Bill Dowsley October 19, 2013 at 9:11 am
That was some of your most beautiful writing, Bob. Too, it showed the man you are, Bill.
SWF tragic October 19, 2013 at 3:54 pm
Did Rees deliver it as is?
Glow Worm October 19, 2013 at 4:20 pm
Beautifully put, Bob.
I knew someone who knew an arsonist many years ago, a young man who enjoyed, in the middle of the night, setting fire to schools. When I asked my friend why he did these things, his answer was simple: he hated schools.
At the root of it, is it a hatred of their environment? I wonder if they just see endless bush, and feel no affinity whatsoever with their land, trees, animals, scrubland. Disconnected. There’s a psychopathy involved, and we must, I agree, try and find a way to reach these people. Punishment is not enough.
Doug Quixote October 19, 2013 at 4:56 pm
Some people just like lighting fires. Perhaps a psychopathy is involved. Most of them (at least those halfway sane) are appalled by the eventual results of their firelighting.
Interestingly, a lot of them join volunteer firefighting groups; they are attracted to fires, and who gets closer to fires than firefighters?
Of course I do not want to denigrate those wonderful people who give of their time and labour to help fight fires, but some of them are inevitably borderline pyromaniacs, just as some scoutmasters, some priests, some teachers are paedophiles.
We are complex creatures.
Helvi October 19, 2013 at 8:01 pm
Nothing to do with hating anything, just some young louts , bored and dumb; in America they shoot by-passing joggers, here they start bushfires.
Glow Worm October 19, 2013 at 8:37 pm
Helvi, I’m not sure it’s just about boredom. Idle louts break windows and pinch ciggies from the shop, or steal cars. There’s more in play – a destructive malevolence.
Anyone with half a brain would know what the consequences of lighting a fire on a hot, windy day would be – these boys/men have other motives.
gerard oosterman October 19, 2013 at 8:10 pm
More likely the progeny of zinc alum suburbia. Bored shitless. Miles of sameness, dreariness beyond belief. What to do? Get drunk or sneak away and start a fire, anything for relief.
gerard oosterman October 19, 2013 at 7:51 pm
And now this, on top of everything else. Terrorists are fiddling with Dick Cheney’s heart.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-10-19/cheney-reveals-defibrillator-altered-to-thwart-terrorists/5033354
Rome is burning
Doug Quixote October 19, 2013 at 9:24 pm
Damn – all that work wasted.
gerard oosterman October 19, 2013 at 10:11 pm
It took hours but doctors finally found Cheney’s heart. It was made of granite with traces of lead, hatred, and copious malice in the left ventricle.
chris hunter October 19, 2013 at 8:55 pm
According to DQ, Jsa is sulking about our lack of support re climate change. Well, here is a small piece piece I wrote in 2000 and I offer it as evidence regarding my long term hopes, a return to a healthier, less polluted planet:
Death’s fragment is our inheritance
bashed through time
from bard to preacher,
seldom does our raga of hate weaken
in this snivelling watered down version
of living
we take on board as something precious,
Defend with armies; fighting since
the first erected cross
stained the last bleeding hill.
I wonder and I wonder
as the stars must wonder why they
gravel the universe in such prolific
design,
or the crab wonders as his wounded meat
smarts
too polluted to eat;
he can only scuttle and remain infertile
in less cluttered company.
It’s not hard to slip into despair,
forget the reason why we are here
and substitute our own ideas;
intricate laws
too intricate to maintain, they are changed
and changed
but who do they really protect,
and what has been protected?
The one-winged bird cannot perfect its flight,
nor the half-tailed fish its style,
as we perfect ours while wrecking the ball
slack jawed when the big mushroom spores
Be aware of that thief in the night.
gerard oosterman October 19, 2013 at 9:01 pm
Well done Chris. A poet hiding in the long grass.
Name:
a different sort of bushfire…
The Miranda by-election result was a 27 per cent swing to Labor - the largest swing ever recorded at a New South Wales by-election.
It was grossly at odds with state opinion polls that showed the Coalition maintaining a massive lead over Labor and Mr O’Farrell, well ahead of Mr Robertson as preferred premier.
well, well, another poll telling lies before an election and getting burned by the truth.
Not quite…
Polls in this seat had revealed a big swing was on … and a Labor win.
The polling was hard for the pollies and the press to believe, so most of them were cautious - “we might not know the result for days” etc.
Well this time we knew the result by 8.00pm!
And O’Barrell hasn’t done all that badly. With such a volatile electorate Labor could be back State and Federal within 3 years; if only they can get their house in order.
Is this the time to question the sense in closing down Fire Stations in NSW by O’Farrell?