a year ago today: publicity for the bogan delusion

Tomorrow is, I think, the absolute last publicity commitment. Strangely, it was almost the first one undertaken - I was booked for this months ago. I'm going to be on a show on 3CR.

Today however I got a call out of the blue from a journalist on the Dandenong Leader, who interviewed me for a long time about Doveton, which I write about quite extensively in the book. We talked for ages, then we got cut off somehow, then we talked for ages again later in the day. It was fine.

too hot for the age

(This is an op ed piece I submitted to The Age on spec earlier in the week. They didn't respond, which is their prerogative of course. They responded three days later with a rejection email, which is their prerogative of course.)

Over the last few weeks, I have been having a public stoush with a man called Peter Olney. Olney, who is the secretary of the Whitehorse Ratepayer’s Association, believes that Asian businesses in his area – and I suppose by extension everywhere in Australia – should have English signage explaining what it is they sell.

The mayor of Whitehorse has described Olney’s idea as crazy. If I had to choose one word to use, I might pick that one. But perhaps another word – futile? – might be handy for an idea whose inventor is ‘not really interested’ in whether he gets ‘much support’ – or so he told the Melbourne Weekly Eastern a few weeks ago. Which begs the question that if he’s apathetic about the follow through, why raise it in the first place?

But the Olney concept is more complicated than that. When I had the pleasure of being interviewed for A Current Affair about Olney’s concept, I was told in advance the four questions I’d be asked. When the camera was on, a fifth emerged: ‘Is Peter Olney racist?’

I doubt he is, and said so, but of course the Olney protest is the touch paper for racists. Racists are by definition people unable to see a complex view of society. Such folk are not smart enough to have even crazy ideas of their own – but quick to support anything that supports their own narrow, nasty world view. Many of the online comments on both the MWE and ACA websites were along the lines of English being the ‘official language’ of Australia and how political correctness had gone too far. Political correctness – such as it is – is actually not that interested in how shopkeepers advertise their wares, but let that pass. In an argument about clarity, let’s call racism by its real name: racism that bases its argument on the unlikely possibility of the mainstream being discriminated against by the minority is, similarly, still racism.

The bigger issue, though, is what passes as normal and comprehensible. Clearly, if Peter Olney doesn’t know what’s being sold in any shop in Whitehorse, he can go inside and ask – though he seems like a smart chap and it’s probably pretty obvious before he goes that far. However, I wonder if Olney has thought about the other ramifications of his request?

It has never really bothered me if a shop does not have signs in English. But it has bothered me, from time to time, when it is not clear what outlets are actually providing. The boutiques of Chapel and Brunswick Streets, to give a for instance, are often labeled only by a solitary word. Hairdressers have long run out of names using puns on the word ‘hair’. Cafes and restaurants might easily drop off the descriptor in their signage; why bother? Their clientele knows. Peter Olney might not always be able to pick out which shop sells what on Lygon Street Carlton – or, for that matter, in Whitehorse Plaza – even amongst the ‘anglo’ retailers. I haven’t heard him complain about this, however, and I wonder where he feels truth in signage should stop?

Because, when it comes down to it, what Olney is objecting to – even within the proviso that he’s not really interested if his objection has any effect - is that not everyone knows what’s being sold in particular outlets. Which leads me to a very obvious, but still very pertinent, example of the same: McDonald’s.

We’ve had McDonald’s in Australia for close to forty years now, and most of us know what we’re in for when we enter its doors. If you didn’t know, you could go in and assess the situation pretty fast. But that hardly fits the Olney objection: McDonald’s do not label their premises ‘McDonalds Cheapish Fast Food With a High Sugar and Fat Content’, and indeed they’ve been spending a motza in recent years to try and pretend that’s not what they’re pushing.

Indeed, over time, McDonald’s have been moving to uberminimalism in labeling and signage: the big yellow M, the golden arches, is their beacon on the hill. Fine if you know what it means, as Peter Olney might say, but very discriminatory if you don’t. Last I heard, McDonald’s, English was the official language of Australia; the hieroglyph of those big curvy golden arches doesn’t mean anything in that official language. By the way, who is McDonald? Oh, that’s right, there is no McDonald – it’s a name purchased by the Czech-derived Ray Kroc to market a product to Americans in the 1960s. But we can leave truth in possessive apostrophes for later.

This is not political correctness gone mad, as much as Olney’s supporters might suggest. In fact, it’s exactly what they want: one rule for everyone. I demand to know, via external signage, what is sold in a McDonald’s outlet; what KFC stands for; if the Rooster really is Red. We’ll then move on to things like ‘Bunnings Warehouse’, which I gather is not so much a warehousing operation as a large supermarket for hardware items; and a little business concern called Coles which I have on good authority does have even one cole, whatever that might be, in stock. Fix these up and then – and only then – we can get started on the little traders, selling to an exclusive clientele, who know what’s being sold within by big signs. Yes, they may be in a language other than English. But they are, at least, in a language. 

ho hum the media is tedia

Not really, I'm loving it. Back in 2012 once again, don't be confused by these 'a year ago' posts. I have been in the media a fair bit in the last week, via the University's media unit, I assume because the people who are normally asked for comment are out of town or otherwise sensibly away from their desks. But I am enjoying it. It is, as you can well imagine, also always very interesting to see who watched commercial television news/current affairs - not the people you'd imagine (but they do always say 'I honestly never watch A Current Affair but I saw you...'). I mean I believe them. These things happen for a reason.

So, I was on ACA last week (more about that topic later today or tomorrow) and two newses on Monday. The Monday was about Robert Doyle's pronouncement on the front of the Age about city eyesores that megarich developers were sitting on for the time being. I met the news crews at the Savoy Inn in Spencer St and answered a few questions from my professional standpoint. The weirdest thing about doing this is that you talk to them for 5 mins with the very clear knowledge that they will probably use a sentence, at most. I don't object to that per se, but my mind is always running in the background 'is that the bit they'll use?' of course I can't know because I don't know what other people have said.

Anyway, I was at the Savoy a few minutes early and had a look around it. I was surprised to discover that this building, which is a pub from I guess the early to mid-70s which has been empty since the mid-1990s, is actually a platform over a car park. I'd love to see inside it again.

a year ago today: publicity for the bogan delusion

People at work keep coming up to me and talking about bogans. I have no idea who some of them are.

There was an opinion piece in the Age this morning critiquing pop-culture opinion programs. It singled out Can of Worms for equating the putative existence of bogans with that of God, I wonder if this came from the title of my book, but I didn't see the program so I'm not sure.

a year ago today: publicity for the bogan delusion

Publicity is tapering off, I assume, even if television is catching on. On Saturday I did the MTR interview as mentioned, then yesterday I did the final capital city ABC of all - Hobart. It was a good half hour, and very enjoyable, so I didn't mind too much basically devoting my Tuesday evening to the whole thing. The interviewer had gone round her office (I think?) asking random (?) people what a bogan was and once again my point was proven - everybody gave different viewpoints. And ultimately the only commonality was a mullet, and I said I am quite often in Tasmania ('because I love it' - I thought that was a nice touch and also true) and I have never seen anyone with a mullet. Then I went off on a strange little tangent, even as a voice in my head was saying not to, talking about how in 20 years maybe when we're all celebrating the fabulous days of the bogans everyone will have mullet wigs.

Television is catching on because apparently my book was mentioned on The Circle on Monday morning prepping the world for discussion of 'is "bogan" a slur' on the new show Can of Worms which was premiering that night. The actual COW didn't mention my book at all, though, I'm told. I don't care but Martin Hughes was pretty cross I gather.

No doubt I've said this before but I'm ready to move on, really. I have two more interviews - both public radio - Perth and Melbourne. Then that's it.

it just goes on

So as you can see for the last few weeks I have let my younger self from June-July 2011 run the show, he has been doing an OK job. In the meantime my present self has been getting on with work related things, went to Canberra to do some research (I know, we've covered that, to some degree) and have been trying to get some long-overdue writing done. I've been listening a lot to the Soft Machine era when they drafted Phil Howard in to replace Robert Wyatt. I am intrigued by Phil Howard (1) because his playing was (perhaps still is, though no-one knows where he is or what he does) incredible and challenging, and (2) because he was Australian apparently but he does not appear to have done anything in Australia before he left - he must have done something but what?! and (3) because as implied earlier, he disappeared about 40 years ago. 'Moved to New York', they say. So, I'm just fascinated. (1) is the only really important part of it and without (1) I wouldn't have too much interest in (2) or (3) but it is fascinating when people just slip away like that. He was in Soft Machine for 5 months and he was too free form for 2 of the 4 members at that time. They'd just thrown Robert Wyatt out, who was the heart and soul of the thing, and now they had to contend with another drummer who was looking like he might well end up taking them into a whole new territory, and they had enough trouble marking out the territory they had. He recorded one side of Soft Machine 5. I still think SM went downhill badly when they stopped RW singing, but this PH stuff is really fascinating, especially when he gets out the two kick drums.

Did I mention Garry Disher? I've been reading a lot of Garry Disher, who I really enjoy as well. When 'I say a lot of Garry Disher', poor Garry he seems to have written a huge amount of books and I'm only reading the thrillers. But they are pretty great - I have a feeling I'd be reading them even if there weren't the killings and the crimes. Particularly the Challis-Destry ones because of the atmosphere of the Mornington Peninsula. But I like the Wyatt ones too.

Last night I had a dream I had a birthday and almost everyone there was older than me and wore white bowling uniforms. Anyway, back to the golden olden days of 2011... there are three more posts coming up re: the publicity campaign of last year. I edited some of this stuff into a final chapter for the e-Book version of the book, which I still haven't seen incidentally but I gather it exists. 

a year ago today: publicity for the bogan delusion

I was most gratified by a good review in the Spectator. Even if it was short, and my pleasure a little problematised by the fact that the reviewer compared my book favourably to Owen Jones’ Chavs book which I didn’t necessarily need to happen (at the same time, I did kind of note that Jones somewhere, somehow is attributed with comparing himself to Orwell, which seems a bit Icarusy to me). Jones and Imogen Tyler, who I discussed (i.e. ‘used’) a little bit in my book were on Laurie Taylor’s Thinking Allowed on Radio 4 last week. I’d sent Taylor a copy of my book a few weeks ago, with the hint-hint that I’d be in London in September, and Jones is aware of my book, so I was hoping they’d mention it but nope.

My grandmother Marion would have loved me getting a review in the Spectator, favourable or otherwise, because she read it every week. Though she would for all that have probably not agreed with my book (I’m not sure; it’s hard to imagine her responding to 2011, particularly as she more or less disengaged from daily events in the final years of her life, so I’m used to memories of her not caring about what was going on outside her four walls).

I am writing this en route to my third (I think) commercial radio interview, at MTR (Melbourne Talk Radio – I’d never heard of it – used to be 3MP, which I listened to a lot when I was 11 or 12). It’s Glenn Ridge’s show, I’m only vaguely aware of who he is, too, which would only make sense to me via who he was – a tv game show host or something similar? That’s what I told Mia anyway, now I’m starting to doubt it.

Late: so I went to do the Ridge show, and it was fine – the guys on the show were pretty slick, and I was fairly scattered in my responses, but I imagine that’s OK – the important thing probably is not to seem smug or pompous. The whole thing had a cloud over it though, because there were police all over the station because someone had died in the building overnight, probably a suicide. When I got there the producer mentioned all the cops and I said, what’s that about and she said you don’t want to know, but then later when I was in the control room a panel operator came in and talked all about it, occasionally casting glances at me. The person who died had motor neurone disease, he was 60 and apparently there had been some kind of party the previous week after which he had called to thank everyone who had come, and there was a theory that he’d been saying goodbye to everyone. He’d done his show that morning and then he had died somewhere on the premises. I thought the staff I was talking to there were a bit in shock but they were coping.

So I did the Ridge show and it was fun. Unlike Fidler, they hadn’t read the book and I should be regarding that more as an opportunity (the difference is, I suppose, if the interviewer has read the book they become your collaborator in presenting your ideas to the audience; if they don’t know anything about it, you have to scrub away at their unknowingness). Not that I blame anyone for not having read it, I couldn’t give a loose root.