Someone decides it is insulting to call people whose intellectual development has been retarded ‘retarded.’ So we are told to call them ‘intellectually handicapped.’

Soon ‘intellectually handicapped’ becomes a form of insult. So we are told to call them ’slow learners.’

A couple of years later, every time you want  to insult your mates you say ‘Looking like a slow learner there Joe!’

So that term naturally becomes unacceptable, and anyone who has ever used it is obviously insensitive and uncaring.

Let’s call them ’special children’ instead. Let’s have ’special schools’ for ’special children.’

Scene in schoolyard: ‘You’re a special child!’ ‘I am not. I’m telling.’

There is no getting around reality.

So when you are no longer supposed to call homosexuals homosexuals because that might be insulting, and instead you are supposed to call them ‘gay,’ what is going to happen to that word?

Any school teacher can tell you that the worst possible insult in the playground is beng called gay. You can say someone is lame, you can insult his mother, or her father. But but if one child calls another child gay, be prepared for trouble.

Whether being gay really is gay, I don’t know. Most homosexuals of my acquaintance don’t demonstrate a a high level of satisfaction with their lives, so I suspect it might be.

But they really are gay, the ones who objected to principal Garry Martin’s replacing the word ‘gay’ in the Kookaburra song with the word ‘fun.’

Firstly, when the song was written ‘gay’ pretty much meant fun. Remember The Gay Divorcee? OK, there aren’t many of them either. Or the Gay Nineties? Not the recent nineties, the ones before?

No? Well, you know what I mean.

Before the word gay, a good word, was hijacked, it meant happy, light-hearted, fun.

Now it just means gay.

Marion Sinclair meant that a kookaburra’s life was carefree, fun. So Principal Garry was being true to the original text. And Kookaburra, fun to sing though it is, is not Shakespeare.

Secondly, this was about children singing. Children singing. Children, at school, singing together.

The word gay is an extreme insult in the playground. So naturally the kids were rolling around the floor laughing when asked to sing about a gay kookaburra.

So why not do the sensible thing and replace the word ‘gay’ with the word ‘fun?’

Garry describes what he was thinking:

“I wasn’t trying to incite or insult gay people, or trying to violate the copyright of Larrikin Music; it was just a decision at the time that I thought would minimise a disruptive atmosphere with grades one and and two.”

But after a controversy in which it has been suggested he is trying to make gay people invisible:

In an interview on the Nine Network, Mr Martin was backtracking on his decision, saying that perhaps he should have discussed the true meaning of the word with the children.

So Garry now thinks he would have been doing the right thing if he discussed homosexuality with year ones and twos?

Well, that’s what the brownshorts wanted.

No, Garry no. You were right the first time.

Given that Sarah is an attractive, powerful, intelligent woman who is successful in her own right and has challenged and beaten corrupt men and corporations?

And that she doesn’t believe, for example:

• Women are inferior to men.
• Women should have fewer rights and responsibilities than Larry the Cable Guy.
• Women count for one-half of a dude in giving evidence in a court of law.
• Women should be horse whipped if they ever make their husband feel like a dork.
• Victoria’s Secret Miraculous Bra (with extreme level 5 cleavage) makes God angry.
• Women can’t say squat in regard to whom they’ll marry, what they’ll wear, where they’ll live, or whether or not they can divorce their cheating and/or abusive husband.
• Girls can be wed beginning at the ripe old age of frickin’ nine.
• Women should be cool with hubby having a couple of hoochies or female slaves on the side.
• Women, on the pretext of “honor,” should be locked up, isolated and unable to have a girls’ night out at Mango’s on Ocean Drive.

While radical islamists do believe those things, and are earnest about putting them into practice, to the point of killing people who disagree.

It’s a mystery.

As if you needed another one, reason number 126,475 never to go into an Anglican church again.

Gay vicar, 65, to ‘marry’ Nigerian male model half his age.

According to the article, they met and fell in love at a Christian conference in Togo.

And don’t they look lovely together:

Gay vicar to marry male model

Really, for f&#%’s sake.

Today, marriages crumble, families are torn, society flounders. Why? We are not living in the truth. We accept a bad definition of marriage, acquiesce to almost any sexual arrangement, glorify the quest for sexual pleasure, treat children as a means to fulfill our desires. Overwhelmingly, research shows that rearing children in any other environment than with both their natural parents is damaging. Sometimes that damage is unavoidable, as when a parent dies, but we shouldn’t seek it. And it certainly won’t help to say the impossible is real.

We need the truth. We need to fix the legs. Calling a tail a leg only makes matters worse.

 A couple of quotes from A Marriage Tail, by Stephen J Heaney.

Wendy is a Queensland senate candidate for the Family First Party.

She, or someone on her staff, tweeted that allowing the adoption of children by homosexual couples was equivalent to legalising child abuse.

She was not suggesting that children brought up in such relationships are more likely to suffer violence, neglect or sexual abuse.

Such an argument could be made, and perhaps should be considered, given the relative instability of homosexual relationships, the high rates of domestic violence, and the disproportionate amount of child sexual abuse committed by male homosexuals. But that is not what she was saying.

What she was saying is that research suggests that children do best when raised in a stable family headed by a male and a female. There are obviously times when that is not possible, when parents must do their best alone.

But for the state to put children into situations which are known to be less than optimal is not responsible. In matters of adoption, the children’s needs come first. Children are not fashion accessories, and having children is not a right.

The Courier-Mail reported that Wendy had ‘apologised unreservedly’ for the comment.

No she didn’t. She said she would have put the matter differently, and apologised if anyone was upset over the language used. But she continues to insist that allowing homosexual partners to adopt children is to make those children guinea pigs in an extraordinary social experiment that cannot be justified.

It is possible to argue that sufficient evidence exists now to be able to claim that children raised by homosexual couples show the same sexual, intellectual and physical development as other children. That is not that case - the research purportedly demonstrating this does not meet basic standards in terms of sample sizes, statistical analysis or reporting, and in almost every case was conducted by gay advocates.

Catholic Education’s Review Of Research On Homosexual Parenting, Adoption, And Foster Parenting is worth reading for some solid background on this issue, and comparison of outcomes for children raised by homosexual couples with children raised by male/female married parent families and other family types.

And the other apology? That was the absurd apology by Channel Nine CEO David Gyngell for Mark Latham’s questioning of PM Julia Gillard.

The PM was never in any danger (except of being embarrassed). Political journalists used to believe it was part of their job to ambush politicians with difficult questions.

So what the heck has happened to our media organisations when the CEO of a major TV network feels the need to apologise over a perfectly reasonable (if irrelevant to most voters) question?

Shaznaz Bibi, Muslim Woman

An isolated incident? There are more photos in an article called Terrorism that’s Personal.

Since 1994, a Pakistani activist who founded the Progressive Women’s Association to help such women “has documented 7,800 cases of women who were deliberately burned, scalded or subjected to acid attacks, just in the Islamabad area. In only 2 percent of those cases was anyone convicted.”

The article makes the point that terrorism is not a distant political movement. It is real murder, mutilation, and horror for millions of men and women.

Today also brought news of a couple stoned to death in Afghanistan.

It is all very well to say that these events are not representative of Islam, which is a religion of peace, yada yada yada.

But religions are a reflection of those who founded them. Jesus was gentle, forgiving, truthful, giving, respectful in all his relationships.

Mohammed was a serial murderer and rapist, a torturer who had sex with a nine year old girl when he was fifty-four.

These comments from a Muslim website are typical of the veneration given to him by Muslims:

… we look to divine guidance in order to define for us good manners and character, exemplified by the Prophet, as God said:

“Surely, you (O Muhammad) are upon a high standard of moral character.” (Quran 68:4)

God also said:

“Indeed in the Messenger of God you have a beautiful example of conduct to follow…” (Quran 33:21)

Aisha, the wife of the noble Prophet, was asked about his character.  She replied:

“His character was that of the Quran.” (Saheeh Muslim, Abu Dawud)

The Koran authorises violence against women, Mohammed exemplified violence against women, including the rape of women captured in war.

So how is disfigurement, rape and murder contrary to the ‘real teaching of Islam?’

If the Quran and the example of Mohammed are not the real teaching of Islam, what is?

And if this violence is wrong, a defaming of Islam, where are the protests and outrage from real Muslims at this misrepresentation of Islam, on a scale anything like the vengeful wrath expressed over the cartoons of Mohammed a few years ago?

At least, that’s the impression you might get from this article in the Sydney Morning Herald.

Some of the comments quoted really are obnoxious. Only one of them is actually attributed to Christensen. The rest were in a magazine he edited.

All date from 1998, when he was a university student.

Sorry, when? 1998. Twelve years ago. Christensen was a teenager at the time.

There are a few things to note here. Firstly this was twelve years ago. Christensen was a teenager.

Secondly, some of the opinons expressed by Christensen as a teenager are simply sensible.

Is it really extreme, anti-gay, or anti-women to suggest there is something wrong with using tax-payer funds to pay for a sex change operation for a bloke who thinks he’d like to be a lesbian?

Thirdly, this was twelve years ago, and Christensen was a teenager at the time.

Fourthly, even the most extreme views expressed in the magazine edited by Christensen are no match for the personal attacks, obscenity and sheer nastiness exhibited on an ongoing basis by such left-wing luminaries as Marieke Hardy and Catherine Deveny, without so much as a disapproving murmur from the mainstream media.

Finally, if what you thought at university can safely be held to be what you think now, we are really in trouble with Ms Gillard, who is therefore still a ‘revolutionary leftist’ (her own words), committed to undermining capitalist society.

I feel much more confident that Christensen does not now hold the juvenile views he did twelve years ago than that Ms Gillard does not hold the radical views she did.

Christensen has acknowledged that some of what he said was inappropriate. He says those remarks were made in jest, or to generate discussion. They are not representative of his views now. And he has apologised unreservedly. 

Julia is still to tell the truth about the extent of her involvement in communist groups.

I know who I’d trust first.

I didn’t want to, but the current edition hasn’t yet made it to the doctors’ surgery, or to the library.

Julia Gillard is made to look very attractive.

There has been a bit of photo-shopping. In the photos, this makes her look younger and softer. In the text, it makes her look more caring and trustworthy.

I asked a random sample of female friends what they thought of the article, and of Julia.

One answered that she was lovely, and it would be great for Australia to have a female Prime Minister, just like it is wonderful that America has a black President.

This respondent is obviously a complete dimwit.

I didn’t point out that Australia already has a female Prime Minister, or that voting for someone on the basis of race is, well, racism. And besides, that’s worked out just peachy for all concerned, hasn’t it?

My two other friends said the fact that Julia is a backstabbing schemer who may have broken up a marriage, isn’t able to solve any of the problems currently facing the government, and seems willing to promise anything with taxpayers’ money to stay in power, is more important to them than that she is a woman.

They weren’t impressed with her domestic arrangements either. How is her consort going to be introduced? Please welcome Mr Tim Mathieson, the guy who’s currently shagging the Prime Minister?

It may sound snobby, but most Australians won’t sit comfortably with the idea of the Prime Minister shacking up at the Lodge with her hairdresser boyfriend.

Is this fair? Should politicians’ personal lives be up for discussion?

Well, yes.

It is important that our leaders be intelligent, energetic, capable. Julia is all of those things. So was Kevin Rudd. So was Mussolini.

Those things alone don’t make good leaders.

People also want to know that the Prime Minister is stable, truthful, compassionate, willing to honour commitments.

If a politician is willing to deceive friends, betray colleagues, lie to partners, make promises he can’t keep, why should voters have confidence he will keep his promises to them?

If the Women’s Weekly really thinks that faithfulness, integrity, stability, and kindness are less important to its readers than having nice hair and a vagina, it has seriously underestimated the intelligence of Australian women.

It has been interesting to read the outraged remarks that followed his answer.

The question was  ”What advice would you give your three daughters about sex before marriage?”

The answer was ”I would say to my daughters, if they were to ask me this question … it is the greatest gift you can give someone, the ultimate gift of giving and don’t give it to someone lightly.”

It all seems perfectly reasonable to me.

The question was “What would say to your daughters…”

Not “What advice would you like to give to Australian women?”

The answer was prefaced with “… if they were to ask me this question… “

It was not even gratuitous advice to his daughters.

Yet Julia Gillard immediately jumps in to tell the world that ”Australian women want to make their own choices, and they don’t want to be lectured to by Mr Abbott.”

Senator George Brandis quite rightly and respectfully points out that “Julia Gillard who is – has chosen not to be a parent – and, you know, everybody respects her right, in the vehemence of her reaction in fact shows that she just doesn’t understand the way parents think about their children when they reach a particular age.”

But judging from the further outrage occasioned by Senator Brandis’ comments, it is clear the left wing believes Mr Abbott and his personal choices and beliefs are fair game, but Ms Gillard’s are not.

Even more absurdly, leading nitwit, sorry ‘leading feminist,’ Eva Cox says that by encouraging young people to value themselves and their sexuality, and to wait until marriage Abbott “is commodifying women, by saying their sexuality was something to trade.”

Of course, Mr Rudd’s attendance at a New York strip club, where he was reportedly told off for attempting to touch the girls, but was so drunk he claimed he couldn’t remember anything, is an example of non-commodifying respect for women, where trading in sexuality is the last thing on anyone’s mind. Obviously he was only there to get the ladies’ opinions on climate policy.

Then there are the bullhorn bellows of ‘hypocrite’ from the ‘I’ll do what I want when I want and don’t anyone dare tell me I can’t’ crowd.

Is Mr Abbott a hypocrite?

Only in the same way that a bank robber who told a young person tempted to a quick solution ‘That wasn’t the right thing to do. It wasn’t good for me or the people I loved. If I had my time again I would make a different choice,’ could be called a hypocrite.

And here’s the heart of the matter: Tony Abbott is right.

Giving yourself to someone wholeheartedly, completely, emotionally and physically, is something wonderful and precious.

Complete physical giving of oneself only makes sense, can only be really complete and wonderful and joyful, as it is meant to be, when there is also an unreserved commitment of life, love and time.

In other words, in marriage.

You can be a party girl or boy, and have sex with anyone you fancy, because it’s your choice, and everyone else is doing it, and there’s no harm in it, and no one can tell you what to do. Or you can have a deeply fulfilling, faithful, life-time commitment to one person.

You cannot have both.

With increasing age, it becomes clearer that the path of lifetime loving commitment is the one that brings real happiness and trust and fulfillment. That is wisdom that comes from thought and experience, often painful and regretful.

So when parents ask their children to be careful, to treat themselves and their bodies as something precious, and to wait for the love and commitment of marriage, it is not because they want to spoil their children’s fun, nor because they are hypocrites.

It is simply because they care.

Wherever it was, the consensus amongst the blokes was that our poofters were indeed better than their poofters. There was even a touch of pride in some of the accomplishments, say, of Sir Robert Helpmann and Peter Allen.

So in that same spirit, I would like to wish Mr Byron Adu, Australia’s regional winner, all the very best of luck as he represents us in the Worldwide Mr Gay competition in Oslo in a few weeks’ time.

When I was at Flinders University in the early 80s I spent most of my time in the Philosophy Department. It was a Marxist department.

Being a unique individual who was able to think for myself, I thought exactly what I was told, and became a Sandinista supporting, land rights demanding, tree hugging member of the Socialist Workers’ Party – the only political party of which I have ever been a member.

I enrolled in Women’s Studies (and I was dutifully grateful for the opportunity to do so – not every university allowed men to participate).

I only lasted a couple of months. Not because I found it challenging – I had already read Greer and Friedan, and knew that men, especially white men, were the scum of the earth, rapists and pillagers who had never done anything good - but because even as an obedient little left-wing clone, I found it mind bogglingly dumb.

Mary Daly was a leader in the mind-bogglingly dumb, Elvis has left the building version of feminism. Germaine Greer was strikingly obvious, but not competely nuts, so I had no trouble with her.

Ten years later doing post-graduate studies at the University of Queensland, we were still being invited to draw from the deep well of Dalyan drivel.

Here are a couple of samples of drivel from an article on the Millenium Project:

It is also of obvious significance that other lethal purifying medicine is working to ensure an even earlier extinction of women. Now that the model of female moral purity has been converted into pure sexual availability, the Purifiers have produced The Pill. This is known to increase risks of …[long list of claims] … Premenopausal Pill-popping thus prepares the way for premature death, the ultimate purification.

(The writer of the article notes: One of the feminists loons that I was forced to associate with told me that using only female subjects in clinical trials of contraceptive pills was an example of how the patriarchy treated women as disposable, worthless objects. My questions about the usefulness of including men in trials designed to test the disruption of embryo attachment to the endometrium were brushed aside as examples of patriarchal ignorance.)

Dreadful, Deadless Women are the ones who have never stopped trying and who have continued to Hope. Our Hope is vigorous and active, and it is sustained and continually inspired by the Outrageous Courage of our Sisters/Foresisters who are ever more intensely Present to us, beckoning and Daring us to move further into The Fifth Spiral Galaxy. They are Calling us to continue our work of Metapatriarchal Metamorphosis Here and Now. This will require a New/Archaic Awakening.

It is never right to rejoice in the death of another, and I don’t rejoice in Mary Daly’s. I am sorry that so much of her life was wasted in pointless resentment and silliness.

I hope now that she knows the truth, she is able to find peace, and accept the certainty of being loved and valued by the Father God she so vehemently rejected on Earth.

Quite right. The child was a person, and its death is a tragic loss.

But what makes this child a person, and another child at the same stage of development an object which is inconvenient, and which can be destroyed and disposed of?

There is no difference in the child – just in the parents’ attitude to it.

Is that all it takes to make one a person, and one not?

I’m with Horton – a person’s a person, no matter how small.