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Resistance Thinking Culture
Culture is a term used to describe why humans act the way they do. The study of culture attempts to explain why certain behaviours have special significance for some humans, where as for others it is completely meaningless. Culture encompasses everything from watching television and surfing the web, to doing yoga and having pre-arranged marriages.
All of the human behaviours that make up a particular culture are founded on a certain set of ideas. For instance, Islamic women wear a hijab for modesty because of teahcings in the Hadith and many Christians wear a cross around their neck in rememberance of Christ. These are human behaviours that are founded on a very clear set of ideas. Ideas are expressed in human behaviours that make up a certain culture.
In this culture section you will find articles, news and reviews on an extrememly diverse range of topics that relate to culture: the media - TV, news, magazines, movies etc., other religions - Islam, Judaism, New Age, Buddhism, Hinduism etc., philosophy - postmodernism, existentialism, humanism, consumerism etc., popular culture, music, Christian culture - music, moviews etc., and a whole lot more!
Please browse through the articles below
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Wednesday, 07 November 2007 21:29 |
John Roskam of the Institute of Public Affairs pens this insightful piece on the reality and inefficiency of foreign aid. In the wake of the opinion piece bombardment of The Age by Tim Costello and Hugh Evans pleading with Australians to vote for a party that will increase Australia's commitment to foreign aid (read 'vote ALP'), this article is particularly relevant. This is a must read. Then debate the issue on the forum.
Development is not a dirty word
The Age, John Roskam, November 7, 2007
The Christian churches have lost sight of the facts as they try to remain a force in society. NO ONE has a mortgage on morality. But you could be mistaken for thinking otherwise if you've been following the argument over the past few days about whether we should increase the foreign aid budget.
A range of Christian organisations have endorsed Labor's proposal that Australia raise our foreign aid to 0.5 per cent of gross domestic product by 2015, in line with the targets of the Make Poverty History campaign. So far the Coalition has committed to lifting foreign aid spending only to 0.35 per cent of GDP. Unfortunately it seems that this debate has less to do with poverty, and more to do with the struggle of various Christian churches to remain relevant. If this was really a debate about poverty, we'd be talking about what works, not what makes us feel good. |
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Read more... [Development is not a dirty word]
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Tuesday, 20 November 2007 22:10 |
Ageing rocker Bob Geldof falls behind other preaching celebrities who are happy to tell others how to live, but not so happy to adjust their own extravagent lifestyles. As usual, the message is light on facts, big on emotion and assumes that throwing money at a problem will make it go away. His criticism does not take into account Australian private giving, nor does it address the problem of corrupt governments receiving this foreign aid. See our posting of the exceptional article 'Development is not a dirty word' for a more considered perspective on this issue.
Bob Geldof brands us as mean boomtown rats
Herald Sun, November 20, 2007
OUTSPOKEN Irish rocker Bob Geldof says Australia's foreign aid is "embarrassingly pathetic" and one of the stingiest on the planet. The former Boomtown Rats singer and Make Poverty History campaigner, in Brisbane to accept his new role as honorary ambassador for the city, described Australia's foreign aid commitment as tragic in the face of its booming economy.
Labor has pledged to boost foreign aid to 0.5 per cent of Gross Domestic Product by 2015-16, up from 0.35 in 2010-11. |
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Read more... [Bob Geldof brands us as mean boomtown rats]
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Thursday, 01 November 2007 01:55 |
An article exposing incidences of teacher activism in schools and universities.
Failing Grades
Front Page Magazine, Alan W. Dowd, October 11, 2007
Once upon a time, schools emphasized the “three Rs”—reading, ‘riting and ‘rithmetic. But recently a “fourth R” seems to have entered the schoolhouse—radicalism. And teachers are increasingly the source of the radical ideas being peddled in America’s schools.
“When you go into a class where you’re supposed to learn about government or geography,” as high-school junior Sean Allen puts it, “you expect to learn what the truth is.” But as Sean learned in 2006, some teachers don’t teach the truth.
When Sean signed up for “Accelerated World Geography” at Overland High School in suburban Denver, he probably didn’t expect diatribes against the United States, capitalism or President George W. Bush. Nor did he expect to be thrust into the middle of a national debate over the limits of academic freedom. But that’s exactly what happened.
“Sean had told me the teacher was pretty radical,” his father, Jeff Allen, recalls. |
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Read more... [Failing Grades]
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Tuesday, 20 November 2007 19:31 |
Recycling message getting through as Victorians improve their waste practices putting us among the best recyclers in the world!
Victorians get better at recycling
The Age, Chris Evans, November 19, 2007
An extra 705,000 tonnes of kerbside waste was recycled in 2005-06, or 13% more than the 6.13 million tonnes collected by municipal councils the previous year, the State Government reported yesterday. This was material that was otherwise destined to be dumped in landfills.
But the Towards Zero Waste progress report, released by Environment Minister Gavin Jennings and based on the State Government's 2005 Towards Zero Waste strategy, also showed that on average only 40% of all kerbside waste collected statewide was recycled in 2005-06. |
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Read more... [Victorians get better at recycling]
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Wednesday, 24 October 2007 20:50 |
Andrew Bolt casts some perspective on the raging worm debate questioning its accuracy and pointing out the facts in the decision to cut the live feed to Channel 9.
When the TV worm turned
Herald Sun, Andrew Bolt, October 24, 2007
SINCE you're all talking about the worm, let me say something about Ray Martin, too. I saw him on TV, damning the Howard regime for - he claimed with thundered brow - cutting Channel 9's controversial coverage of Sunday's election debate, forcing Martin and his team to pinch their feed from other stations.
"So much for free speech in Australia", he jeered. Attention, Ray. The issue at stake is not that of the right to speak, but of the right to a fair hearing. A hearing free for just a few minutes from Nine's spin - and yours.
Nine's disgraceful and, in my opinion, deceitful behaviour this past week also raises other issues.
Here's one: How honest is this Left-lurching station, and how trustworthy its most famous face?
Here's another: How much of the bad reviews John Howard got for his performance in this vital debate were manipulated by the media?
The immediate issue that has Martin on his soapbox is this: Howard agreed to debate Labor's Kevin Rudd on Sunday, with the coverage provided to all media by Canberra's National Press Club with one proviso.
As the journalist-run club told the TV stations: "Clean feed of the debate to be available to all media outlets on condition live broadcast is not 'wormed' or otherwise changed . . ."
Why? Because the Liberals wanted viewers to be free to watch Howard (and Rudd) debate and draw their own conclusions, without some TV station first trying a stunt to manipulate opinions.
Leave the worm and other ratings tricks until after the live debate was over.
So the deal was clear, I'd say, to any honest man. Take the broadcast and you've accepted the conditions. Sky News and the ABC were as good as their word. Channel Nine was not.
Didn't sign anything, it's claiming now. Ha ha. Fooled you.
In defiance of the conditions set by the press club, the station had a market research company handpick 90 "uncommitted" voters to give instant reactions through a handset to each syllable of the debate as it happened.
And off the worm went during Sunday's debate, with these "uncommitted" voters - under Martin's eye - rating Rudd through the roof and Howard through the floor.
So obviously was this worm of the species eisenia foetida - one of Red Worms so common here - that, at its most farcical moment, it gave Rudd a high rating just for drawing breath before he'd even begun to answer a question.
I kid you not.
Rudd hadn't yet uttered a syllable and the creature was standing on its tail, cheering.
By the end of the debate the worm couldn't have been happier with Rudd if it had spent the 90 minutes in his compost bin. It gave the debate to the Labor leader by 65 per cent to 29.
That was some margin. Compare it with the verdict of the Nine viewers who rang in with their own take.
Of the 48,000 callers, 52 per cent gave the debate to Howard, despite all the worm's work. Viewers of the worm-coverage on Sky News also gave first prize to Howard.
So, why did the "uncommitted" worm react so differently and turn so strongly against the Prime Minister?
True enough, Howard, now carrying more baggage than ever through Customs, was at times too grim, and his final questions to a smiling Rudd were like half-trackers to Ponting: Tell me, Mr Rudd, what will you do to help the battlers?
It's also true that for half the debate the Canberra journalists on the panel steered him on to topics of raging interest for Howard haters - reconciliation, global warming and Iraq - and well away from more practical concerns, such as hospitals, water and jobs for the next generation.
No wonder he found it a trudge.
Even so, did Howard really perform so very much worse than glib Rudd, who remained in that debate a man more of slogans than substance?
Continue reading at herald sun |
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Thursday, 15 November 2007 23:39 |
A new book urges single women to 'put the sin back into singlehood' as a way of dealing with the epidemic of 'singleness' as a greater number of women are remaining unmarried.
Don't worry, be naughty
Herald Sun, November 05, 2007
UNLUCKY in love? Say goodbye to Ms Victim and hello to Ms Vixen. A new book aims to put the sin back into singlehood and celebrate the life of those who are footloose and fancy free. The Naughty Girls Guide to Life is written by British "it" girl Tara Palmer-Tomkinson, who is the infamous god-daughter of Prince Charles.
Sick of moping around the house after yet another break-up, Palmer-Tomkinson and her co-author Sharon Marshall decided it was much better to be naughty than nice. The book comes as most Australians now spend their 20s - and a good bit of their 30s - unmarried. |
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Read more... [Don't worry, be naughty]
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