% of those ‘experience mental illness of clinical significance’ has 20 beds. Current waiting periods for those adolescents needing psychiatric care can be upwards of five months, with the beds being made available at the new Children’s Hospital not coming close to relieving the ‘unrelenting pressure’ on Perth’s child and adolescent mental health services, says Aaron Groves, the Chairman of the WA branch of the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatry. This is a reality which is costing lives. A recent public inquiry has been initiated by the work of Christine Brown and Linda Stillitano, both mothers with children who have been forced onto a waiting list that can be up to ten patients

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deep at any one time after seeking urgent psychiatric aid for their daughters, who suffer severe depression. Their efforts to create awareness of the issue has been backed by Stephen Dawson, Shadow Minister for mental health, and the inquiry is currently in process. One has to wonder what the State Government will do with the information once they have the results, when officials from the College of Psychiatry have already claimed that despite the planned Children’s Hospital there remains a lack of 60-70 beds across the state for youths aged 16-24 years.

more specialist psychiatric care and/or police intervention.’ This ultimately puts more economic pressure on local and state facilities, with penny pinching initiatives across state institutions literally costing lives. Mental Health Commissioner Tim Marney has suggested that it isn’t just the beds that need reviewing; recommendations from the ten year plan, which has already been assessed and written, need to be implemented in order to tackle the current crisis in the system. These recommendations are currently being ignored by both the facilities and the State Government.

With the Abbott government’s new federal budget pulling $53.8 million out of mental health recovery organisations over two years, the pressure on State Facilities will only grow. This, along with the mandatory GP levy of $7 and the introduction of the $6 co-payment on prescriptions has prompted what the Sydney Morning Herald dubbed a ‘distinctive cycle that means not taking medication, needing

The lack of available treatment has become so bad in some instances that there are Facebook outreach pages which have told the stories of some families who literally mortgage their house in order to afford the premiums for mental health care under private insurance companies, premiums which start in the hundreds of dollars per month. Even more desperately, families send their children interstate or overseas to the U.S.A, where they are charged upwards of $10000 per month for adequate psychiatric treatment. Therapy just isn’t available under the current government supported hospital system. Sadly, these options are not always available to some families. People in remote and regional communities have identified an even more severe lack of adequate mental health services. This reality is sadly represented in disproportionately high suicide rates in people living in regional communities. This ongoing crisis highlights the importance of the State funded resources for psychiatric treatment, treatment that is vital to the preservation of life.

WITH THE ABBOTT GOVERNMENT’S NEW FEDERAL BUDGET PULLING $53.8 MILLION OUT OF MENTAL HEALTH RECOVERY ORGANISATIONS OVER TWO YEARS, THE PRESSURE ON STATE FACILITIES WILL ONLY GROW.

For support or more information about depression and other mental illness, please visit: Lifeline: 13 11 14 Suicide Prevention: http://www. suicideprevention.com.au/main/?id=5 Beyond Blue: http://www.beyondblue.org.au/

UNSEX ME HERE: Politics’ War with Women

by Leah Roberts and Hamish Hobbs Senator for Tasmania Jacqui Lambie wants a well hung man. We know this not, as initial media reports hinted, because Jacqui Lambie is a voracious sex queen who can’t stop talking about her man hunt. We know it because, unlike any of our male senators, she was asked about it. When she appeared on Hobart’s Heart FM 107.3 breakfast radio in mid-July as a guest, it was decided that the best use of our Senator’s time was to place her in a deeply uncomfortable Tasmanian version of The Bachelorette. While it may be less entertaining to find that she has not been fiercely using her senate position to aid her quest for the perfect three legged man, it does provide a better insight into the gender inequality in Australian politics.

The trouble began with the radio host mentioning the highly personal fact that Senator Jacqui Lambie had not dated for 11 years. This lengthy period was, in Lambie’s own words, a result of being “physically and psychologically damaged” after her time in the armed forces and being busy raising her two children. Unwilling to drop the issue there, the tacit assumption in the interview from this point was that Lambie’s single status needed fixing. The dating games began with the hosts inviting callers to try to woo our reluctant Senator. Lambie quickly responded to this cringe-worthy situation with her own ill-advised, awkward humour. She suggested that any man of hers would need to have “a package between his legs” and expressed worry about the untrimmed state of her own bikini area.

Pundits from left and right have been rushing to discuss this new development, labelling it as anything from brave and empowering to crass, reverse sexism. What this incident really acts as, however, is just one more example of the subtle and complex game which women in politics have no choice but to play. Being a female in Australian politics opens up a whole arena of performance in which one must succeed. It is a whole different ball-game. While a man must succeed as a politician, a woman must succeed as both a politician and as a female.

The problem is that this performance, the act of the ‘professional woman’, places women in a near impossible position. Being a woman in politics is a confusing act of being assaulted with sound while having to maintain your own silence. The media will speculate noisily on every aspect of any female candidate’s appearance, clothing choices and personal life. She will be aggressively gendered regardless of her own personal choices. Yet, in response to this media buzz, she must remain silent. While the media will interrogate her in highly gendered ways, she must not respond in a gendered fashion. If she does, the pundit gatekeepers of the politically appropriate will punish her and she can never again be simply ‘a politician’, instead forever becoming ‘that woman in politics’.

Jacqui Lambie made the fundamental mistake of responding to media pressure and broadcasting the details of her sexual desires.

Despite the fact that the radio station had literally turned itself into a personal dating service for her and asked her to engage with it, the blame fell on her. While it was acceptable for the radio station to ask, it was inappropriate for her to respond.

Julia Gillard followed a different tack. On her first day in parliament she wore a carefully innocuous ensemble; she kept her sexuality quiet and simply attempted to get on with the job. Soon criticism swept in for her clothing choices. She was too frumpy and didn’t wear enough make up. Her husband’s profession was too effeminate; making her too manly in comparison. Julia had failed once again, by not being feminine enough. When she reacted to this criticism with a makeover, in the ultimate contradiction, she was criticised for her shallow preoccupation with her appearance.

She made the second key mistake in the femininity game by actually acknowledging the fact that she was a woman and calling Abbott out on his sexism. When faced with clearly gendered attacks such as “ditch the witch” and “her father would be ashamed of her”, some media outlets instead continued to criticize Gillard herself, now for playing the “gender card” and speaking out against misogyny. Responding to gender-based

attacks in a gender-aware way is against the rules in the gender game.

Julie Bishop, on the other hand, has been relatively successful in this game. She is a perfect example of the brand of silence which is exalted and expected in female politicians.

While routinely dismissed as the ‘token female’ in the Liberal Party, she has largely avoided the gender issue. When questioned on topics like working mothers, she suggests that “women can’t have it all”, neatly avoiding the gender politics tied up in the unspoken corollary ‘but men can’. In response to Gillard’s claims of misogyny Bishop criticized her suggesting “she should be governing for all Australians and not trying to wage a gender war”. This once again carefully sidestepped the politics of the fact that, perhaps the gender war had already been begun when “ditch the witch” fell into vogue. This silence should not take away from her achievements.

She is widely respected as one of the few beacons of competence in the current Liberal cabinet. However it is worth considering that she appears to have been the only woman who has achieved the carefully silent balancing act of the female politician well enough to make it into Abbott’s cabinet.

So, if you’re thinking about applying for the next position as female Senator or Prime Minister, just remember: Wear clothing that is professional and not too feminine, but don’t look frumpy or manly. Be polite and comment on allegations made against by the media about your appearance, personal life and clothes, but don’t reply like a woman.

Hold your own amongst the men, but don’t acknowledge the conflict or play the ‘gender card’. Be an overachieving career woman of an appropriate age, but have children and a family that you still provide care for in the proper, traditional motherly way. Deal with constant gender based speculation, but stay silent.

The fact that any of our female politicians succeed in this environment shows their true merit as savvy political actors, and more are doing it all the time. Perhaps what Beyoncé says is true: Who runs the world? Girls do.

REVELATION FILM FEST : REVIEWS

by Samuel J Cox, Anna Saxon, Kieran Rayney, Callum Corkill, Matthew Green, Kevin Chiat, Lucy Ballantyne, Wade McCagh UNDER THE SKIN MG: Scarlett Johansson plays a shapeshifting alien who trawls the streets of Glasgow, looking for men to seduce and devour. What more could you want?

As Scarlett’s alien learns to empathize with her human prey, she becomes increasingly more vulnerable. Without exaggeration, I can say this is the best film of the year. Visually stunning and deeply unsettling (not mention totally bizarre), it’s my pick for film of the year.

5/5 AS: Every man in the cinema was shaking with fear when the lights went up. If that’s not a recommendation I don’t know what is. In the words of pre-rehab Ke$ha “let’s eat boys up, breakfast and lunch.” 4.8/5 TIME LAPSE CC: Time Lapse is a succinct, tense, and overall damn enjoyable time travel film. It’s not bogged down explaining the science of its time travel, instead focusing on how knowing the future affects its cast of characters. This is its strong point; the way the characters are manipulated and warned by their future selves makes for some intense viewing and I found myself on the edge of my seat for most of the third act. It’s beautifully shot and incredibly crafted sci-fi. 4/5 LOCKE MG: Tom Hardy plays a Welsh construction foreman driving from Birmingham to London. Along the way, he takes phone calls from his wife, co-workers, and his lover, as his life crumbles around him. That’s it, really. Although Hardy gives a typically commendable performance, a film set entirely within the confines of a car is by definition limited. 2/5 PALO ALTO AS: This movie made me so freaking glad I wasn’t in high school anymore, because Franco my dear I don’t give a damn about Emma Roberts’s half-arsed

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teenaged angst. Painfully middle of the road. And how can these kids afford so much weed!? You’re like 14! 2.5/5 WM: Val Kilmer’s kid can act. Val Kilmer cameo nearly made this worth 100 minutes of my time. Gia Coppola now 6th on the Coppola Family Tree Power Ranking scale, behind Francis Ford Coppola, Nic Cage, Sofia Coppola, Thomas Mars, and Jason Schwartzman.

(Note: Spike Jonze officially not included in rankings, probably ties with Cage if he was still was.) 2.5/5 THE CONGRESS KC: The Congress is Ari Folman’s followup to Waltz with Bashir, and it is a weird, visually stunning film experience. Robin Wright plays Robin Wright, a fading actress who sells her image rights to a studio. 20 years later the studio wants to re-up the deal so they can sell Robin Wright as a chemical compound. I told you it’s weird. The film’s highlight is its beautiful and trippy animation. Some of the satirical elements of the film are a little on the nose though. The Congress is a psychedelic exploration of the boundaries between reality and fantasy; it’s strange, but well worth checking out.

4/5 COLD IN JULY MG: Based on Joe Lansdale’s crime novel, Cold in July kicks off as a neonoir thriller, before going completely Tarantino. Michael C. Hall plays Texan Richard Dane, a timid man caught up in a gothic murder mystery with an excon (Sam Shepard). However, it quickly transpires that the situation is much more complicated, and the pair must work together, along with private detective Jim Bob (Miami Vice’s Don Johnson, who steals the show), to uncover the sinister truth. Although the tone totally back-flips into completely over-the-top stylized violence, it’s a hell of a lot of fun. If you love Texas, this is your movie. 3/5 WM: The plot has some Cadillac with bullhorns attached to the bumper sized holes, and it take a weird 90 degree turn about halfway through from psychological thriller to buddy detective movie, but Michael C. Hall’s straight, button downed square is the perfect foil to Sam Shepard

looking grizzled and Don Johnson going full Don Johnson. Its not perfect, and there ends up being a weird juxtaposition of the darkly macabre and the darkly comic, but its fun and doesn’t take itself too seriously.

Come for Dexter, stay for Jim Bob. 3/5 JOE WM: Nic Cage plays the anti-Lorax, running an illegal tree killing business in the American South. Along the way, he employs and then befriends and mentors a young poor boy trying to provide for his white trash family, who suffer under a cruel patriarch whom we come to know as ‘G-Daawg’ from the awfully perfect jacket he wears. Joe is realist neo-Southern Gothic at its best; the accents are thick, the dialogue is slowly slurred out of tobacco stained mouths, and the grime of life in the post-GFC South is heavy and ever-present. Cage’s performance as a man with anger issues trying to lead an upright life is just outright brilliant, his brooding figure subtle and seething, an outburst always just being repressed under the surface. Its a reminder of the kind of acting that delivered Cage an Oscar nearly 20 years ago, and while not everyone’s cup of tea, this film is undeniably good. 4/5 WETLANDS LB: Wetlands is disgusting. The film is a mess of tactile and visceral rampages through bodily obsessions, Electra complexes, and perversion in all its forms.

The disgustingly good-looking cast of Berliners couldn’t distract from vision that made me sick to my stomach. A revolting reminder of the power of cinema to shock and scandalize. We need God. 4/5 AS: Warning, do NOT see this film if you: are on your period, have ever used a public bathroom, know what hemorrhoids are, have ever shaved any part of your body, have ever been pregnant, want to have children, eaten a pizza, picked a scab, done a poo, gone to the beach, swum in a pool, been through puberty, have parents, or have ever been to hospital. DO see this film if you are: turned on by any of the above. 3.5/5

documents the decay of the small town, taking in the Schneidkrauts’ troubled family history, the final despairing cries of the local punk and poetry scenes, and ultimately, Dan’s father’s remarkable streak of empathy in the face of betrayal, failure and regret.

I cannot describe how important this film is. It’s that good. 5/5 FIND A WAY TO SEE THIS FILM TO BE TAKEI MG: Since coming out in 2005, George Takei has become an icon of same sex marriage and equality. To Be Takei is a doco closely following the actor and his husband Brad, as they navigate his fame (he played Sulu on Star Trek). Takei grew up in a military internment camp during the Second World War, on account of his Japanese heritage.

Although Takei’s rise as an actor in the 1960s is truly impressive, this doco ultimately feels lightweight; it relies on one-liners and social media for quick laughs, rather than anything lasting or substantial. 2.5/5

DOCOS

the only TV channel is WWF Wrestling?

No thanks. Happiness is relative. 3/5

EVOLUTION OF A CRIMINAL KR: Evolution of a Criminal had so much potential: a well liked, good student turned convict, and now a chance to hear see how it happened.

Darius Clark Monroe provides a well shot autobiographical doco using firsthand accounts to retell the events surrounding a bank robbery he undertook in high school. I left the film feeling like it was a missed opportunity, with Monroe’s actual ‘evolution’ being largely overlooked, outside of cursory references to motives. An enjoyable watch, Evolution encouraged a reflection on the far-reaching repercussions of the decisions we make.

3/5

THE INTERNET’S OWN BOY: THE STORY OF AARON SWARTZ SJC: A sufficiently moving sob story, this documentary about a computing prodigy and ‘hacktivist’ raises some interesting questions about the appalling state of modern copyright laws, but falls short of an intelligent discussion. Thoroughly one-sided, the film tells a David and Goliath story of a naïve optimist persecuted by a Sith Lord (the United States Government). As with the jailing of Australian journalist Peter Greste, it is timely reminder that life doesn’t play out like the Good Book. Goliath triumphs over David, and governments ain’t nuthin’ ta fuck wit. 2/5

HAPPINESS AS: Bhutan is supposed to be the ‘Happiest Country in the World’. And yet no one in this documentary seems particularly happy. Perhaps the film should have been called ‘Contentment’ or ‘Accepting the Inevitable’. 5/5 for cinematography but a country where

OLD MAN MG: Holy shit. If you only watch one documentary this year, make it this one. Where do I even begin? Old Man is the love letter from a son (Daniel Schneidkraut) to his father (Andrew).

Andy owns the last record store in Boulder, Colorado, and looks back over his life, with the aid of Dan. Old Man

WATERMARK MG: It’s really hard to pitch a doco based on water. Watermark is a slow, considered look at the history and use of water throughout the world. Filmmaker Jennifer Baichwal and photographer Edward Burtynsky take us across the globe, from massive hydroelectric dam projects in China to grimy leather factories in Bangladesh to alarming land degradation in the United States to communal bathing in the Ganges, all with an intense focus on our relationship with water. It’s phenomenal cinematography, with subtle environmental undertones, on a par with Koyaanisqatsi. 4.5/5 WEB JUNKIE MG: Set within the confines of a Chinese military hospital, Web Junkie focuses on a select few ‘inmates’, who have all been enrolled (whether by doctor’s orders, force, or even kidnapping) to undergo treatment for their supposed illness: internet addiction. It’s a fascinating subject matter, straddling the line between what constitutes mere laziness and genuine mental illness. Its best moments focus on the private thoughts and interactions of the hospital’s inmates, as they contemplate their relationship to the internet. However, the doco suffers from a lack of focus; it can’t decide whether its topic is quirky, or disturbing. 2/5

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REVELATION FILM FEST DIARY

by Matt Green

Writing for a student publication like Pelly is the best way to get free shit, especially movie passes. I love going to the movies, to the point where it’s perhaps even a little unhealthy. No wonder I’m so pale.

That’s why, for me, the Revelation Perth International Film Festival is the standout event on Perth’s film scene’s calendar. It’s not often that Perth is genuinely at the centre of anything, really, so the Rev’s very existence really ought to be cherished.

2014 marked the Fest’s 17th year running, and boy was this year a real doozy. There truly was an international blend of films and docos on show, from Belgium to Bhutan, with a few local debuts thrown in to boot, with a smorgasbord of subject matters, including Chinese internet addiction (Web Junkie), existential ennui in Finland (Concrete Night), and sex aliens attacking Scotland (Under the Skin).

Rev ran from 3-13 July: eleven straight days of the best the international independent film scene has to offer (read: arty & ambiguous), along with a number of workshops and competitions for Perth’s own budding filmmakers. There was also the Iranian Film Festival to contend with, a growing fixture of Revelation’s lineup.

A tough ask, but I had a point to prove: our dear Culture Ed, Lucy “the Goose” Ballantyne, had teased that I couldn’t handle the sheer volume of movies by myself. Because I’m a spiteful bugger, I had to prove her wrong. So, with the aid of a disturbing amount of caffeine and the generous access granted me by Revelation (thanks!), I set out to accomplish the borderline-socially-unacceptable goal of (at least) one movie per day.

The programme kicked off with the best in show: Jonathan Glazer’s Under the Skin. A sci-fi horror, Scarlett Johansson plays an alien scouring the streets of Glasgow for men to seduce and devour: a literal sexual predator. Count me in. Rev’s director Richard Sowada had offered the disclaimer that the film would certainly divide

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audiences, but the festival had a duty to provoke as much as it did to entertain, and boy did Under the Skin set the tone for the next 10 days. Visually daring and emotionally disturbing, it’s just a must-see.

I can’t remember the last time I saw a film where large parts of the audience gasped in terror at a suspenseful moment; the grisly fate of Scarlett’s victims is something I’ll never forget. Following the screening, a free-for-all after party saw Perth’s culture scene hit the sauce, and talk about how they didn’t get the movie. Seriously, I wasn’t aware these people even existed.

Schneidkraut’s Old Man, an empathetic look at the turbulent life of a small town record store owner. I can’t recommend this movie highly enough. Get your hands on it! Revelation was capped off by Revel-8, a competition for Perth filmmakers, tasked with creating their own short films, using Super-8 cameras. All jokes aside, this was Revelation’s pleasant surprise, and the impressive audience turnout proves there is a serious market for film made in Perth.

Rev Fest was hosted by Luna, across their Leederville, Northbridge, & Freo cinemas.

Trekking between them would’ve been a nightmare, and I no longer dare venture any further south than Como (I fear change), so I arranged as many screenings at Leederville and the Paradiso as possible. Over the first weekend I took in Web Junkie (China), Watermark (Canada), the Iranian classic Downpour, and Concrete Night, from Finland. These four really displayed the variety that Revelation can be relied upon to offer; you couldn’t pick four more different films, really. Watermark was my highlight for the weekend, though.

An epic environmental doco about humanity’s relationship and use of water, it was a real eye-opener, if only on the basis of its stunning cinematography. I honestly could not tell you what the hell Concrete Night was about, but I did learn that Finnish people say ‘scorpion’ in a really funny way. Sidenote/confession: I had a gap between Rev Films on the first Sunday, and I chose to use that break to see another movie, Calvary, for fun... Like I said, a little unhealthy.

Led Zeppelin Played Here sounded great on paper. A lifelong fan hears a rumour that the legendary band played their first gig at his local school dance hall, but there are conflicting sides to the story, and he attempts to piece together the truth through extensive interviews and investigation. My brother and I love Led Zep, so I had this one pencilled in from the start. It turned out that filmmaker Jeff Krulik got his start through Youtube, and this amateurism filtered throughout his doco. Leaving aside his terrible grasp of editing and framing (pro tip: don’t position your interviewee in front of a mirror), Led Zeppelin Played Here ended up being an accidental case study in mental illness.

Krulik’s interview technique basically amounted to asking the same question over and over and over, and his ‘experts’ proved to be nothing more than a collection of aging hoarders, unable to let go of the past.

This movie reminded me why I don’t listen to Zep anymore.

Across the next week I ran the gamut of Rev’s selection, taking in Cold in July (Don Johnson is a boss), To Be Takei (ohhhhh myyyyyy), The Wedlock (another Iranian gem), Last Hijack (Somalia = depressing), and American Arab. The latter was a real highlight, a short doco covering the spread of Islamophobia in the wake of 9/11.

However, the real standout doco was Dan

The official worst movie of the festival (sorry)

My Rev Fest Top 5 1. Under the Skin 2. Old Man 3. Watermark 4. American Arab 5. Cold in July

OH, HAI MARK! An Interview with Greg Sestero

by Chloe Durand and Matt Green CD: Why did you choose write The Disaster Artist when you did?

GS: Uhm, really... The Room was a crazy experience. I’ve told stories about it for so long and then it really started to gain momentum roughly around 2009, 2010, and when there was an audience there for the story as the phenomenon went on I realised there was more to it than just the making of a bad movie, there were elements of the American Dream and what it’s like to start out having a vision and then having that totally change. So I felt compelled to like... do justice to the story about what it was like to get there. I felt that right around the ten year anniversary was a good time to do that.

CD: Awesome. As you were saying it’s more than just an odd film. But it is quite absurd, so did you feel like you had to explain your experience with The Room? Because it’s a hard movie to explain.

GS: Yeah I definitely think people assumed that you know, you went out there and auditioned and you tried to really make this movie because you believed in it and I really wanted to make this clear that this was an accident for me and I didn’t expect anything from it. And I think the back story was crazier and funnier than the film and that’s what I wanted to show.

CD: But it wasn’t an accident for Tommy was it? I mean, he really believed in it.

GS: Yeah this kind of the project that represented his life. He put everything in it, he did.

CD: Tell me more about when you first met Tommy because it seems like he would be the kind of person hard to represent in book form.

GS: It was exactly like meeting a character from a movie. You questioned whether he was real or not.

He was just unlike anybody I’d ever met.

CD: And how did your friendship start to solidify? I mean, how did you come to trust this man so much that you really... you got involved in his life’s dream?

GS: I think it was just his zest for life and his childish enthusiasm and him being the one person that urged me to keep going after something that nobody else believed in. I felt like I saw the genuine side of him and there was just something kind of unique there that I hadn’t seen in anyone else.

CD: So tell me, why did The Room get made? And how? Because a lot of funding was thrown into it.

GS: Yeah, I mean it was really just sheer will. He funded it, wrote the script, starred in it. So it was really... All credit to him, his passion, his want to make a movie.

CD: And why did you in particular stick with this project? Given all of the bizarreness?

GS: Just because I’d committed to trying to help him make his movie and I knew that he... even if he couldn’t communicated it, he meant well.

CD: Tell me more about when he asked you to play Mark, given that the rest of the cast seemed to change every so often and why did you decide to take the role? Was it just money or again were you trying to support a friend?

GS: Uhm... I think it was a mix of things.

Uhm... Obviously, I was 24. Unemployed actor, the offer was enticing but at the same time I knew it would be important to him. I figured I’d be on set all day

anyway. So again, a mix of things. And of course, the money.

CD: Do you think the book really communicated the chaos that took place on set of The Room?

GS: Yeah, I think, I think it was... You know, I’d interviewed all the other actors for the book, and heard their stories of the way it was such a crazy experience.

CD: I have to ask, because there are so many bizarre scenes in the film, why was Tommy so insistent on having the sex scenes in there? And how did you react to them because I imagine they would have been quite uncomfortable?

GS: Yeah that was probably the most uncomfortable part of the whole thing.

And, I mean, I got to keep my jeans on thankfully the whole time. But I just felt they were sort of long and unnecessary.

CD: And, we got some very intimate views of Tommy and his body there.

GS: That... Yeah, that is.. I feel for the audience every time those come on.

CD: How do you find working after The Room? Do you find that it’s affected your career a lot?

GS: No, it’s not really a movie that that many people saw until later, and so I had been working in Europe. It was sort of this LA in-joke that comedians and film students would check out.

And really when it started to become more popular is when I started working on the book. So if anything it’s just allowed me to travel the world and meet a bunch of great people.

CD: And what do you mainly do now?

Are you still interested in acting?

GS: Well there was the book and now the books going to be turned into a

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OH, HAI MARK! An Interview with Greg Sestero: Continued

film. I did a movie recently and costarred with Patton Oswalt & Andrew WK. It’s coming out soon, and I’m pretty excited for that.

CD: As I was reading The Disaster Artist, it sort of seemed hard to distinguish between it being a tale of inspiration or a tale of caution against such a relentless belief in something.

Tommy really believed in The Room and you seem at the same time in awe of his belief but a bit wary of that level of determination. What would you say about that?

GS: I think the one thing with Tommy is that things always get done, thing always happen, there’s never a dull moment. It’s kind of the yin and the yang. For me, I’m a little bit more cautious, a little bit more reserved so it’s interesting to watch someone attack life the way he does and I think, it’s a choice really, like, things happened with The Room you know, and would you choose for nothing to happen at all or for something to evoke a response in your audience. And I think at the end of the day that was shown that despite the film being really horrible, people are still intrigued by it, people still show up for it, and I guess at the end of the day maybe I’d rather have that than have... you know, like with the book I obviously wanted it to be received well, I put my heart in it and I wanted it to be taken seriously and luckily for the most part people have responded that way.

It’s rewarding, I don’t know how I would respond if people had said “Oh my god, it’s such a great book because it’s so bad”, personally I would be affected by that. But Tommy, he just rolled through any of that, he said “Hey, people love it, people love it because it’s great whether they wanna believe that or not” and he’s just gonna go that way. So it’s been fascinating to watch this whole things unfold.

CD: You seem really honest about the fact that The Room is a bad movie. Do

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you sort of take that in your stride or is that something that hangs over your head?

GS: I’ve always seen it for what it is I mean I knew it wasn’t going to be a good film, conventionally. Tommy isn’t conventional and I don’t think he really wants to be, he’s outside the box. I just accepted it for really what it is and I really kind of phoned in my performance, I didn’t really put anything into it because I didn’t see it as that. So I kind of do what the audience does, just accept it for what it is.

CD: There is a film adaptation of your book coming out. So who’s going to play who?

GS: Oh yeah, for now James Franco’s supposed to direct it and play Tommy, and his brother Dave to play me.

CD: Big names there! Do you think that The Room gathered more momentum than even Tommy could have realised?

GS: The most powerful thing about The Room is the word of mouth, people wanting to share it with their friends and experience it with new people and that’s something you can’t buy or create, I think that’s a testament to Tommy’s vision and his creation of... you know, this movie belongs to him from beginning to end and I just think that there’s something there that people find that they want to watch.

CD: Do you think Tommy will have any input into the upcoming movie?

GS: Uhm, I don’t think so. I mean The Room really is his movie and I think this movie really is about the book and my story and the story behind it I don’t know how would really fit into or offer something to that. But he’s been involved, and I think it’s something that’s important that it’s

separate as a story and a movie. We don’t want flying spoons in this movie!

CD: Of course not. That being said, actually, I was interested to ask, would you anticipate any sort of on screen homages to The Room in the movie for the fan base?

GS: It depends, you know, what they want to do with it. But for my own understanding and the review I read in Vice magazine it’s going to be taken as a character story about what it’s like to try and make art. You know I think that’s the direction they’re going. It’s more Boogie Nights, The Master.

CD: So you would prefer it to come across as a character film than as a documentary?

GS: Yeah, because I think with the book especially, I didn’t want it based on The Room, I didn’t want it to have to rely on The Room, because The Room has become a very popular cult film, it’s still not known in the mainstream. But I think the story possesses something of mainstream appeal and I think that’s the direction it should go.

CD: I was interested in how much you think that The Disaster Artist is taking on a fame of its own. Do you think it remains an accompaniment to The Room, or do you hope that it’s a story that can stand independently?

GS: Yeah, I think that the response I’ve had, initially from the publisher, that the readers there had never seen the movie had responded well to it. And it’s been able to garner an audience that’s not familiar with the film. I think the book definitely stands alone as an independent story. You know, it opens up with these two characters in a restaurant that are total opposites, trying to find their way.

CD: It’s quite a surreal scene, obviously having seen Tommy onscreen, to imagine the scene as it’s written. But if you haven’t seen The Room you’d be very confused, his behavior is quite jarring. Is that who he was as a person?

GS: Yeah, he was a character and I think that’s why first and foremost it’s a character story. You know like with the movie Capote, you don’t have to have read In Cold Blood to enjoy it. And that’s very much like this story, you read it for the friendships, the journey of moving to LA and I think that’s kind of where the heart of the movie lies, more so than the making of a bad film.

CD: So are you and Tommy still friends?

GS: Yeah we still throw the football around once in a while.

CD: Do you tux up for the occasion?

Or is it a bit fresh, still too soon?

GS: Greg laughs. Yeah I haven’t used the tux in a while.

CD: And how did Tommy react to the book? Did he have any comment to make on it?

GS: Yeah, he calls it the red bible.

CD: Oh my goodness, why?

GS: Fans... when he sees fans with the book they hold it really tight.

CD: Yeah, I noticed that the book and the movie are really playing off each other quite well in this sort of very cyclical way. The book fuels publicity for the movie, the movie fuels publicity for the book.

GS: Well you see, the movie used to have like... a million questions. So you’re like, where can I get these questions answered, and then you read the book, and then the book answers them. Or you read the book and you’re like “I’ve gotta see this movie”. So, yeah they do play off each other.

MG: Are you planning to appear in the film?

GS: An audience member brought this up and said it would be funny if I played the Mark that got fired. The Don character.

MG: Yes! GS: That would be really good.

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THIS IS A CALL TO ARMS: THE SOUNDS OF WAR

by Bridget Rumball ‘How could you send us so far away from home When you know damn well that this is wrong I would still lay down my life for you And do you think you deserve your freedom?’

War, revolution, and resistance have always been central themes throughout the history of music. As long as there are restless youth, and ongoing global conflict in some form or another, bands will continue to adapt the overarching concept of ‘war’ to fit their music and lyrics. But it’s often forgotten that this relationship between music and war is a two way street; regardless of the century, conflicts have been battled, lost and won with the aid of a genre-spanning selection of songs. Back in 1970, Edwin Starr may have famously sung that war was good for absolutely nothing- but little did he understand that music had absolutely everything to do with setting the mood of war and conflict.

To begin, let’s retrace back in time. Before the beginning of modern civilisation, music has been inextricably linked to conflict as a result of ‘war music’- a method for ancient warriors to prepare, defend, and simultaneously brace themselves for the physical combat and potential death around the corner. One example is the war Haka, or peruperu- a variant of the loud, brash dance performed before sports matches by the (traditionally) male New Zealand side. This wartime derivative of the Haka dance was intended to a) mentally build and support the morale of Maori fighters, b) showcase the physical prowess and strength of said Maori fighters and hence c), scare the enemy line into submission before they had the opportunity to attack.

However, the most important part of the Haka is the grunts, cries, claps and chants that accompany the fighters’ movementscreating a ‘symphony of the body’ by utilising the arms, legs, voice and feet as instruments.

Similarly, bagpipes were used throughout 16th century British battles, with the Scottish Highland bagpipe named the successor to the battlefield trumpet/coronet. Its job was

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not to use music to scare and intimidate (as does the Haka) but to warn and protect soldiers during dangerous conflict, with loud noises and short compositions alerting each side to their next move. Even now, this bagpipe usage has caused the training of British military pipers amidst the first and second World Wars, and the creation of reams of ancient bagpipe songs known as the ceòl mór. Despite holding two different purposes, both ancient practices began the relationship of influential ‘war music’ that has continued to exist to this day- setting the scene for fighters through blood-pumping, primal rhythms and noises.

Fast forward a handful of centuries, and the connection between war and music grows stronger with the composition of classical music. One of the most obvious classical piece is Richard Wagner’s ‘Ride of the Valkyries’- everyone’s favourite, dramatic entrance music, taken from the second piece in the humongously epic Ring Cycle of operas. With its stirring brass motif representing flying angels yelling out a battle-cry, it’s hard not to be motivated to gallop majestically into battle yourself whilst listening- exactly why the piece was beloved to one of history’s most brutal dictators.

Adolf Hitler was an obsessive fan of the composer’s work, using Valkyries during Nazi Party propaganda and broadcasts and dragging reluctant German soldiers to Wagner performances, kicking and screaming. However, many believe that this classical piece may have changed the tune of Hitler’s plan for Germany, pre-WW2. As a result of Wagner’s anti-Semitic views, the leader saw his vision for a master race - and hence adapted the Nazi Party’s manifesto accordingly. It has been theorised that without Wagner’s rousing music, Hitler’s dictatorship of Germany (and hence WW2) would not have happened at all- again, an example of music aiding the development of conflict history-wide. On the other hand, Wagner’s Valkyries, and its intense connections with the antisemitic movement, completely turned off philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche - Wagners original number one fan. He argues that the composer’s music is used merely to create dramatic effect- perhaps why it was so successful at

influencing the outcome of WW2 along in the first place.

But it’s not just crazy dictators and their classical music favouritism that manage to bridge the gap between music and 20th century conflict. As per Newton’s 3rd Law, for every war there will always be vehement opposition to it- and hence ‘anti-war’ music began to grow in popularity. Much like earlier war songs, anti-war compositions were written to pump up the masses; yet their purpose was completely the opposite to their predecessors’. During the earlier World Wars, artists would compose songs purely to motivate troops‘Force Sweethearts’ such as Vera Lynn and the Andrews Sisters performed rousing, patriotic songs to keep people, both home and away from the battlefield, in momentum.

But with the Vietnam War, protest songs did the exact opposite- encourage troops and their families to oppose conflict and embrace a happy, hippie lifestyle. John Lennon wrote some of the most famous of these songs, recording ‘Give Peace a Chance’ in 1969 and ‘Imagine’ in 1971- both of which promote making love, not war. The mid 1970’s caused more punk/metal-themed songs disapproving of war- The Sex Pistols’ ‘God Save the Queen’ opposed Britain’s monarchy and its role in Vietnam, whereas Black Sabbath’s bassist Geezer Butler commented that ‘War Pigs’ was written ‘totally against the Vietnam War… about how rich politicians start all the wars for their benefit and get all the poor people to die for them.’

These ‘anti-war’ songs continued to be composed even after the Vietnam Waragain, wherever there is war, there will be an opposing distrust/disgust of it and a willingness to create an oppositional mood, often expressed in the form of music. U2’s album War was a perfect example of this.

Most songs on the album reflect certain conflicts that arose in the late 20th centuryopener ‘Sunday Bloody Sunday’ recounts the period of unrest in Northern Ireland known as the Troubles, while ‘New Year’s Day’ explores the civil Polish Solidarity movement. Bono notes that “you can still take the title on a lot of different levels…

we’re not only interested in the physical aspects of war, as the emotional effects are just as important.” Hence, it’s at this point in history that the relationship between music and warfare turns on its head- music is given the opportunity to bring war to a halt, as opposed to war using music as a weapon to motivate those fighting.

Where does that leave music and war’s tumultuous relationship in the 21st century?

It seems that with more and more strategic battles beginning on a monthly basis, music has seemingly lost its ability to influence conflict for better, through protest songs or otherwise. However, the influential capabilities of music have simply shifted from affecting war itself to affecting those who have already warred- soldiers who have returned home from service. The

use of songs as part of post-war therapy is crucial to veterans suffering from posttraumatic stress disorder, depression and a host of other negative effects. For example, American organisation Guitars for Vets donates instruments to retired soldiers from wars in Afghanistan, Iraq and beyond, with one teacher noting that “musical training causes the two sides of the brain to talk to each other- it requires so much concentration, it’s hard to think of anything else.” Giving past soldiers an outlet to express wartime experiences means that the typical psychiatrist’s office and accompanying probing questions are replaced with music and lyrics, and allows patients to take their minds off the war they’ve left behind.

between music and war is becoming more and more elaborate. Bands regularly release charity singles to support both war and anti-war efforts, play at ‘heal the world’ style events such as LiveAid and alongside a host of actors, performances and other media figures, openly air their opinions about conflicts around the world. Albums across a wide range of genres have lyrics that motivate discussion of different, modern types of war- against society, against oppression, against governments. But as long as there are soldiers deployed worldwide, and as long as there are battles to be fought, music will always be capable of cultivating motivation and influencing outcomes- for better or worse.

Even in this fresh new decade, the link

GREAT SOUNDTRACK MOMENTS IN WAR FILMS

by Wade McCagh

Theme from Das Boot by Klaus Doldinger As Used in Das Boot (1981)

Surfin’ Bird by The Trashman As Used in Full Metal Jacket (1980)

Conflict: WWII

Conflict: The Vietnam War There’s something wonderfully authentic and perverse about this segment in the film, as we see Marines rolling into Hue City and engaging in the long, drawn out horror of urban warfare. Rather than go with something epic to add false heroism to the moment, and bypassing the psychological darkness of other Vietnam movies (see Martin Sheen losing his mind to The Doors in Apocalypse Now), Kubrick instead juxtaposes heavy artillery fire and an endless tracking shot of a media crew shooting a tracking shot to the mindless repetition of pop novelty hit Surfin’ Bird. The result is the blackest of comic moments and one of the most real depictions of Vietnam that goes beyond the cliché and serves as a subtle reinforcement of the Jungian duality of man theme running through the story. It’s just one example of perhaps the most perfect synthesis of pop music in a war film we’ve ever seen.

Das Boot is probably the greatest depiction of the cramped, claustrophobic terror that submariners endured during the Second World War, and a large part of its greatness is owed to Klaus Doldinger’s tense and unrelenting score. The use of synthesisers to create the anxious echo-filled atmosphere of life below the waves elevates the desperation of the crew, the heavy pulsating drone building to a suffocating crescendo.

Incorporating classical guitar and orchestral string into the mix to build the tension of the unseen enemy and the insufferable silent pauses makes this an absolute stand out. It’s a undying shrine to the brilliance of West German electro, reborn again as a chart topping techno remix throughout Europe in 1991.

The Ecstasy of Gold/The Trio by Ennio Morricone As Used in The Good, The Bad and the Ugly (1966) Conflict: The US Civil War You could argue over the merits of categorising The Good, The Bad and the Ugly as a Civil War film, given that its protagonists are searching for buried gold while the War rages in the background, occasionally getting them tangled up in the action. But all that is irrelevant when the film reaches its brilliant climax in a graveyard, and the greatest cinematic standoff in history takes place. What holds Leone’s audacious use of extreme close up and wide shots together is Morricone’s brilliant composition, cascading guitar riffs and rolling piano phrases looping over rising horns, the staccato percussive taps whipping the tension into a frenzy, all before giving way to a soaring trumpet solo and thunderous timpani and cymbals. Nearly 50 years on, it’s still the gold standard for the sound of ‘The Epic’ in cinema.

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I WENT TO A MORRISSEY CONCERT AND ALL I GOT WAS THIS LOUSY SENSE OF GUILT

by Kat Gillespie

The best thing about the Morrissey concert was the merchandise. While the man’s woeful flamboyance lends itself easily to tour t-shirt design, apparel was only the beginning.

Featuring Moz in various positions were key chains, framed posters, crucifixes, and mouse mats. All were reasonably priced. Long after the final chords of ‘Every Day is Like Sunday’ had faded from my ears, regret that I hadn’t purchased an official Morrissey branded iPhone 4 cover while I’d had the chance continued to ring.

I saw Morrissey accidentally, in Memphis, Tennessee, approximately 6800 km from Manchester. It was a humid southern evening in May, and a chance meeting with a drunken couple outside the concert venue resulted in them giving away free tickets. In their inebriated states they had purchased four seats instead of two, and were apparently unable to find willing buyers. The show wasn’t sold out -demand for ageing, occasionally racist ex-front men being unsurprisingly low in Memphis, home of the blues.

I was eager enough to take them up on the offer. The majority of concert patrons swirling around the foyer of the theatre were oldish and white, and while falling short of the median age by a good two decades I nonetheless felt safe in the knowledge that my teen years had been just as Smiths-coated as anyone else’s. Indeed, I felt comfortable and prepared for what was to come.

The show began promisingly. Instead of being made to wait patiently for the Morrissey roadies, dressed identically in sleek black t-shirts and jeans, to set up the stage, the audience was treated to a pre-show video montage presumably curated by Morrissey on a late night YouTube binge. The montage included music videos by an early 70s Brian Eno, T-Rex, the New York Dolls,

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and Nico, spliced between clips of esoteric 60s British comedy sketches.

It was difficult to know Morrissey’s true intention here – the videos were just as likely to have been his idea of a generous pre-show amusement as they were a patronizing tool to inform and educate his clueless audience about ‘rock music’. The choice to air videos by some of the 20th century’s most revered and influential artists may well have been deferential, but it seemed more likely an earnest attempt

by Morrissey to place himself squarely within the Western musical canon.

Glam rock Eno was worth it, in any case.

Morrissey was apparently determined to entertain, shock and educate from the minute he took to the stage. A rendition of ‘Meat is Murder’ was punctuated by a frenzied Morrissey literally ripping off his own shirt. In doing so, he was able to strategically reveal the surprisingly ripped torso beneath. Meanwhile, a giant projection screen showing graphic videos of animal slaughterhouses dwarfed him and the other musicians. I vividly recall de-feathered, horrifically scrawny chickens being slung about, bleeding everywhere. Live cows on meat hooks, eyes bulging. It was all as deeply unpleasant as it was mesmerizing. The stage strobe lights clicked quickly back and forth, masking the audience variously in darkness and light. The PETA stand in the lobby of the theatre was going to be getting some seriously guilt-ridden post-show patrons.

I was prepared for the vegetarianism, sort of. After all, I had read last year’s Morrissey autobiography cover to cover, only skipping six or seven chapters. Less a life story and more a manifesto, from its first edition Autobiography has been published, amazingly, as a Penguin Classic. It is probably the least ghostwritten biography ever sent to print - every

self-involved, hyperbolic sentence is not only tear-stained but actually soggy with trademark Morrissey emotion. Any minute evasiveness Morrissey occasionally achieves by virtue of his slick baritone gives way in text to pure, unadulterated confession. Much of the biography’s subject matter relates to the singer’s deeply held animal rights convictions.

The show’s encore, eventually teased out by extensive clapping and cheering, brought forth a wrenching rendition of ‘Asleep’, one of only three Smiths songs on the menu.

The night culminated in an acoustic rendition of ‘First of the Gang to Die’, by far the most fun track from 2004’s ‘You are the Quarry.’ By this point, I was really upset that the night was over – it was a kind of Stockholm syndrome thing, where you want to stay with your captor forever as you run your fingers through his quiff and he whispers insecurities into your ear.

There are some questions I can answer definitively. Would I have enjoyed the show more if Morrissey had bypassed his solo career and simply performed ‘Hatful of Hollow’ track by track for an hour? Yes. Would I have had time for a few short Johnny Marr-directed tirades in between songs? Yes, absolutely.

Plus, I think a more subtle approach to animal rights might have persuaded me better against the fried chicken I ingested the next day. But I saw Morrissey live, the handsome devil himself in the flesh, performing with the pained conviction of a high school battle of the bands contestant. Even with the merely cursory knowledge of Morrissey’s extensive solo catalogue that I, and I expect most of the audience, held, it was impossible not to be hypnotized by the man on stage. The more you ignored him, the closer he got.

SOUND / FURY MUSIC REVIEWS Want Wreck and Reference The Flenser Records Wreck and Reference are a metal band, whose sound inflected as it is with soft and rising ambient textures and harsh drones, make as much sense playing alongside doom metal bands as they do with electronic noise acts like Ben Frost. With this album they lean towards the latter style; the band consists largely of drums and a sampling machine and they’ve largely done away with blast beats here. The vocals on the other hand (when they’re not spoken word and they do find a good mix) channel something very dark and raw that sits perfectly alongside the claustrophobic pulsing reverb of tracks like ‘Corpse Museum’. A definite highlight, the visceral urgency of the track stand in contrast with the more cohesive mood of the rest of the album: slow, foreboding, though no less gripping. The atmospherics on these tracks are great, consistently gloomy and disconsolate. Of particular note are the crushing screams, mellow synths and furious hi-hat rhythm of ‘Bankrupt’, the suspenseful static of ‘Stranger, Fill This Hole in Me’ and ‘A Tax’, and the recurring drone of ‘Glass Cage for an Animal’. Lamentably some of these atmospheres are cut short or underdeveloped and they would certainly benefit from longer track lengths and attempts to flesh them out. Most samples on the album are well considered; the indulgent and unnecessary piano samples in ‘Apollo Beneath the Whip’ on the other hand, unfortunately detract focus from the track. Want finds the band edging closer to a sound that’s quite original, and I expect will bear greater fruit in their next releases.

7/10 James Munt

Jungle Jungle XL Recordings Splendour ‘it band’ Jungle’s debut album is an incredibly intriguing one. With their viral video beginnings came speculation over whether the group could carry their undoubtable energy over a full-length record. It’s my pleasure to report that the duo have, for the most part, done so.

The record admirably tightropes the line between dorky and cool; with the retro influences never feeling forced, but rather a natural effect of the members’ clear affliction of 70’s disco and 80’s pop. The best description I can give of the sound this band produces is falsetto driven, electronic soul funk. Think Daft Punk’s ‘Get Lucky’ with less Pharrell and more Prince. ‘Busy Earnin’’ is funkladen and deliciously pompous, ‘Julia’ is a festival ready anthem packing an extremely hooky chorus; whereas current single ‘Time’ sounds like the lovechild of the Bee Gees and Flume conceived whilst on holiday in Kokomo. Tracks such as ‘Drops’ and ‘Lemonade Lake’, both loaded with hollow atmospherics, prove to be highlights; the latter a sombre closing track to a predominantly joyful album.

Whilst the record’s good is fantastic, the highs create a standard that can make other tracks seem weak in comparison.

Early cut ‘Accelerate’ fails to hit the mark; with its repetitive formula long overstaying its short three minute run time. So too does the penultimate offering ‘Lucky I Got What I Want’; by no means a bad song, but merely one that sags unnecessarily.

But let that not cloud what is a very promising debut from one of 2014’s buzz groups. This is a sound you’ll be hearing time and time again.

Neotokyo OST Ed Harison 0edit records (free download) Neotokyo is an obscure Source-mod game released in 2007.

Despite being pretty enjoyable, it never took off in the mainstream, and an unaddressed bug prevented its stellar soundtrack from ever featuring in-game.

Now, with Neotokyo re-released on Steam (again to a lukewarm reception) it felt fitting to give the diamond-in-therough that is it’s soundtrack a review, despite how unlikely a reprint of the CD may be.

The first official release of Sydney producer Ed Harrison, Neotokyo is an instrumental cyberpunk themed double album extravaganza – with the scope and grandeur of the Protomen without the rock-opera underpinnings.

Rather, it’s a dystopian mixing pot of influences stretching as far as the Middle East, South East Asia and Afrobeats. Underpinned by a brooding, downtempo backing, Neotokyo is the perfect compliment to taking depressed, introspective walks through a sprawling metropolis.

As with most soundtracks, pacing and the wider sense of the ‘album’ are not the primary goal here. Despite some glaring changes of pace, there has obviously been work to string thematics into rough chunks, and it manages to create a passable flow. While its sound is less rounded than it could have been and leaves the audiophile a little lacking in the mastering and production side, all is forgiven when those juicy hooks sink in. Ultimately Neotokyo provides as engaging a cyberpunk soundscape as that of Blade Runner or Ghost in the Shell.

7/10

8/10

Jett Broughton

Simon Donnes

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PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A YOUNG MAN: EVALUATING MEIN KAMPF

by Brad Griffin Mein Kampf (German for ‘my struggle’) is one of the most famous and arguably important texts of all time. If you’re not in the loop, it’s the book that Adolf Hitler wrote during his incarceration in the early 1920s. In it, he lays out his basic political ideologies and his justifications behind them. He details his childhood, his experiences living in Vienna, through to the First World War and the founding and consolidation of the National Socialism movement – the Nazi Party.

Being as interested in history as I am, I was naturally drawn to Mein Kampf. I believe that one of the most important elements of the study of history is recognising where we went wrong, and how to avoid such future mistakes. Mein Kampf is a blueprint for exactly that. The word that I think most perfectly sums up Mein Kampf is ‘disputed’. This is true in historians’ opinions on its content, different versions of translations, Hitler’s sincerity, and how much his views changed between then and the crucial foreign policy decisions of post-1936.

However, two of the biggest disputes are its alleged corrupting influence, and whether or not the Second World War could have been avoided if it had been thoroughly read by European politicians.

In response to this first claim, I refer to the preface of the Ford translation, which says that if a person were to read the text and emerge from it an anti-Semite, then there was already something wrong with them. Having read Hitler’s justification for his anti-Semitism, I was slightly mystified. His justification seemed little more than a paranoid rant.

Secondly (and I believe more crucially) exists the question: could a thorough reading of Mein Kampf by European leaders have prevented the Second World War? The answer to this is simple: no.

In Mein Kampf, Hitler clearly states several things which, in hindsight, should have raised red flags. He discusses the

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superiority of the German people, their destiny to settle lands in the east (specifically at the expense of Poland and Russia), his contempt for Marxists and Jews, and his severe distaste for the French. But in the context of the time – in the aftermath of the First World War, and with Europe splitting into Fascist and Socialist blocs – these sorts of views were hardly rare.

German nationalists had been agitating for generations about the need to settle lands in the east, and aggression toward Jews had existed in Europe for over a thousand years. It wasn’t anything new. Add to this Hitler’s own personal charisma and his sweet-talking of leaders all over Europe, who believed

THE WORD THAT I THINK MOST PERFECTLY SUMS UP MEIN KAMPF IS ‘DISPUTED’. his promises of peace. How could Hitler, they asked, a man who himself had spent four years in the bloody trenches of the First World War, possibly want to repeat that? The fact of the matter was that Hitler’s foreign policy techniques during the mid-to-late 1930s were so deft that Britain and France were in no position to act against him anyway, even if they were certain that Mein Kampf was less of a loose ideological ramble, and more a blueprint for European domination.

Mein Kampf was an interesting, but at times frustrating read. The guy sure liked to talk about himself and his feelings a lot. I get it Adolf, you hate the Habsburgs, you hate the Marxists, you hate the Jews, you hate the Social Democrats, you hate this, you hate that.

What do you like? Oh, Germany – but not Germans in general. Some Germans you also hate.

… COULD A THOROUGH READING OF MEIN KAMPF

BY EUROPEAN LEADERS HAVE PREVENTED THE SECOND WORLD WAR? THE ANSWER TO THIS IS SIMPLE: NO. In preparation for reading Mein Kampf, you have to detach. You have to remember that this evil influence is gone from the world, and can never directly do any harm to anyone.

I try to find a little bad in every good, and a little good in every bad. This is why I’m not afraid to admit that I admire Hitler’s conviction. I’m certain that it took a lot of balls to stand up for what he believed in, especially after his failed Beer Hall Putsch in 1923. That kind of conviction is severely lacking in Australian politics. Bu then again Australian politicians also aren’t genocidal maniacs… then again Scott Morrison… but I digress.

BOOK REVIEWS Westerly 59:1 For anyone with even a passing interest in getting to know the best literature coming out of WA, each new edition of Westerly is an eternal must-read.

The short fiction here is as excellent as it is varied; Zdravka Etvimova spins a crushing web about honour killings in the Afghanistani hinterlands, while Graham Kershaw’s static, absentminded tale of a crumbling expat relationship is exactly how you tell a story about shattering without resorting to jabbing readers with the shards. Elsewhere, Robin Mundy gives you a guided tour through the year of Australian fiction, and Rohan Wilson provides an in-depth and warranted analysis of the historical practice and style of Kim Scott, who is somehow both our state’s most gifted and most underappreciated author. The poetry third suffers slightly for a tart staidness, but among the best is Ross Jackson’s meditation on the loss of a matriarch through describing her garden that only reveals itself with the final lines: “but if she was here/she’d have wanted you to know/about the roses outside the curtains.” As ever, now is the best time to discover, absorb and support the immense literary legacy that’s been coursing out of the office on the ground floor of the Arts building for the last six decades. Hunt Westerly down in the library or snap it up at the Co-Op! Best bit: Robert James Berry describing New Zealand as “a risible nation of dairy farmers and child abusers” (renders sheep jokes a bit passé hey) Worst bit: Beth Spencer makes the smuggest salad of all time, and then makes a poem of it. Smug.

9/10 Alex Griffin wants to take Dorothy Hewett to the movies and be back after curfew

Asa Akira - Insatiable, Porn: A Love Story Popular media is increasingly accepting of sex work as a legitimate profession, and riding the accompanying wave of writers bridging the industry and journalism. Asa Akira is one of the more visible figures both in journalism and porn, and she’s been a dominatrix, briefly an escort, porn star and now director, author, podcaster and entrepreneur. Insatiable is an autobiography of her life, primarily that which has been spent in porn and sex work, but connecting into how it has affected other areas of her life; parents, partners and friends. What this book offers, alongside constant jokes, anecdotes and risque haiku is a glimpse into what being in the high end of the porn industry is like.

Without at all discounting the arguments that sex work is a bad thing for women/ society/hypersexualized young adults, which I’ll however not engage with at this time, even if you’re anti-porn, this book might be worth a look into how women inside the business interact with it and find the experience.

Of course, it’s from the perspective of a highly successful and multi-award winning porn star, who also presumably wants to present the happy, funny, if harmless misadventure prone side of the industry - so it must be considered as only one perspective, but it is a highly enjoyable and stimulating one.

Worst bit: When Asa thought she had torn her anus and was bleeding during a scene.

Best bit: When it turned out to be beetroot juice.

William Dixon is considering alternate career prospects

My Salinger Year My Salinger Year is a memoir of Joanna Rakoff’s year working at a publishing agency in New York City in the late 1990s. Having dumped her respectable, well-liked collage boyfriend Joanna also drops out of graduate school and begins her so called ‘Salinger Year.’ She gets her first job at a publishing agency which seems to be closed to all technology advancements post the 1960s. The most notorious client is J.D Salinger, best known for writing the acclaimed The Catcher in the Rye, and Joanna is under strict instructions to respect the privacy of the reclusive writer.

The memoir addresses key quarter-lifecrisis issues: the just above poverty line salaries of a first job, the absence of a clear direction and the bludgeoning face of responsibility. Joanna clearly enjoys the vibrant, cultural epicenter that is Williamsburg, Brooklyn, accompanied by a mature new socialist boyfriend.

Nevertheless she finds herself burdened with student debt and in conflict with the inevitable responsibilities that come with maturity.

My Salinger Year is a funny, poignant memoir which almost hits too close to home. Although I am not an aspiring young writer, I found myself candidly comparing Joanna to my many writer friends, who also enjoy living the bohemian lifestyle but struggle with the unsavory realities of an artist’s paycheck. This memoir is a pleasant reminder that even award winning, published writers also have to undertake low level jobs.

Best bit: Realizing maybe all the hard yards volunteering at the Afghani exhibition at Perth Museum will pay off.

Worst bit: Not being well-read enough to understand all the references to authors and poets.

3.5/5 Dinuka Muhandiramge is drinking a culpa

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INSIDE LOOK: UNIVERSITY DRAMATIC SOCIETY

by Samuel J. Cox

I spend most weeks of semester avoiding assignments, chewing down on Adderall and losing control of my life.

As Chris Pyne understands, life can be tough as a student; however attending the UWA University Dramatic Society’s performances allows me to avoid facing my struggles (and paying my SSAF) and live vigorously through thespian drama.

I spoke with current President Ben Thomas (BT) and Immediate Past President Ben McAllister (BM) about the club that puts on four shows every year at UWA. Having joined UDS in 2011 and 2012 respectively, McAllister and Thomas have seized the opportunities the club affords to experience acting, directing, producing and writing.

Previously collaborating at Christ Church Grammar School’s Midnite Youth Theatre Company, they are now the co-authors of new play Kate, Don’t Scream.

Though unfinished, the play is destined for the Dolphin Theatre stage this September and October, and the quality of their first co-writing experiment, 2013’s Tav comedy The Heist, bodes well for this piece. A 1930s murder mystery, it is “set in a hotel outside London, and follows the events of a conference run by two high profile business magnates. When a murder takes place, and an encroaching snow storm stops the authorities from arriving, the guests in the hotel are forced to figure things out for themselves.” Clearly heavily influenced

by Agatha Christie’s classic whodunit The Mousetrap, McAllister (who will direct) claims the period drama “isn’t super doom and gloom,” continuing that while the second semester content is typically dramatic, the pair wanted to remove that reputation.

Like Hollywood actress Lucy Liu, UDS has gotten better with age. Since it’s

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inception in 1917, there has been trend towards the performance of original student work. McAllister explains, “UDS used to perform established works, like Shakespeare, but now we try and prioritise unique pieces, providing a platform for students to have their vision performed on stage.”

BT: As long as there are still members keen to contribute original material we will support them, as there aren’t many opportunities for the young and inexperienced to do that, especially if they don’t have the necessary networks.

BM: Every President wants to leave the club in a better position at the end of the year than at the start. As a university club, the dramatic society has a high turnover rate, every three to four years. Therefore the attraction and retention of new talent is a priority.

However, our main focus is making a profit. Not for ourselves, but so that the society can continue putting on shows.

BT: We want every show to be bigger and better than the last, and we want to afford people the opportunity as writers or actors or technical experts to do what they love.

BM: We don’t receive funding from anyone, bar a small membership grant from the Guild that doesn’t go very far when spent on theatre and equipment hire. The money we have is just what we sell off tickets.

We need a financial buffer because it gives us security if a show goes over budget.

Thomas’ role includes liaising with University Theatres (the

administrative body overseeing UWA theatres) to book theatre space for performances, and the university currently subsidies the use of its venues by half.

BT: We feel the university is not doing enough to cultivate and nurture the artistic talents of its students. We run on a shoestring, and usually half our budget is spent on hiring the venue, even at the discounted rate! Every semester we endeavour new ways to try and keep things as cheap as possible, but the expenses keep going up and up. University Theatres help us as much as they can, but even that isn’t enough. Those at the very top are putting us under immense pressure.

We deserve more recognition and financial assistance from the university for what we do, especially when the actions of so many other groups garner UWA a negative reputation.

BM: We’re probably one of the only university theatre troupes in the world that doesn’t get free run of the university’s theatres. We contribute to cultivating a positive image of UWA, and putting on original student work is something positive for the UWA community. UDS has been running for 97 years now (in a 102 year old

university), and no one wants to see it go under, especially when there’s nothing similar available.

Without befriending Anna Kendrick (<3), joining this amateur theatre collective is likely to be the closest you’ll ever get to your dream of living out Pitch Perfect, and they welcome members from all faculties. If you’ve got a burning idea or dream of becoming the next Hollywood star, the UDS common room is located in the Cameron Hall loft (behind/above the Tav).

The $5 membership fee gives you voting rights at the General Meetings, where the program for the following semester is democratically determined.

Here, the writers’ seeking to have their play or musical performed deliver a seven-minute pitch (whether their script is completed or in the development stage), with the support of the other members attached to the project. Auditions ‘aren’t rigorous’, and while not everyone who tries out will get a role, there are a number of other ways to get involved: backstage work, lighting and sound design, and stage management. Indeed, Thomas professes that his initial involvement

was offstage, as he endured a series of unsuccessful acting auditions. “I heard someone say once that theatre is the greatest team sport. People have to come together to make something greater than the sum of its parts. Each moment is a combination of so many factors uniting together: the sound, the lighting, set changes, the acting! If you have the desire and the drive, you can give it all a go.”

Thomas and McAllister emphasise the mentorship experienced members offer to new recruits, labelling theatre “a skill learnt over time, so we make an investment in people”. They single out last year’s Fresher Reps Rosie Schultz and Matt Perrett as those being developed into the future leaders of the club. Co-writing this semester’s Tav comedy, Schultz and Perrett’s play Sticks and Stones “is a Western parody about a family called the Stones, set in Outback Australia”. With the more elaborate semester one musical and semester two Dolphin Drama typically quite expensive, McAllister emphasizes the importance of their Tav shows, “[they] cost virtually nothing to put on…the tavern is cheap [and] we keep sets and costumes to a minimum. It’s often a money-maker, and it helps us

garner that financial buffer we spoke of before.”

BM: The power of theatre over other mediums of expression is its immediacy. No performance will ever be exactly the same, and people who weren’t there that night will never enjoy the same experience. It might be similar, but people will stand in a different way, speak differently, and play to the audience reaction differently. It’s more personal, whereas a film is constant and unchanging.

BT: There’s nothing quite like UDS. You’ll be pleasantly surprised at the level of professionalism, and high production value, for an amateur theatre group. Even with each show enjoying a budget of around $8000 $9000, tickets are still inexpensive and the shows entertaining. I challenge you to find something of this quality, at this price, anywhere else.

Kate, Don’t Scream runs September 24, 25, 26, 27, and October 2, 3, 4 at UWA’s Dolphin Theatre.

Sticks and Stones runs October 13, 14, 15, 16, 17 at the UWA Tavern.

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ART REVIEWS Spanning two and a half hours (with an interval), it is driven by the powerful acting of James Beck (as lead character Charlie Bucktin) and Shaka Cook (as the titular figure). Their on-stage chemistry is transfixing, and they offer a convincing portrayal of characters at least 10 years younger than themselves.

JASPER JONES BARKING GECKO THEATRE COMPANY

By Samuel J. Cox Adapted for the stage by award-winning WA playwright and actor Kate Mulvany, Jasper Jones is based upon a book of the same name by BGTC ambassador and WA author Craig Silvey. Labelled as Australia’s answer to To Kill A Mockingbird, the play awkwardly oscillates between mature themes and immature, slapstick comedy.

DUST BLACK SWAN STATE THEATRE COMPANY

By Dan Werndly The visually stunning Dust played at the Heath Ledger Theatre at the State Theatre Centre, the home of the Black Swan Theatre Company. Dust is a fine piece of Australiana theatre and although running at a lengthy 120 minutes, was not overbearing. Set in Perth, it follows multiple characters during a near apocalyptic dust storm that consumes the entire city.

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Hosted at the State Theatre Centre’s Studio Underground, the sinister coming of age tale is a whodunit led by Charlie Bucktin, a wide-eyed, imaginative fifteenyear-old in the rural WA town Corrigan in 1965. His life is upturned when the notorious half-cast Jasper Jones (reminiscent of a rage-fuelled Nicholas Cage) draws him to the scene of a death, late one summer night. The play tersely builds up and boils over in the second act, delivering a heart wrenching, confronting climax.

BGTC’s Artistic Director, and spirit animal, John Sheedy expertly directs the cast of six, but it is the work of Set and Costume

The driving force in the play was the interaction between the groups of characters, who were usually paired off or in a trio and stayed with their counterpart for the entire show. The staging for each individual interaction was reasonably well done, there was only one moment where the stage seemed cluttered with action during a scene change and the scenography itself was very intuitive. Most of the minimalistic set pieces were multi-purpose as well, for example some steps became a bed, a table and a beach in different scenes. The oppressing red colour, present throughout the entire play as the dust was used really well, in the sense that different tones of red were used to enhance the different emotions in each scene. The uncertain chronology also played into a sense of reformation as in one particular scene a FIFO worker is talking to another character about the problems he has with his wife, it is then revealed that these events took place over nine years ago.

This serves to create a feeling of great myth occurring around all the events on stage.

Designer Michael Scott-Mitchell that is truly inspired. His minimalist stage paints a vivid picture, using only a multipurpose mound of blue sand, a bedroom, and a sprawling, one-dimensional tree lit by UV lighting.

They play, set against the backdrop of the Vietnam War, offers up an intense experience with a raw look at racism, alcoholism, adultery, multiculturalism, and sexual assault of a minor. As a company that prides itself on theatre for young people, BGTC took a risk in engaging with this novel. It tries to provide a tender, child-appropriate look at decidedly adult themes, but ultimately misses the mark and must be accompanied by a massive language warning. While many children might not be strangers to the content portrayed, if they have the misfortune to experience it in their lives, they deserve to enjoy escapism, rather than realism, in their entertainment. The result isn’t family friendly, and, if I had kids, I would have serious reservations about them seeing it.

If you’ve seen any Black Swan productions you’ll recognise their style, an uneasy interplay between presentational and representational drama with a few ‘wow’ moments chucked in. The problem with this is that because it isn’t wholly representational the characters are entirely realistic all the time, which can create some distance as an audience member, but because it isn’t presentational either it struggles to express more abstract ideas.

This is what I have more of a problem with, as Black Swan is simply not pushing any boundaries, and aren’t shaking up their routine. If you saw their production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream you would’ve been mesmerised by their use of the newly installed curtains, however a few years on the same techniques do not have the same appeal that they once had. Dust was a good play; it was interesting and discussed some interesting issues. However it’s failure lies in its inability to expand on the Black Swan or the Perth theatre scene in general.

Do you have a passion for print and online media? Do you want to make a positive impact on campus?

Then you should apply to edit Pelican Magazine! Pelican editors are appointed by the Guild and tasked with putting out eight editions over the course of the academic year. Candidates must have been Guild members for the last two years (or as long as they’ve been at UWA) and not have run in Guild Elections over the same period of time. Pelican can be edited solo or as a duo; if applying as the later, you’ll need to demonstrate how you’ll divide up the workload and handle differences.

An application should demonstrate: • A strong vision for the design, content, and feel of the magazine • Ways to attract new contributors and keep existing contributors motivated and inspired • How different viewpoints would be sought and represented • Ideas on how to get students to pick up and read Pelican, and how to encourage involvement with the magazine • A vision for how you will create a final product that best reflects the talent of UWA • Time management and deadline planning • Creative flair and a desire to innovate • Experience in writing, editing, co-ordinating and art direction Important things to consider when applying: • How will you get students to pick up, enjoy, relate to, and get involved with the magazine?

• How you can ensure Pelican actively represents, showcases, and develops the talents of the UWA student body?

• How will you uphold the tradition of Pelican, dating back to 1929?

• How will you maintain a politically unbiased approach to issues on and off campus?

• How will you create an intelligent, positive magazine that demonstrates the best of what UWA can be?

Your application must consist of: • A CV including references - due Friday 31st October 12pm • A physical portfolio outlining in detail your vision for the magazine for 2015, as well as physical design mock-ups - due Friday 7th November, 12pm How to submit: CV: e-Mail to creative@guild.uwa.edu.au Portfolio: submit to Alex Pond and/or Kate Hoolahan in the Design, Marketing & Events Office, located in the South Wing of the Guild (the Guild Student Centre can provided directions if needed).

If you have any questions about the position or would like more information, please contact creative@guild.uwa. edu.au or stop by Design, Marketing & Events Office.

GOURMET BURGERS I’ll admit, I was wrong. I truly believed the gourmet burger joint would have jumped the shark by now. It seems we still can’t get enough of our $18 wagyu beef patties, Panini buns, and surly wait staff. The gourmet burger joint only grows stronger, expanding and diversifying, and getting away with charging exorbitant prices for fries. But don’t be fooled, Pelican readers: not all burgers are created equal. You’ve got a crisp fifty-dollar note and a craving for some meat and cheese; what do?

Let us help.

Grill’d Grill’d is, in many ways, the quintessential gourmet burger joint. They seem to have covered all bases: extensive menu, way trendy promo material, that charity bottle cap game, and not a single staff member over the age of thirty. You’ll never be confronted with an ugly person at a Grill’d. The blonde with the strong jaw and dimples behind the counter sustained eye contact and laughed when I cracked an unfunny joke about PayPass. Swoon.

Best bit: The herb mix they put on the chips.

A sensory experience I imagine is akin only to doing meth.

Worst bit: Novelty red bandanas.

Degrees of separation: A friend of a friend was once turned down for a job because he wasn’t ‘Mt Lawley’ enough. Ew. Order: The ‘Mustard and Pickle’. A controversial choice, but the right one.

Jus Burgers Good Perth boy-cum-burger giant Justin Bell started Jus Burgers in 2008, pushing the ‘Buy West Eat Best’ slogan and using predominantly local produce. A jus burger is messy but very, very satisfying, and available from locations across the city. Jus take this kitsch hipster interior thing to the extreme, we’re talking astroturf on the roof, but it’s worth it.

Best bit: Free chips when you flash your UWA Guild sticker!

Worst bit: Alfresco style dining means about a 90% chance there’s a pigeon in the kitchen at any given time.

Degrees of separation: Not one but two friends under current employ of the Jus Empire.

Order: The salted caramel milkshake (disclaimer: comes in a mason jar).

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Flipside Don’t be fooled by the hyper-trendy minimalism of Flipside’s interior: these burgers are generous and delicious. Though guilty of peddling the typical red/black/grey gourmet burger joint uniform, Flipside burgers are probably slightly more homely than those of its competitors. This point is drilled home by the, admittedly charming, children’s drawings that take pride of place on the walls. I’d feel quite cozy if it weren’t for the stark quasiScandinavian interiors. Give me a chair with a back any day.

Best bit: You can get your burger sent to the adjacent bars, including Mechanics Institute in Northbridge. A burger and a gin please and thank you.

Worst bit: The music at Mechanics.

Degrees of separation: Employs one friend; one Pelican staff member.

Order: ‘The Kenny Burger’ (vegetarian!)

The Burger Bistro I am always slightly too intimidated to enter The Burger Bistro. Where other burger joints are small and nooky, The BB is big and airy.

Its seats are plush and black, and the lights are dimmed to ‘moody’. They’re one of only a few burger joints not trying to pull off some faux-Americana/Urban Outfitters sales rack aesthetic, and I respect that. But it leans too close to being An Actual Restaurant, and I’m scared away when the yuppies come out to play. In the handful of times I’ve been, the burgers have been exxy, but delicious.

Best bit: Leederville restaurant’s proximity to the Luna.

Worst bit: ‘No carbs’ section of the menu

offers option to replace your burger bun with a salad (read: you don’t make friends with).

Degrees of separation: My mum’s probably got a friend who likes it.

Order: If you dare.

Novembar’s Drove to the middle of nowhere (Dianella) to be greeted by a “Cash Only” sign at the door and no ATM in sight.

Best bit: Went to Jus instead.

Worst bit: For $1000, you can get the ‘Hello’ burger: 101 beef patties, 2 T-Bone steaks, plus eggs, bacon, salad and about a million litres of sauce. As long as you’ve got it in cash, though.

Degrees of separation: I wandered through Yokine drunk once.

Order: I might one day.

Alfred’s Kitchen It seems wrong to lump Alfred’s in this mix.

There’s nothing gourmet about this beloved, historic canteen in the heart of Guildford.

The hallowed benches around the bonfire welcome you, and the thick smoke renews you. Nothing says “I’m home” like the guttural scream of “THIRTY SIX… THIRTY SIX… PHONE ORDER FOR SHARON” while children play and parents drink Jack Daniels out of paper bags. When I’m on death row, make my last meal an Alfred’s: my spiritual home.

Best bit: The woman behind the counter with the hair and the nails. You know the one.

Worst bit: Cravings between visits.

Degrees of separation: Got called a regular the last time I was there.

Order: Stick to the original hamburger and chips: don’t mess with perfection.

Picture by Grace McKie

by Lucy Ballantyne

THE SIMS I’m not sure when my love affair with The Sims started, I just know that I was young, reckless and in over my head.

This was a game that I could come out on top without having to compete with my three older brothers, no longer did I have to have my head blown off in Golden Eye or continually crash into the wall in Mario Kart. I was in charge of something important, and by god, I was going to do a good job of it. It was a life I had never dreamed of.

Unlike other strategic life-simulation games I played at the time like Habbo Hotel, Neopets, and Runescape, I didn’t have to dial up the Internet.

And I could cheat. Cheating to a kid is something exotic and exciting, and as a type A personality, it was a drug. In the fifth grade I lived permanently in fear of getting my face on the sad face board and was already writing ten page responses to simple English questions.

Yet at home I could pull out that rosebud or motherload cheat code and feel like I was stealing from a bank. Life never felt so good. What I realised now is that I loved the control of it all, I could make people ‘happy’, even if the people I was making happy were AI controlled humanoids who held no relevance in the real world. I was God and I had power.

In the real world I was a ten-year-old girl who constantly felt overshadowed; my oldest brother was graduating high school as Head Boy and Dux, I had just won a colouring in competition. Every achievement felt like nothing and the only thing I had to compensate for this with was a game.

My Sims had the best houses and the best lives. I enabled cheat codes to increase their skills and satisfy their many needs and motives. I made them do exactly what I wanted them to do and invested heavily in their lives. When The Sims 2 came out I spent hours making the perfect families and watched babies grow into toddlers and children. The teenagers felt like I did, moody and

misunderstood, yet still able to carry on with their lives and engage in other school sports and friendships. Yet at times I felt like I engaged with the game more than I did with others, with time quickly slipping away whenever I logged in. But I feared missing out on what was happening in my Sims lives.

I felt like my Sims needed me in a way that I needed them. Unlike the times when strangers on Habbo Hotel asked me to be their girlfriend or I transferred 10 000 Neopoints to my sixth grade crush, I felt needed in a way that wasn’t motivated by appearances or greed.

Manipulation was now a weapon that I wielded, but only for the powers of good (and so my Sims were 100% perfect). I navigated my way through the game and created overarching storylines and mourned the death of every Sim. For many people gaming is a social activity, which can involve collaborative play in faceto-face or online groups.

Indeed the Sims Website forum boards were full of people talking about what was happening in their Sim world and the latest material they had created. I remained merely a lurker on these boards; I didn’t want to share my experiences because they were unique to me.

The interactive aspect of the game means that every player can have a different experience of the game.

Ultimately this experience remains the same with the relationship between computer and person remaining consistent. I played God but so did you.

My relationship with The Sims ended in the ninth grade. It happened for all the usual reasons: the game would constantly crash my laptop and we grew apart.

Like any breakup cheat, The

Sims flirted with the other girls in the boarding house and I would discover multiple new families upon logging in. I was no longer the only girl in the world and I wasn’t up for sharing my love.

Our experiences together felt cheap when I realised I wasn’t as important as I thought I was and that The Sims could live on without me. Perhaps this seems melodramatic or childish, but The Sims meant something to me at a time when I was sorting myself out. The ability to know what is about to happen and will happen gave me the power to be more confident and outgoing in my actual life and feel like I had a voice. Maybe one day I will return to The Sims and fall madly in love again, or maybe not, but it sure would be nice to lock a Sim in a room with no doors during exam time.

Picture by Holly Jian

by Lauren Wiszniewski

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CULTURE REVIEWS SEX CRIMINALS: ONE WEIRD TRICK BY MATT FRACTION AND CHIP ZDARSKY (COMIC) Review by Kevin Chiat Over the past six months, one of my favourite conversation starters has been explaining the premise of my new favourite comic, Sex Criminals.

“So it’s about this girl named Suzie who stops time whenever she cums and she meets this guy called Jon, and he also stops time when he cums. And they fuck and the whole stopping time thing becomes a beautiful metaphor for emotional intimacy.

Then they start robbing banks.”

Created by the team of Matt Fraction (who between this and Marvel’s superlative Hawkeye series is writing the two best ongoings in comics) and artist Chip Zdarsky (who detailed his Facebook friendship

CANDIDLY NICOLE (TV REVIEW)

by Mason Rothwell and Lucy Ballantyne Nicole Richie has my respect. She has my respect on such a deep and unusual level. A woman who is reputedly one of the first celebrities to become ‘famous for being famous’, Richie has successfully reinvented her image as a clueless socialite to cultivate one as a deeply sarcastic (but never alienating) fashion icon. Her new ‘reality’ show, Candidly Nicole, reflects much of Richie’s image in its premise. Having its beginnings as an online series and obviously scripted, the show toes a new line in television. The very fact that it’s called Candidly Nicole is an ironic and self-aware joke: this is carefully crafted TV. It’s a distillation of reality television into its purest form – the arguments, the detachment from reality, the eccentricity. One episode is like a Real Housewives Best Of special (sadly lacking star housewife, Gina Liano).

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with his local Applebees restaurant on Tumblr), Sex Criminals is the very funny and occasionally bittersweet sex comedy comics has always needed.

A strength of the series is how well realised the characters of our time-stopping couple are. Both Suzie and Jon feel like real people, helped along by the comic’s use of the characters speaking directly to the reader technique. This fourth wall breaking can often come off as cliché in other works, but here it is effective in demonstrating the pair’s vulnerabilities.

The comic never feels exploitative. There’s a scene with time-frozen ejaculate, but the characters and sex scenes never feel like hollow masturbation fodder.

My favourite sequence is the impromptu musical number set to (kind of, it’s a legal thing) Fat Bottomed Girls. It’s the best example of how exciting Sex Criminals can

The first episode sees Richie dating for a friend online and quickly getting wrapped up in the fictitious relationship.

Whilst having drinks with her friends, Richie becomes increasingly unhinged and clearly begins to feel that the relationship between her friend (who she has been impersonating) and this stranger is real and her own.

Upon receiving no reply for fifteen minutes, Richie quickly begins sending threatening messages - “where’s the gun emoji?” - Richie’s deadpan delivery and dry humour make the show riotously funny. She never strays too far from the centre as to be unlikable – less Kardashian, more the crazy fun friend who always gets you into trouble. She makes you want to hang out, probably shopping for vintage dresses, or something.

Candidly Nicole is driven by Richie’s ‘cool’ factor, achieved largely due to her impeccable style. As you would expect

be. Fraction and Zdarsky just show no fear in dismantling expectations, and taking the comic wherever they want it to go.

Sex Criminals is a comic that can oscillate between making up ridiculous sex positions (my favourite: E.T. The Sex Move) and just being completely emotionally devastating.

Which is really what all art should aspire to do.

Zdarksy’s artwork does an excellent job of conveying the characters’ emotions and his use of colour is evocative. He does a lot of smart things with panel transitions and page layout. What’s going on in there is pretty technically complex as an example of comics craft, but the actual storytelling is very clearly expressed to the reader.

And above all: Sex Criminals is really fucking funny.

in a show with each scene as carefully crafted as in this one, Richie’s wardrobe is so consistently chic it’s sickening. In one establishing shot, she stands on the side of a road waiting for her lift in a white blouse and black trousers with a suit jacket slung over her shoulders, clinging to her phone and Givenchy bag. In those ten seconds, she looked better than any one of us could ever hope to. In typical Candidly fashion, Richie makes self-reflexive jokes about her style, making reference to planning her “wardrobe stories”, and ending each episode with the tagline “it’s going to be very stylish”. If this is the future of reality television, it looks pretty damn good.

THE MELBOURNE JD

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My progress I am currently in the second year of the JD. The highlights so far have been the method and quality of teaching, the range of extracurricular activities as well as the range and quality of guest and public lectures.

Student Profile: Talweez Kaur Senghera From the Western Australian Parliament...

I have been interested in law since high school and I began an undergraduate degree in law in Perth but had to leave it due to personal reasons. My desire to return to the study of law came in 2012, once I began working for the Parliament of Western Australia as a Committee Clerk. This gave me first hand exposure to the law and how it impacts every aspect of our lives. It also really made me interested in the area of public law so I decided to take the plunge and apply for the Melbourne JD. As for career path, I am keeping an open mind at this stage because there are a lot of opportunities in firms, government and beyond. My interest in public law remains, however, I have developed a keen interest in Intellectual Property as well.

The seminar style classes are a more interactive approach to studying law and as a result are really effective. The level of preparation required for these classes is a lot higher than one could get away with in an undergraduate course and this has made me get more out of the classes. The quality of the teaching staff has been great as well, and having a good lecturer really makes all the difference to whether a subject is enjoyable or not.

Academically, I have enjoyed most of my subjects so far however I have particularly enjoyed Principles of Public Law, Administrative Law, Cyberlaw and Law of Commercial Reputation and Brands. You really never know what will pique your interest, and having come into law the second time around with an open mind, I don’t think there is a subject I haven’t enjoyed on some level.

Beyond the classroom The range of extra-curricular activities on offer means that there is something for everyone. I have been involved in the Melbourne University Law Review, one of Australia’s leading law journals, since my first semester at Melbourne and have thoroughly enjoyed it.

Mooting and other competitions are big at Melbourne Law School but if these do not interest you, there are so many other ways to get involved. The Law Students Society, the Global Law Students Society, the Melbourne Chinese Law Students Society and the two journals: Melbourne Journal of International Law and Melbourne University Law Review are just some of the options.

Would I recommend the Melbourne JD? If you are interested in the Melbourne JD, I would definitely suggest you contact Yvonne Au, Manager, Student Recruitment, Melbourne JD to discuss the program in more detail (Telephone: (03) 8344 8879 or email y.au@unimelb.edu.au). Beyond an amazing course and teaching staff, the Law School also has a range of support services for students. It also has careers consultants for law students so that you have knowledgeable people to speak to about your career options.

On the academic side, there is a dedicated staff member to assist students with legal writing and academic skills. Finally, there are great course advisers who will be able to support you through the degree.

On a final note, I would like to add that the people you meet here, and the students studying with you will come from diverse backgrounds and that makes for a great university experience. For many, this will be a career change and the insight they can offer is valuable in itself. You will be making global connections for life.

Experiences that mean the world The Melbourne JD Law degree www.law.unimelb.edu.au/jd Australia’s first, Australia’s global.

Picture by Holly Jian

WHERE’S PELLY

FRINGE FESTIVAL

WEEK 6, SEMESTER 2. SEPTEMBER 1 - 5

路 E S TA B L I S H E D 1 9 1 3 路

P U B L I C A F FA I R S CO U N C I L

higher.

Aim Attend the UWA Postgrad and Honours Expo on Wednesday 24 September, 4pm – 7pm.

Postgraduate study is fast becoming the defining factor in successful careers. When you undertake a postgrad degree at The University of Western Australia, you’ll be studying alongside other like-minded, passionate peers and making relevant industry connections all over the globe.

At UWA, we pride ourselves on arming the future leaders of the global community with the skills and knowledge needed to be the best in their field. We have over 130 postgrad courses available, all designed to meet the specific needs of industry.

If you want to make your mark on the world, start now with a postgraduate degree from the State’s only World Top 100 university.

For details of all the free Expo information sessions and to register, visit uwa.edu.au/postgradexpo CRICOS Provider Code 00126G BRAND UWAM0185