Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Catherine Speck, Emerita Professor, Art History and Curatorship, University of Adelaide

Review: Pure Form, Art Gallery of South Australia.

Japanese art post the second world war is infinitely fascinating. At a time when the country was under Allied occupation and Japan had paid a high price for the war in the Pacific to end, its artists were revelling in new found freedom.

Some of the most interesting work of this era was from avant-garde ceramicists. Their revolution in clay led to them abandoning the Mingei tradition of Japanese folk craft which included making functional vessels such as tea bowls.

In its place, they redefined themselves as artists, placed a premium on individual expression and, as modernists with a Japanese inflection, began producing abstract sculptural ceramics.

Three generations of artists now work in this style, and their stunning work stretching from the late 1940s to 2021 is the subject of the Art Gallery of South Australia’s exhibition Pure Form. The title underscores the shift in ceramics from function to form.

Read more:
Kintsugi and the art of ceramic maintenance

A delicate and refined aesthetic

In a time of often unnamed craftsmen producing humble ceramic objects for everyday use integral to the Mingei tradition, five Kyoto-based ceramicists were abreast of international trends in avant-garde modernism. They formed a group called Sōdeisha, meaning “crawling through the mud association” in 1948.

There was initially a gradual shift to pure form, as seen in Yamada Hikaru’s Glazed jar with sgraffito (scratched decoration) (1951-52). Its shape still alludes to a functional vessel while its sgraffito linework – a decorative technique of incising into pale slip to reveal the clay beneath – is steeped in Korean ceramics.

Other works in the exhibition reference surrealism, such as Square vase on pedestal foot (1950-60) by Sōdeisha member Suzuki Osamu. There are vases devoid of openings, elongated forms negating function, or, as with second-generation Sōdeisha artist Hayashi Hideyuki’s Walk (c. 1980), a minimal geometric form referencing the human body.

A delicate and refined aesthetic underpins the work on show, such as that of Matsutani Fumio, a third-generation artist whose ceramics balance innovation with tradition, as in his Yellow (Ou) (2021). This is a flamboyant extension of the architecture of the tea bowl, replete with beautiful line work.

In terms of drama, Moriyama Kanjiro’s metallic glazed Kai (Turn) (2020) takes the honours for simulating movement. Its tower-like form is constructed from individual pieces assembled and fired to make a stunning swirling sculpture.

Women’s ceramic art and the broader diaspora

One of the many strengths of this exhibition is its focus on women of the calibre of Tsuboi Asuka, who was instrumental in establishing the Women’s Association of Ceramic Art in Kyoto in 1957.

Women’s rights came to the fore during the occupation, along with suffrage, and women ceramicists gained visibility.

Tsuboi’s three panel work Untitled (c. 2005) delicately inserts Japanese textile patterns in clay, each panel taking on the movement of cloth swaying in the wind.

Another is Tanaka Yu, whose clever wrapped bundles in clay imitate reality. Her Yellow sculpture in the shape of a furoshiki (c. 2108), looking like a beautifully wrapped object complete with a knotted tie, is informed by the ancient Japanese art of cloth wrapping.

Japanese-trained ceramic sculptors now form a diaspora working outside Japan – one is US-based Kaneko Jun in Nebraska, whose large hand-built forms such as Untitled triangle (dango) (2004), employ abstract design features.

Uranishi Kenji is another emigre, based in Brisbane since 2004. His white glazed objects portray the wondrous world of coral in the Great Barrier Reef.

Read more:
In Japan, supernatural beliefs connect the spiritual realm with the earthly objects around us

Balancing tradition and the new

The porcelain sculpture on show is superb. Matsuda Yuriko’s erotically charged foot, In her shoes (c. 2007), with its tightly curled back toes suggesting sexual pleasure, is a stunning piece.

Her subject is frequently the female body. Here, the decorative surface evokes the patterning of Meiji ceramics while its subject matter sits squarely in the Japanese tradition of shunga, or erotic imagery. Refreshingly, it comes from the perspective of a woman.

Yet another porcelain piece, Struggling forms (c. 2005) by Nakashima Harumi, looks almost octopus-like, but has only two feet. Its twists echo that of a Möbius strip, it looks disarmingly like an impossible form, but achieves perfect balance. The blue colour of the dot patterning harks back to the Japanese tradition of sometsuke which is underglaze painting in cobalt blue on porcelain or stoneware.

In contrast to referencing tradition, Mishima Kimiyo’s ceramic forms in Box Batter -17 (2017) shows bottles in newspaper wrappings in a roughly opened box, very much of their time. Her interest is the imbalance between the human footprint and nature, seen in the detritus of modern life, newspapers, packaging and soft drink bottles littering the environment.

The limits of clay

This is a must-see exhibition.

Its 100 plus artworks by 65 ceramicists drawn from public and private collections in Australia and Japan, and spanning modern and contemporary work, are dazzling in innovation, skill and aesthetic.

The sculptural leap to pure form in porcelain in Fukami Sueharu’s To the sky (c. 2013), simulates flight itself and leaves viewers elevated by the experience.

While in the exhibition space, I could hear some, including senior artists, puzzling as to how several of the ceramic objects were actually produced. These ceramicists have indeed tested the limits of clay.

Pure Form is at the Art Gallery of South Australia until November 6.

Catherine Speck has received funding in past years from the Australian Research Council to research art exhibitions.

– ref. How Japanese avant-garde ceramicists have tested the limits of clay – https://theconversation.com/how-japanese-avant-garde-ceramicists-have-tested-the-limits-of-clay-184470

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Erica Millar, Senior research fellow, La Trobe University

In a post-Roe world, 26 US states are certain or likely to ban abortion and one quarter of abortion clinics are predicted to close. Indeed, many closed the day Roe was overruled.

With increasing ferocity over the past 15 years, abortion access in the US has been gradually eroded since the 1973 landmark Supreme Court ruling on Roe v Wade, through measures including the banning of federal funding for abortion, and state laws that enforce mandatory counselling and stringent licensing requirements for abortion clinics.

In 2021, states across the US introduced 663 abortion restrictions and enacted 108 of them, a record number in any year since 1973. One quarter of US abortion clinics closed between 2011-2016, and, as of early 2022, there were five states with only one clinic.

The erasure of the constitutional right to abortion will be felt most acutely in states with already dramatically reduced access. It will not result in a seismic shift in access but will accelerate a decades long process that is far from over for either anti-choice activists, or the pro-choice majority.

Ending Roe won’t end abortions

Women have always circumvented restrictive abortion laws and, with the advent of medical abortion, it’s never been safer to do so. Individuals can safely self-manage their abortion using oral medications.

Pregnant Americans living in states hostile to abortion rights are getting abortion pills online or via the telephone, or travelling to buy them elsewhere — in the pharmacies in cities just over the Texan-Mexican border, for example.

Of course, this is far from ideal — medical abortion is only recommended up to the twelfth week of pregnancy, and women should optimally have the choice of surgical or medical methods. Good information about medical abortion is key to its success and safety.

Clinics over the border from the worst affected states will be placed under increased pressure. Many states will criminalise travelling to obtain an abortion, “aiding and abetting” someone from getting an abortion (by, for example, driving them to an interstate abortion clinic), and searching for or providing information about how to obtain an abortion (via the telephone or internet for example). Yet such measures will be difficult to enforce.

Read more:
US Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade – but for abortion opponents, this is just the beginning

Forced pregnancies don’t usually end in adoptions

It’s estimated about one quarter of people who would have had an abortion under Roe will be forced to continue with a pregnancy post-Roe.

These pregnancies will, in about 90% of cases, lead to parenthood. Despite what the Supreme Court imagines, forced pregnancy, birth and parenthood, and not adoption, is generally the alternative to abortion.

Moreover, far from being “voluntary”, adoption is, as legal scholar Dorothy Roberts writes, most often “forced upon politically marginalised people as a response to crises caused by race, class, and gender inequities”.

The end of Roe will increase inequality

Forced pregnancy will further entrench existing inequalities. Wealthy Americans in states that will ban or restrict abortion will continue to have abortions because they will have the capacity and resources to travel interstate or access abortion pills online.

Three quarters of abortion seekers in the US are living in poverty. Black women get abortions at nearly three times the rate of white women, and a higher proportion of Black women live in states that will restrict or criminalise abortion.

Police will disproportionately target non-white people in laws criminalising abortion. Today, 38 states have laws that can be used to charge a woman for pregnancy outcomes, including charges related to drug addiction and accidental falls.

Of the 1,200 prosecutions under these laws over the past 15 years, 52% were against Black women.

Last year, Brittanay Poolaw, a 21-year-old Native American woman, went to hospital in Oklahoma seeking help for a miscarriage, and was charged and convicted of first-degree manslaughter of her unborn child.

The complications for medical abortion and miscarriage are identical. Seeking medical help in this context may work for white women, who will be less subject to medical-legal surveillance, but is likely to subject racial minorities to increased surveillance for miscarriage.

Forced pregnancy increases poverty levels and takes a toll on children born and women’s health, their well-being, and their relationships well into the future.

Continuing with a pregnancy and birth is always more dangerous than abortion, and these risks are greater for Black women, who die 3.5 times more often in birth and the postpartum period than white women. Deaths resulting from the failure to properly manage miscarriage are also very possible.

Read more:
‘A revolutionary ruling – and not just for abortion’: A Supreme Court scholar explains the impact of Dobbs

What now?

The post-Roe world is undoubtedly concerning but is not all doom and gloom. Abortion is likely to remain protected in 20 states and the District of Columbia, and some states have recently strengthened their capacity to become abortion “safe havens”.

Responding to already restrictive contexts, US activists are organised to maximise and help fund abortion travel and self-managed care. With only 34% of the US population supportive of the Supreme Court’s decision, US pro-choice activists and organisations have significant force behind them.

Read more:
Roe overturned: What you need to know about the Supreme Court abortion decision

Erica Millar receives funding from the Australian Research Council. She is a member of the South Australian Abortion Action Coalition.

Barbara Baird has received funding from the Australian Research Cuoncil. She is affiliated with the South Australian Abortion Action Coalition.

– ref. The end of Roe: what now for the women of America? – https://theconversation.com/the-end-of-roe-what-now-for-the-women-of-america-185769

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By C Raina MacIntyre, Professor of Global Biosecurity, NHMRC Principal Research Fellow, Head, Biosecurity Program, Kirby Institute, UNSW Sydney

The World Health Organization (WHO) has decided not to declare monkeypox a public health emergency of international concern. This may change in the future.

However, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said he was “deeply concerned” about the evolving threat of monkeypox, which he said had reached more than 50 countries.

There have been more than 4,100 confirmed cases globally, including at least 13 in Australia.

The WHO also acknowledged there were many unknowns about the outbreak.

Here are three things we know about monkeypox and three things we want to find out.

Read more:
At what point is a disease deemed to be a global threat? Here’s the answer

3 things we know

1. Monkeypox is caused by a virus

Monkeypox is a large DNA virus belonging to the orthopoxvirus family. Unlike the related smallpox virus, variola, which only affected humans, monkeypox virus is found in rodents and other animals in parts of Africa.

We know of two clades (virus groupings), and it is the less severe of the two currently circulating outside Africa.

Orthopoxviruses are stable viruses that do not mutate much. Multiple mutations, however, have been described in the virus causing the current outbreak.

In the United States, at least two separate strains have been circulating, suggesting multiple introductions into the country.

Read more:
Monkeypox in Australia: what is it and how can we prevent the spread?

2. You can be infected for more than a week and not know

It takes an average 8.5 days from infection to showing symptoms, such as enlarged lymph nodes, fever and a rash, which usually looks like fluid-filled blisters that erupt. People are infectious while they have the rash, and are usually infectious for about two weeks.

Children are most severely affected and have a higher risk of dying from the disease. Historically, in the endemic countries of Africa, almost all deaths have been in children.

The European epidemic is mostly in adult males, so this, together with better access to care, may explain the low rate of deaths in these countries.

Read more:
What’s in a name? Why giving monkeypox a new one is a good idea

3. We have vaccines and treatments

Vaccines work. Past vaccination against smallpox provides 85% protection against monkeypox. Smallpox was declared eradicated in 1980, so most mass vaccination programs ceased in the 1970s.

Australia never had mass smallpox vaccination. However, an estimated 10% of Australians have been vaccinated in the past, mostly migrants.

Vaccines protect for many years but immunity wanes. So declining population-level protection is likely responsible for the resurgence of monkeypox seen since 2017 in Nigeria, one of seven endemic hot spots in Africa.

Mass vaccination is not recommended. But vaccines can be given to contacts of confirmed cases (known as post-exposure prophylaxis) and people at high risk of contracting the virus, such as some lab or health workers (pre-exposure prophylaxis).

There are also treatments, such as vaccinia immune globulin and antivirals. These were developed against smallpox.

Read more:
Monkeypox: we have vaccines and drugs to treat it

3 things we want to find out

1. How much do these new mutations matter?

The virus causing the current outbreak has several mutations compared with versions of the virus circulating in Africa. However, we don’t know if these mutations affect clinical disease and how the virus spreads.

The monkeypox virus has a very large genome, so is more complex to study than smaller RNA viruses, such as influenza and SARS-CoV-2 (the virus that causes COVID).

Experts wonder if the mutations have made it more contagious or changed the clinical pattern to be more like a sexually transmitted infection. A study from Portugal shows the mutations likely make the virus more transmissible.

Read more:
Monkeypox is a DNA virus unlike coronavirus – here’s what that means for the virus and us

2. How is it spread? Is that changing?

Monkeypox has not been described as a sexually transmitted infection in the past. However, the current transmission pattern is unusual. There seems to be a very short incubation period (of 24 hours) following sexual contact in some, but not all, cases.

It is a respiratory virus, so aerosol transmission is possible. But historically most transmission has been from animal to human. When there was transmission between humans, this usually involved close contacts.

The rapid growth of the epidemic in non-endemic countries in 2022, however, has been all due to spread between humans. There may be many more cases than officially reported.

We do not know why the pattern has changed, whether it is sexually transmitted or simply transmitted due to intimate contact in specific and globally connected social networks, or whether the virus has become more contagious.

The virus is found in the skin rash, mouth and semen, but this does not prove it is sexually transmitted.

Read more:
Monkeypox: ‘This is an entirely new spread of the disease’

3. How far will it spread? Does COVID make a difference?

Will this spread more widely in the community? Does the COVID pandemic increase the risk? Possibly, yes.

We must also not drop the ball on surveillance in the wider community or stigmatise the LGBTQI community.

Due to waning immunity from the smallpox vaccine globally and the spread of monkeypox to many countries already, we may see the epidemic spreading more widely.

If it does so and starts infecting large numbers of children, we could see more deaths because children get more severe infection.

So we should monitor globally for clusters of fever and rash, and misdiagnosis as chickenpox, hand foot and mouth disease, herpes simplex or other diseases with a rash.

Read more:
How monkeypox epidemic is likely to play out – in four graphs

Another factor is COVID. As people recover from COVID, their immune system is impaired. So people who have had COVID may be more susceptible to other infections.

We see the same with measles infection. This weakens the immune system and increases the risk of other infections for two to three years afterwards.

If the epidemic becomes established in countries outside the endemic areas, it may infect animals and create new endemic zones in the world.

It is important we do everything possible to stop this epidemic.

C Raina MacIntyre receives funding from NHMRC and MRFF. She has been on advisory boards for Bavarian Nordic and received funding for a smallpox workshop she conducted in 2019 from Emergent Biosolutions, Bavarian Nordic, Siga technologies and Meridien Medical. She is on the WHO SAGE Smallpox and Monkey Pox Ad Hoc Advisory Group.

– ref. Monkeypox is not a global emergency for now, says WHO. 3 things we need to know next about how it’s mutating and spreading – https://theconversation.com/monkeypox-is-not-a-global-emergency-for-now-says-who-3-things-we-need-to-know-next-about-how-its-mutating-and-spreading-185297

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Prudence Flowers, Senior Lecturer in US History, College of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences, Flinders University

The United States Supreme Court has handed down a ruling overturning Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 decision that found there was a constitutional right to abortion.

In Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the Court ruled 6-3 that

The Constitution makes no reference to abortion, and no such right is implicitly protected by any constitutional provision.

Abortion regulation has now been returned to the individual states. Yet rather than resolving the debate over abortion in the US, we will likely see a dramatic escalation of abortion lawsuits and legislation.

That is because the goal of abortion opponents has always been to stop abortion nationwide. Overturning Roe v. Wade is just the beginning.

Read more:
Roe overturned: What you need to know about the Supreme Court abortion decision

Roe v. Wade has been under constant attack

For 49 years, Roe v. Wade has been under constant attack from opponents of reproductive rights, surviving repeated legal challenges and reaffirmed on multiple occasions by the Supreme Court.

Despite the political controversy and polarising rhetoric from Republican politicians, 2021 polling indicated 80% of Americans support abortion in all or most cases, and at least 60% support Roe v. Wade.

However, after former President Donald Trump was able to fill three Supreme Court vacancies, conservatives had a 6-3 majority on the bench.

The end of Roe v. Wade seemed inevitable and the question became whether the judgement would be gradually gutted or overturned in one fell swoop.

What can Biden and the Democrats do?

In early May, a draft of Justice Samuel Alito’s majority decision was leaked, indicating it would be overturned.

Protests from abortion rights supporters erupted, including outside the Supreme Court and the homes of conservative justices.

President Joe Biden swiftly issued a statement insisting a “woman’s right to choose is fundamental” and his administration has spent the intervening months meeting with abortion rights advocates. However, there is little of substance the president or Congressional Democrats can do to reverse the decision.

In mid May, the Women’s Health Protection Act, which sought to codify abortion rights, was defeated in the Senate.

And although Democrats have a majority in both houses of Congress, without filibuster reform they do not have the numbers to pass legislation, which has stymied much of the Democratic agenda during Biden’s presidency.

While Biden promised to issue Executive Orders on reproductive rights if Roe v Wade is overturned, these would work to offset only some of the likely consequences of the new abortion landscape.

Meanwhile, in the days after the May leak, Congressional Republicans met with prominent anti-abortion leaders to discuss a nationwide ban on abortion after six weeks.

Such a move would shift the contours of the abortion fight back to the national stage and would ensure abortion is front and centre in the 2024 presidential elections.

Read more:
How the US right-to-life movement is influencing the abortion debate in Australia

State laws on abortion access and provision

With the overturning of Roe v. Wade, abortion access and provision will be shaped by a patchwork of state laws.

13 states already have “trigger” laws on the books that criminalise abortion if Roe is overturned. A further 10 are expected to move quickly to ban the procedure.

States hostile to abortion have also begun debating how to close legislative “loopholes”, considering laws that are more extreme than any previously proposed.

In addition to pursuing abortion bans, including from the moment of conception, many of the new laws no longer allow for abortion in cases of rape or incest.

Provisions that would allow abortion to protect maternal health are being so narrowly defined as to render them almost meaningless.

In Oklahoma, one Republican complained the proposed law did not ban abortion in instances of ectopic pregnancy, a condition fatal to the pregnant person if left untreated.

Louisiana Republicans debated language that would have charged abortion patients with homicide.

Opponents of abortion are also strategising about how to prevent patients from accessing abortion from out-of-state providers, including discussing banning interstate travel and making abortion providers and support networks subject to legal sanction.

Nineteen states already ban virtual provision of abortion care, and opponents of abortion are particularly keen to criminalise and limit patient access to medication abortion provided via telehealth.

The National Right to Life Committee has drafted model state legislation that would make it illegal to provide information on self-managed abortion via phone, internet, or website, effectively targeting the First Amendment right to free speech.

Some states have laws enshrining the right to abortion

Supporters of reproductive rights have also been galvanised by the looming end of Roe v. Wade.

Sixteen states, primarily on the east and west coasts, as well as the District of Columbia, have laws enshrining the right to abortion.

California has passed laws protecting abortion providers and patients accessing care from out-of-state civil lawsuits, while New York has passed a package of laws that would make it an abortion “safe haven”.

Advocates are pushing the White House to challenge any law criminalising out-of-state travel to receive an abortion.

A Jewish synagogue is suing the state of Florida, claiming the state’s abortion ban violates religious freedoms protected by the First Amendment.

Impact on abortion patients

Politically and legally, the struggle over abortion rights is primed to explode nationwide, with no foreseeable end in sight.

Yet the impact of today’s Supreme Court decision will be most acutely felt by abortion patients.

Most of the toughest abortion bans and regulations are in the South and Midwest, rendering abortion inaccessible in a vast geographic stretch of the country.

Approximately half of US women and girls of reproductive age live in states where abortion is or will become illegal.

Overturning Roe v. Wade will result in the closure of more than a quarter of the nation’s abortion clinics, placing huge pressure on the remaining providers to offer time-sensitive care to patients likely travelling hundreds of kilometres from home.

Banning abortion does not stop abortion

Banning abortion does not stop abortion, nor does it reduce the number of abortions. Regardless of their home state, pregnant people will still seek abortions, although they may need significant resources to do so and could face criminal sanctions.

The majority of abortion patients in the US are already from vulnerable and marginalised populations.

The devastating consequences of this decision will fall primarily on the shoulders of those least able to bear it.

Read more:
The end of Roe v. Wade would likely embolden global anti-abortion activists and politicians

Prudence Flowers has received funding from the South Australian Department of Human Services. She is a member of the South Australian Abortion Action Coalition.

– ref. US Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade – but for abortion opponents, this is just the beginning – https://theconversation.com/us-supreme-court-overturns-roe-v-wade-but-for-abortion-opponents-this-is-just-the-beginning-185768

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sally Thompson, Associate professor, The University of Western Australia

Protecting people from floods requires many technical professionals to make good predictions and decisions.

Meteorologists predict the risk of extreme rainfall. Hydrologists translate this rainfall into predictions about what the flood will be like in terms of depth, flow and speed. Engineers design roads, bridges and buildings to cope with the likely conditions, while planners ensure new development is compatible with flood risks.

No step in this process is easy – and most are getting harder. Climate change is worsening flooding, because a hotter atmosphere can hold more water vapour which supercharges clouds. A hotter climate provides more energy to lift wet air high into the atmosphere, where it cools, becomes liquid and forms extreme rainfall. In Australia’s north, the intensity of heavy rainfall events has already increased by 10% since 1979.

While it is difficult to adapt to unpredictable rainfall events, we can improve our flood predictions. We focused on improving a common flood prediction technique called the Rational Method.

While simple to use, it can also get some things very wrong – such as underestimating flood peaks by 200%. To fix this, we worked with the developers of Arc Hydro, a popular software package used by stormwater and flood planners, to better describe how the shape of hillslopes affects floods. We hope this can help planners gain a better understanding of the true flood risks in specific areas.

Why do we need better flood predictions?

It’s particularly hard to predict the risk of extreme storms – like those that drove devastating flooding in parts of New South Wales and Queensland earlier this year – because for these storms, the past is not a good guide to the future. Those floods came from a “rain bomb” which dumped 60% of south east Queensland’s normal annual rainfall in just three days.

Managing flood risks is hard, given the cost of flood protection, evacuation and resilience in developed areas and challenges in restricting development in high-risk areas. In recent years, there has been intense pressure on planners in Australian cities to provide new housing stock. The land development sector also makes substantial political donations. Unsurprisingly, these pressures have led to development on flood-prone land. Flooding during the ongoing La Niña events has paused development in some areas.

Australia has robust guidance available to predict flood risk. The federal government’s Australian Rainfall and Runoff guidance is world-leading. Unfortunately, to use this properly, you need to undertake high quality analysis, detailed physical modelling, and thoughtful exploration of uncertainty. This can be expensive, requiring specialised software, highly trained experts, and enough data and time. That’s why many planners in Australia and globally still turn to simpler methods of flood assessments like the Rational Method.

Read more:
Why flooding is still so difficult to predict and prepare for

Simpler is not always better

While appealing, simpler methods are more likely to be inaccurate. Although there are longstanding concerns about the reliability, the method remains stubbornly popular and recommended in design standards globally. Rather than scolding engineers for using the Rational Method, we aimed to improve it.

To maintain simplicity, the Rational Method overlooks many factors affecting how floods form. We looked at one vital factor – the shape of the landscape. When rain falls on sloping land, it flows to the bottom of valleys where stream channels form. But hillslopes aren’t “flat” like a sheet of cardboard – they curve in different ways.

We were worried about divergent hillslopes, which fan out from a short section of ridge to a long stretch of stream. Under these conditions, the Rational Method overestimates how long rain needs to fall to produce a worst-case flood. By overestimating how long a storm will last, the Rational Method underestimates rainfall extremes. That can lead to very significant errors, such as underestimating the flood peak by 200%.

To fix this issue, we developed a mathematical theory to correct flood predictions based on the shape of the hillslope. We tested our new theory using experiments run on carefully engineered model hillslopes and found it worked as expected.

From theory to practice

Sadly, mathematical theories aren’t usually popular outside academic circles. To share our new approach with users, we worked with Esri, the developer of the globally popular Arc Hydro GIS package used by stormwater and flood planners.

Together, we built new tools for the package which map hillslopes, describe the hillslope shape mathematically, and use our new theory to improve predictions produced by the Rational Method.

So does it work? When we applied our tool to test watersheds in California and New Mexico, we found about 40% of the hillslopes were divergent – wider at the bottom than the top. For these areas, using our new methods would improve flood predictions by up to 270%.

Floods are a difficult challenge for societies to deal with around the world. That’s because coping with floods requires us to make long-term decisions about where we live, how we live, and what we build in the face of a rapidly changing climate.

To fully address these problems is an international, multidisciplinary task for scientists, engineers, planners, policymakers and decision makers. We hope our improvement to the Rational Method will be a small, but useful, part of this great endeavour.

Read more:
One in 1,000 years? Old flood probabilities no longer hold water

Sally Thompson receives funding from the Australian Research Council, the Western Australian Department of Water and Environmental Regulation, and the Water Corporation (Western Australia).

Anneliese Sytsma receives funding from The Colorado School of Mines, National Science Foundation’s Engineering Research Center for Reinventing the Nation’s Urban Water Infrastructure (ReNUWIt) (EEC-1028968), and the Gledden Foundation at the University of Western Australia’s Institute for Advanced Studies.

Dana Ariel Lapides receives funding from Simon Fraser University and the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Forest Service Southwest Pacific Research Station administered by the Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education (ORISE).

Mary H. Nichols receives funding from the United States Department of Agriculture – Agricultural Research Service 9USDA-ARS) at the Southwest Watershed Research Center.

– ref. Our flood predictions are getting worse as the climate changes. We have to understand how hills shape floods – https://theconversation.com/our-flood-predictions-are-getting-worse-as-the-climate-changes-we-have-to-understand-how-hills-shape-floods-183820

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra

University of Canberra Professorial Fellow Michelle Grattan and Professor Chris Wallace discuss the week in politics.

They canvass the Albanese government’s reaction to Sri Lankan people smugglers trying to reactivate their trade. Meanwhile, the Prime Minister is heading overseas again, at attend the NATO summit in Madrid. He will also visit Paris to meet Emmanual Macron, and is expected to go to Ukraine to meet with President Zelenskyy, who has warmly welcomed Australia military aid.

Chris and Michelle also discuss this week’s public service shakeup, and the government stepping up its messaging on COVID, which is still costing many lives every week.

Michelle Grattan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. VIDEO: Federal government brings COVID back onto the agenda – https://theconversation.com/video-federal-government-brings-covid-back-onto-the-agenda-185764

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jacob Deem, Lecturer – Law, CQUniversity Australia

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and his new government have committed to enshrining a First Nations Voice in the Australian Constitution. To do so, a majority of Australians in a majority of states will have to vote “yes” at a referendum.

But what are the other challenges along the way? Why might people support a Voice, or why might they be against it?

Last year, CQUniversity and Griffith University conducted the Australian Constitutional Values Survey to answer these questions.

Survey questions and findings

The survey measured attitudes towards the Voice from more than 1,500 respondents. Through quota sampling across participants’ location, age, education and voting preference, we were able to obtain a nationally representative sample.

Our survey found substantial support for a constitutional Voice (51.3%). Twice as many people supported the Voice as were against it (20.8%, with 27.9% undecided). But just as important are the reasons why participants said they were in favour, against or undecided.

Here are four key challenges that need to be addressed, our data suggests, on the journey towards a Voice.

1. Why have a First Nations Voice to Parliament?

As a first step, people must see a good reason to establish a Voice. The Uluru Statement from the Heart, which formalised calls for a constitutional Voice, is framed as a generous invitation towards reconciliation from First Nations Peoples. The sentiments in the Uluru Statement are reflected in many survey respondents’ support of the Voice. For example, one participant said:

I believe that if Australia really wants to reconcile with the Indigenous community – that this is a very important step in that process.

However, some people remain sceptical. While it seems most First Nations Peoples support a Voice, this view is not unanimous. Some First Nations scholars and respondents to our survey questioned whether supporting the Voice further legitimates the Constitution, a colonial document.

At the other end of the spectrum, 10% of respondents did not see the need for a Voice at all. Evidence of the disadvantages faced by First Nations Peoples under all existing political institutions continues to suggest otherwise. For example, the inability to “close the gap” is often attributed to the government’s failure to genuinely engage with Indigenous Australians. Nevertheless, the view that reform is not needed is one the Voice campaign will need to confront.

Advocates for the Voice will be encouraged by the substantial number of survey respondents who are already convinced that institutionalising an Indigenous advisory body is a positive step. Many respondents cited the value in constitutionally recognising First Nations Peoples, and viewed it as the “right thing to do”. Further, when supporters of the Voice were asked how important this issue was, one in three thought it should be a priority for the government.

Read more:
We keep hearing about a First Nations Voice to parliament, but what would it actually look like in practice?

2. The general public’s lack of knowledge

The Voice was proposed in the Uluru Statement in 2017, and calls for an Indigenous advisory body are even older. Despite this, public awareness remains a core issue.

More than half of respondents to the survey had never heard of the Voice before. Of the 27.9% of respondents who were unsure whether they would be in favour of or against a constitutional Voice, most cited a lack of knowledge as the reason.

Encouragingly, the responses also suggest there is an appetite to learn more. Some 19% of undecided participants said they wanted more information about the Voice, while 17.7% had specific questions, such as how representatives would be chosen, and what powers the body would have.

3. The role of bipartisanship

While bipartisanship may not necessarily be essential to obtain a yes vote in a referendum, a proposal with the support of the major parties is far less likely to fail. So far we know Labor is committed to pursuing a constitutional Voice, although the Coalition’s position following its election loss is less clear.

One thing is clear from our survey: differences between the major parties’ positions do not reflect voters’ attitudes in a significant way. This is an important result, as it suggests the major parties should be able to find common ground in supporting the Voice. Senator Patrick Dodson’s appointment as Special Envoy for Reconciliation and the Implementation of the Uluru Statement is an important step, as Senator Dodson is highly regarded on both sides of politics.

Read more:
First Nations people shouldn’t have to wait for a referendum to get a Voice to Parliament

4. Delivering a Voice with substance

Support for Indigenous constitutional recognition is clearly strongest if believed to be likely to deliver practical benefits as well as its symbolic value. Many survey respondents saw tangible outcomes such as improved healthcare and learning from Indigenous land management as reasons to support the Voice. When asked, 75% thought the Voice would improve the lives of First Nations Peoples. Therefore, the Voice many Australians want to enshrine is one that can make a practical difference in the lives of First Nations Peoples.

The new government’s commitment to the Uluru Statement is a hopeful sign for all those seeking constitutional change. While there is still a long journey ahead for the First Nations Voice, if these four challenges are met then a majority of Australians are clearly ready to engage in this important step in the reconciliation process.

Jacob Deem receives funding from the Australian Research Council.

Adrian Miller receives funding from NHMRC, ARC and BHP. He is affiliated with CQUniversity, BHP and Outside Opinion. I run my on small business call “Jirrbal Solutions” and I Chair a community organisation called “Jirrbal Aboriginal Corporation”

A J Brown has received funding from the Australian Research Council and other supporting universities to conduct the Australian Constitutional Values Survey over the years. He is also a boardmember of Transparency International Australia.

Susan Bird does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. The Albanese government has committed to enshrining a First Nations Voice in the Constitution. What do Australians think of the idea? – https://theconversation.com/the-albanese-government-has-committed-to-enshrining-a-first-nations-voice-in-the-constitution-what-do-australians-think-of-the-idea-184841

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alexander Mitchell Lee, PhD Candidate, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University

Fifty years ago this month, in June 1972, Yugoslavia’s Territorial Defence Force was desperately trying to contain and kill militants associated with the Australian-based Croatian Revolutionary Brotherhood.

For the second time in ten years, foreign-based nationalists were attempting to incite a revolt against the country’s Communist Party government, headed by president Josip Tito. Their aim was to create a Croatia independent of the rest of Yugoslavia.

Believing that now was the time for a revolutionary uprising of Croatians, and having learnt from the smaller, unsuccessful attack in 1963, the militants devised a daring plan to strike deep into the heart of Yugoslavia. The fallout of the operation, which was launched under the code name Operation Phoenix, would echo through the governments of both Yugoslavia and Australia.

Read more:
Cinema opens a dialogue about coming to terms with Balkans’ past

Militants move in to Bosnia

Nineteen men, many of them Croatian Australians and some of them from West Germany, had been preparing for months. Inspired by Fidel Castro’s tactics during Cuba’s revolution and observing the recent suppression of the “Croatian Spring” movement, they believed they could rally the Croatians of Yugoslavia against Tito.

On the night of the June 20 1972, the militants managed to evade detection by the authorities and enter Yugoslavia from Austria. They hijacked a truck and drove to Bugojno, a central Bosnian town with a large ethnically Croatian population. There, they attempted to recruit locals to their cause.

Receiving little sympathy from the resident population – some of whom reported them to the authorities – the militants began to attack Yugoslavian outposts and distribute propaganda. Aware that they had no way to escape the country, their aim was to give maximum visibility to their cause.

Alarmed and embarrassed by these developments, Yugoslavia mobilised thousands of men and placed central Bosnia under quarantine. Tito was personally involved in the operation. After a brutal firefight on June 25 in which most of the attackers were killed, the surviving members of the incursion fled into the hills. Only after four more weeks were all 19 men accounted for. Fifteen militants and 13 Yugoslavians had been killed in this bloody event.

The four captives faced trial in Yugoslavia. Three were executed and the final member, the youngest, was sentenced to life imprisonment. He would later be released, and ultimately died fighting during the breakup of Yugoslavia almost 20 years later.

Reverberations

For Australia, the incident was unique. An organisation founded and headquartered in this country had attacked Yugoslavia in a stunning way.

Now, new research, and the increasingly accessibility of primary source documents in the former Yugoslavia, has highlighted the considerable impact of the attack in both countries.

The militants didn’t spark an uprising of Croatians against Yugoslavia, and the Yugoslavian government was no doubt reassured by their failure to attract local support. But the psychological impact of an attack deep into the country was considerable. Tito was enraged. His security detail feared that diaspora Croatian nationalists had the will and sophistication to attempt to assassinate the president.

The prestige of Yugoslavia’s security services was eroded. To ensure an event like this was never repeated, Tito launched a “special war” on émigré nationalists – a decade-long international campaign of targeted assassinations. Yugoslavia also increased pressure on countries like Australia to repress Croatian nationalist and extremist organisations in their territory.

In Australia, the attack wasn’t reported for weeks. When initial reports arrived from Yugoslavia, they were openly challenged by the Australian government, with Attorney-General Ivor Greenwood declaring he was “not aware of any factual basis for such allegations”. Distrustful of its Yugoslavian counterpart, the Australian government needed to be convinced that the improbable events had actually occurred.

When the full scale of the incident became known in the lead-up to Australia’s 1972 election, the government was caught flat-footed and deeply embarrassed. Police findings that at least some members of the group had been recruited and trained in Australia were widely reported in the press.

Australian security forces, more interested in countering communism than investigating machinations within migrant communities, didn’t have files on many of the Australian-based members of the brotherhood. They were unable to give William McMahon’s Coalition government a clear picture of what had happened and how such a plot came to be organised by Australians.

Read more:
Who were Australia’s best prime ministers? We asked the experts

The Commonwealth Police quickly launched a series of raids and reported to the government that approximately 300 Croatian Australians were of “particular concern”. The issue of how best to respond to these developments bedevilled a government that was reluctant to alienate migrant communities but didn’t want to give the impression such plotting was acceptable.

The Labor Party, long concerned about the risk posed by violent Croatian nationalism in Australia, seized on the incursion as evidence the McMahon government was unable to grapple with locally based terrorism. They would move aggressively against Croatian nationalist organisations when they came to power later that year, though this led to damaging typecasting of ordinary Croatian Australians and sometimes serious impacts on innocent individuals.

Coupled with the September 1972 bombings of the Yugoslav General Trade and Tourist Agency in Sydney, the June attack in Yugoslavia weakened McMahon’s law and order record going into the 1972 election. Indeed, Labor MPs like Jim Cairns warned the government that any attempt to campaign on law and order had been undermined by their failure to tackle this issue.

While it is impossible to judge the role of a single issue in any campaign, and while neither party made the issue of Croatians central to their election pitch, the incursion had resonance.

Writing later, journalists Laurie Oakes and David Solomon observed that the government’s inability to deal with Croatian nationalist violence meant “Labor could appear stronger on national security than the Coalition”. The narrowness of McMahon’s election loss made every weakness more important.

A forgotten episode of Australian national security history, the 1972 attack is more than just a footnote. The incident had real consequences for the political trajectories of both Australia and Yugoslavia.

Alexander Mitchell Lee receives funding from the Australian Government Research Training Program (AGRTP) Stipend Scholarship.

– ref. How Operation Phoenix exported violence from Australia to Yugoslavia – https://theconversation.com/how-operation-phoenix-exported-violence-from-australia-to-yugoslavia-185499

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nicholas T. Van Dam, Associate professor, The University of Melbourne

Mindfulness forms part of the trillion-dollar wellness industry, representing 1.5–6% of yearly spending around the world (estimated to be more than US$200 million) on wellness products and services.

Smartphone apps, in particular, have skyrocketed in popularity offering incredible promise for mental health with wide reach, and scalability at low cost. Mental ill-health was on the rise before the pandemic but reached new heights during it. Correspondingly, COVID created previously unseen demand for mindfulness apps and online courses.

Read more:
What is mindfulness? Nobody really knows, and that’s a problem

It’s no surprise people have turned to mindfulness in the wake of the past few stressful years, and their considerable promotion. And while there may be some benefit, it cannot treat mental ill-health on its own, and should not be relied upon to do so.

What does research say about mindfulness for treating mental health?

In-person mindfulness-based programs such as those for stress reduction, which often include health information and guided meditation practice, show moderate benefits among healthy individuals and those with mental ill-health.

Among healthy populations, a comprehensive review shows mindfulness-based programs help most with symptoms of anxiety, depression, and distress, and to a slightly lesser extent, in promoting well-being.

Among individuals with a psychiatric diagnosis, a comprehensive review shows mindfulness-based programs can help with anxious and depressive disorders, as well as pain conditions and substance use disorders. But mindfulness-based programs do not outperform standard talk therapy.

When it comes to structured online mindfulness programs (digital variations on programs like mindfulness-based stress reduction), a review shows benefits are small but still significant for depression, anxiety, and well-being.

Read more:
Can an app help us find mindfulness in today’s busy high-tech world?

What about mindfulness apps?

The evidence for mobile phone interventions and apps is less positive.

A recent comprehensive review of mobile phone interventions (including apps) combined results from 145 randomised controlled trials of 47,940 participants. The study examined text messaging interventions and apps for a number of mental health conditions relative to no intervention, minimal intervention (such as health information), and active interventions (other programs known to work). The authors “failed to find convincing evidence in support of any mobile phone-based intervention on any outcome”.

One review of mindfulness apps, included in the above comprehensive review, found well-designed randomised controlled trials for only 15 of the hundreds of apps available. Overall results were small to moderate for anxiety, depression, stress, and well-being. While these results sound positive, most studies (about 55%) compared apps to doing nothing at all, while another 20% compared apps to controls like audiobooks, games, relaxing music, or maths training.

When apps are compared to well-designed treatments, the effects are often less promising. One study comparing a mindfulness app to a “sham” (something that looked and felt like mindfulness but was not), the app was no better.

But does it do any harm?

Evidence shows mindfulness meditation can actually make some people worse off.

A recent meta-analysis that examined 83 studies on meditation, including 6,703 particpants, found 8.3% of people became anxious, depressed, or experienced negative changes in their thinking during or after meditation practice.

Other research suggests those first exposed to meditation via an app may be more likely to experience adverse effects such as anxiety, depression, or worse.

While apps and other forms of meditation are relatively inexpensive, if they do not work, the return on investment is poor. While the costs may seem relatively small, they can represent significant costs to individuals, organisations, and government. And some learning modules and training programs cost thousands of dollars.

Read more:
We don’t yet fully understand what mindfulness is, but this is what it’s not

Mindfulness should be used ‘as well as’, not ‘instead of’

The investment in these programs is not a problem on its own. Mindfulness meditation (including various digital offerings) has considerable potential. The problem is mindfulness is not enough, and should be used as a supplement to first-line mental health treatment such as psychotherapy and medication, not instead of first-line treatment.

More concerning is that some mindfulness apps claim they can prevent mental health problems. There is not enough evidence yet to be able to make these claims.

In a world where people are facing so many challenges spanning social and income inequality, unprecedented environmental changes, war, economic instability, and global pandemics (to name a few), we must choose support programs very carefully.

While mindfulness may have some benefits for some people, it is not a replacement for first-line treatments for mental ill-health.

Nicholas T. Van Dam received funding from the Three Springs Foundation Pty Ltd to establish the Contemplative Studies Centre at the University of Melbourne. He is a Fellow of the Mind and Life Institute, as well as a member of the International Society for Contemplative Research.

– ref. How effective is mindfulness for treating mental ill-health? And what about the apps? – https://theconversation.com/how-effective-is-mindfulness-for-treating-mental-ill-health-and-what-about-the-apps-182436

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alexander Mitchell Lee, PhD Candidate, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University

Fifty years ago this month, in June 1972, Yugoslavia’s Territorial Defence Force was desperately trying to contain and kill militants associated with the Australian-based Croatian Revolutionary Brotherhood.

For the second time in ten years, foreign-based nationalists were attempting to incite a revolt against the country’s Communist Party government, headed by president Josip Tito. Their aim was to create a Croatia independent of the rest of Yugoslavia.

Believing that now was the time for a revolutionary uprising of Croatians, and having learnt from the smaller, unsuccessful attack in 1963, the militants devised a daring plan to strike deep into the heart of Yugoslavia. The fallout of the operation, which was launched under the code name Operation Phoenix, would echo through the governments of both Yugoslavia and Australia.

Read more:
Cinema opens a dialogue about coming to terms with Balkans’ past

Militants move in to Bosnia

Nineteen men, many of them Croatian Australians and some of them from West Germany, had been preparing for months. Inspired by Fidel Castro’s tactics during Cuba’s revolution and observing the recent suppression of the “Croatian Spring” movement, they believed they could rally the Croatians of Yugoslavia against Tito.

On the night of the June 20 1972, the militants managed to evade detection by the authorities and enter Yugoslavia from Austria. They hijacked a truck and drove to Bugojno, a central Bosnian town with a large ethnically Croatian population. There, they attempted to recruit locals to their cause.

Receiving little sympathy from the resident population – some of whom reported them to the authorities – the militants began to attack Yugoslavian outposts and distribute propaganda. Aware that they had no way to escape the country, their aim was to give maximum visibility to their cause.

Alarmed and embarrassed by these developments, Yugoslavia mobilised thousands of men and placed central Bosnia under quarantine. Tito was personally involved in the operation. After a brutal firefight on June 25 in which most of the attackers were killed, the surviving members of the incursion fled into the hills. Only after four more weeks were all 19 men accounted for. Fifteen militants and 13 Yugoslavians had been killed in this bloody event.

The four captives faced trial in Yugoslavia. Three were executed and the final member, the youngest, was sentenced to life imprisonment. He would later be released, and ultimately died fighting during the breakup of Yugoslavia almost 20 years later.

Reverberations

For Australia, the incident was unique. An organisation founded and headquartered in this country had attacked Yugoslavia in a stunning way.

Now, new research, and the increasingly accessibility of primary source documents in the former Yugoslavia, has highlighted the considerable impact of the attack in both countries.

The militants didn’t spark an uprising of Croatians against Yugoslavia, and the Yugoslavian government was no doubt reassured by their failure to attract local support. But the psychological impact of an attack deep into the country was considerable. Tito was enraged. His security detail feared that diaspora Croatian nationalists had the will and sophistication to attempt to assassinate the president.

The prestige of Yugoslavia’s security services was eroded. To ensure an event like this was never repeated, Tito launched a “special war” on émigré nationalists – a decade-long international campaign of targeted assassinations. Yugoslavia also increased pressure on countries like Australia to repress Croatian nationalist and extremist organisations in their territory.

In Australia, the attack wasn’t reported for weeks. When initial reports arrived from Yugoslavia, they were openly challenged by the Australian government, with Attorney-General Ivor Greenwood declaring he was “not aware of any factual basis for such allegations”. Distrustful of its Yugoslavian counterpart, the Australian government needed to be convinced that the improbable events had actually occurred.

When the full scale of the incident became known in the lead-up to Australia’s 1972 election, the government was caught flat-footed and deeply embarrassed. Police findings that at least some members of the group had been recruited and trained in Australia were widely reported in the press.

Australian security forces, more interested in countering communism than investigating machinations within migrant communities, didn’t have files on many of the Australian-based members of the brotherhood. They were unable to give William McMahon’s Coalition government a clear picture of what had happened and how such a plot came to be organised by Australians.

Read more:
Who were Australia’s best prime ministers? We asked the experts

The Commonwealth Police quickly launched a series of raids and reported to the government that approximately 300 Croatian Australians were of “particular concern”. The issue of how best to respond to these developments bedevilled a government that was reluctant to alienate migrant communities but didn’t want to give the impression such plotting was acceptable.

The Labor Party, long concerned about the risk posed by violent Croatian nationalism in Australia, seized on the incursion as evidence the McMahon government was unable to grapple with locally based terrorism. They would move aggressively against Croatian nationalist organisations when they came to power later that year, though this led to damaging typecasting of ordinary Croatian Australians and sometimes serious impacts on innocent individuals.

Coupled with the September 1972 bombings of the Yugoslav General Trade and Tourist Agency in Sydney, the June attack in Yugoslavia weakened McMahon’s law and order record going into the 1972 election. Indeed, Labor MPs like Jim Cairns warned the government that any attempt to campaign on law and order had been undermined by their failure to tackle this issue.

While it is impossible to judge the role of a single issue in any campaign, and while neither party made the issue of Croatians central to their election pitch, the incursion had resonance.

Writing later, journalists Laurie Oakes and David Solomon observed that the government’s inability to deal with Croatian nationalist violence meant “Labor could appear stronger on national security than the Coalition”. The narrowness of McMahon’s election loss made every weakness more important.

A forgotten episode of Australian national security history, the 1972 attack is more than just a footnote. The incident had real consequences for the political trajectories of both Australia and Yugoslavia.

Alexander Mitchell Lee receives funding from the Australian Government Research Training Program (AGRTP) Stipend Scholarship.

– ref. How Operation Pheonix exported violence from Australia to Yugoslavia – https://theconversation.com/how-operation-pheonix-exported-violence-from-australia-to-yugoslavia-185499

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hans Westerbeek, Professor of International Sport Business, Head of Sport Business Insights Group, Victoria University

Organisers of Wimbledon, the main draw of which begins on June 27, have found themselves in a quandary over their controversial decision to ban Russian and Belarusian players in protest over the invasion of Ukraine.

The banned players include current men’s world number 1 Daniil Medvedev, number 8 Andrey Rublev, and women’s world number 6 Aryna Sabalenka.

Both the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) and Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) penalised Wimbledon for this ban by stripping the tournament of its ranking points.

Because one of the world’s most prestigious tennis tournaments has been relegated to merely a high-profile exhibition event, a growing number of players have pulled out of the tournament, including Naomi Osaka and Eugenie Bouchard (this shows how a boycotter event can simultaneously be boycotted by participants).

These kinds of boycotts occur regularly in high-profile sport as event organisers and participants use its global reach to highlight human rights violations.

But boycott actions and counter-actions – including those at Wimbledon – often do more to harm individual athletes who happen to be nationals of these countries rather than to the condemned regime or the event sponsors.

Read more:
Is banning Russian tennis players from Wimbledon the right call?

Sport and human rights

Australian former golfer Greg Norman sparked world-wide condemnation with his statement that “we’ve all made mistakes” when discussing the Saudi-Arabian-backed killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

It didn’t go unnoticed that Norman is also CEO of the Saudi-backed LIV Golf Investments, which launched a PGA-breakaway golf tour for the super-rich.

Norman’s dismissal of a murder and the horrified global reaction to his comment show the power of sport to highlight and simultaneously ignore human rights violations.

Nations accused of violating these rights have found strategic, proactive approaches to counter the punitive, reactive, and short-term approach of economic boycotts. And sport plays an important part in that, such as the example of Qatar using the FIFA World Cup as a confirmation of their credibility and ability to host a globally significant event.

Such investments in “sportswashing” – using sport as a thin veneer to present a sanitised, friendlier version of a political regime or an organisation – are big business. The global influence of sport can become a vehicle for soft diplomacy and pursuing legitimacy.

November’s FIFA World Cup in Qatar remains a topic of a decade-long debate questioning how FIFA could award the world’s biggest sporting event to a country with a dubious human rights record.

This has now only worsened with evidence of mass exploitation of the migrant workers constructing the Cup’s stadiums.

Although arguably less extreme in nature, Australia is not absolved of human rights deficiencies in sport.

Why, for example, do Indigenous Australians remain under-represented at the elite and community level in most Aussie sports? Why are Australian women missing as leaders in coaching? Why is there currently only one openly gay male professional soccer player in Australia and no openly gay male AFL players? Why have so many members of Australia’s gymnastics and swim teams reported abuse and toxic cultures that started when they were children?

We should take to heart that even the practice of sport is a universal human right under the Olympic and European Sports Charters, and other internationally ratified declarations and treaties.

However, most nations do not fully recognise and implement this notion in policy and practice, with access to sport participation often marred with complexities and hypocrisy.

Read more:
The Olympics have always been a platform for protest. Banning hand gestures and kneeling ignores their history

Has Wimbledon’s boycott worked?

Wimbledon organisers are clearly trying to make a point: invading the sovereign territory of another nation is unacceptable.

Yet even though the tournament can call the world’s attention to its stand, has banning players from invading nations proven to be an effective means to defend and protect human rights?

The answer would be a resounding “no”.

What the ban has achieved is to signal that the Wimbledon organisers take a position against the Russian invasion of Ukraine. But taking a stand does not defend nor protect.

In this case, it hurts those who cannot be blamed for the war (the banned tennis players), and the unintended consequences (no ranking points) hurt the wider community of professional tennis players.

Read more:
French Open: understanding why Russian and Belarusian tennis players are competing despite Wimbledon ban

While sport can indeed be a valuable platform to promote human rights, we must also recognise it doesn’t take much for sport to become exclusive, divisive and controversial.

Crucially, leveraging sport to advance human rights requires that human rights safeguarding by Australia, Russia or Qatar is measured by the same yardstick, recognising that much work must be done to ensure each country’s own sporting environment is inclusive and free of discrimination.

In doing that, we can truly recognise sport as the universal human right that it is, and it can remain true to its core objective of celebrating human potential and achievement.

Ramon Spaaij receives funding from the Australian Research Council and the Department of Health.

Hans Westerbeek does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Boycotts in sport may not advance human rights. But they do harm individual athletes – https://theconversation.com/boycotts-in-sport-may-not-advance-human-rights-but-they-do-harm-individual-athletes-185208

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mike Gardner, Flinders University

Ever wondered about the secret to a long life? Perhaps understanding the lifespans of other animals with backbones (or “vertebrates”) might help us unlock this mystery.

You’ve probably heard turtles live a long (and slow) life. At 190 years, Jonathan the Seychelles giant tortoise might be the oldest land animal alive. But why do some animals live longer than others?

Research published today by myself and colleagues in the journal Science investigates the various factors that may affect longevity (lifespan) and ageing in reptiles and amphibians.

To investigate this, we used long-term data from 77 different species of reptiles and amphibians – all cold-blooded animals. Our work is a collaboration between more than 100 scientists with up to 60 years of data on animals that were caught, marked, released and re-caught.

These data were then compared to existing information on warm-blooded animals, and several different ideas about ageing emerged.

What factors might be important?

Cold-blooded or warm-blooded

One popular line of thought we investigated is the idea that cold-blooded animals such as frogs, salamanders and reptiles live longer because they age more slowly.

These animals have to rely on external temperatures to help regulate their body temperature. As a result they have slower “metabolisms” (the rate at which they convert what they eat and drink into energy).

Animals that are small and warm-blooded, such as mice, age quickly since they have faster metabolisms – and turtles age slowly since they have slower metabolisms. By this logic, cold-blooded animals should have lower metabolisms than similar-sized warm-blooded ones.

However, we found cold-blooded animals don’t age more slowly than similar-sized warm-blooded ones. In fact, the variation in ageing in the reptiles and amphibians we looked at was much greater than previously predicted. So the reasons vertebrates age are more complex than this idea sets out.

Environmental temperature

Another related theory is that environmental temperature itself could be a driver for longevity. For instance, animals in colder areas might be processing food more slowly and have periods of inactivity, such as with hibernation – leading to an overall increase in lifespan.

Under this scenario, both cold and warm-blooded animals in colder areas would live longer than animals in warmer areas.

We found this was true for reptiles as a group, but not for amphibians. Importantly, this finding has implications for the effects of global warming, which might lead to reptiles ageing faster in permanently warmer environments.

Protection

One suggestion is that animals with certain types of protections, such as protruding spines, armour, venom or shells, also don’t age as fast and therefore live longer.

A lot of energy is put into producing these protections, which can allow animals to live longer by making them less vulnerable to predation. However, could it be the very fact of having these protections allows animals to age more slowly?

Our work found this to be true. It seems having such protections does lead to animals living longer. This is especially true for turtles, which have hard shell protection and incredibly long lifespans.

We’ll need to conduct more research to figure out why just having protections is linked to a longer life.

Reproduction

Finally, it has been posited that perhaps longevity is linked to how late into life an animal reproduces.

If they can keep reproducing later into life, then natural selection would drive this ability, generation to generation, allowing these animals to live longer than those that reproduce early and can’t continue to do so.

Indeed, we found animals that start producing offspring at a later age do seem to live longer lives. Sleepy lizards (or shinglebacks) are a great example. They don’t reproduce until they’re about five years old, and live until they’re close to 50!

Read more:
Breakthrough allows scientists to determine the age of endangered native fish using DNA

The challenge in understanding ageing

To understand ageing, we need a lot of data on the same animals. That’s simply because if we want to know how long a species lives, we have to keep catching the same individuals over and over, across large spans of time.

This is “longitudinal” research. Luckily, it’s exactly what some scientists have committed themselves to. It’s also what my team is doing with sleepy lizards, Tiliqua rugosa. These lizards have been studied continuously at Bundey Bore station in the Mid North of South Australia since 1982.

Here, more than 13,000 lizards have been caught over 40 years of study. Some have been caught up to 60 times! But given the 45-year longevity of these lizards, we’ve been studying them for a shorter time than some of them live. By keeping the survey work going we might find they live even longer.

Some animals’ chance of dying isn’t linked to age

Another interesting part of this research was finding, for a range of animals, that their chance of dying is just as small when they’re quite old compared to when they’re young. This “negligible ageing” is found in at least one species across each of frogs, salamanders, lizards, crocodiles and, of course, in tortoises like Jonathon.

We’re not quite sure why this is. The next challenge is to find out – perhaps by analysing species genomes. Knowing some animals have negligible ageing means we can target these species for future investigations.

Understanding what drives long life in other animals might lead to different biomedical targets to study humans too. We might not live to Jonathan the tortoise’s age, but we could theoretically use this knowledge to develop therapies that help stop some of the ageing process in us.

For now, healthy eating and exercising remain surer ways to a longer life.

Read more:
The search to extend lifespan is gaining ground, but can we truly reverse the biology of ageing?

Mike Gardner receives funding from the Australian Research Council. He is affiliated with The South Australian Museum.

– ref. We helped track 77 species for up to 60 years to try to reveal the secrets of long life. And some don’t seem to age at all – https://theconversation.com/we-helped-track-77-species-for-up-to-60-years-to-try-to-reveal-the-secrets-of-long-life-and-some-dont-seem-to-age-at-all-185583

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Roger Patulny, Associate Professor of Sociology, University of Wollongong

Despite widespread access to social media and videoconferencing technology, many Australians experienced heightened loneliness during COVID lockdowns, and continue to do so.

We surveyed more than 2,000 Australians during 2020-21 about their experiences during and after lockdown, for research published today in the Australian Journal of Social Issues. Participants came from every state and territory and ranged from ages 18 to 88. About two-thirds were female.

We captured respondents’ detailed experiences of lockdowns in their own words. From this we gained insight into people’s feelings of loneliness in the context of digital media use.

While many have struggled, the impacts haven’t been felt equally by all.

Who was lonely, and stayed lonely after lockdowns?

The pandemic opened up new “inequalities” in loneliness, by creating barriers to socialising for several types of people. These difficulties remained even after lockdowns ended, as they had higher rates of loneliness months later.

For example, 49% of men and 47% of women agreed they had been lonely “at least some of the time” (a minimum 1-2 days per week) during lockdown. But this dropped to 40% of men and 42% of women in the months after lockdown, opening up a gendered “loneliness gap”.

Men bounced back quicker when activities such as sports and recreation resumed. This makes sense when you consider men are more likely to base friendships on such activities than women are.

We also found people with a physical disability, single people (not in a relationship), those with low incomes, and those lacking strong social ties before COVID had higher levels of loneliness during lockdowns – and persistent loneliness afterwards.

Why did they stay lonely?

Loneliness was extensive among young people who experienced COVID‐induced isolation. They missed out on formative opportunities to make friends (such as starting university), travel overseas or enter the workforce for the first time. Such interruptions may correct themselves as regular routines resume.

A potentially more serious problems is social networks having diminished during lockdown. There was a reported “pruning” of friends, where people chose to socialise online with those they were already close to, at the expense of more distant and diverse friendships.

One respondent noted:

I spend more time with close friends. Less time with ‘acquaintances’. More time with reliable colleagues. Less time with ‘time‐wasters’.

The problem with this is it takes time to rebuild extensive networks, which likely contributes to more protracted “social” loneliness. It may also propagate intolerance towards those more distant types of people that we cull, as shown in studies of COVID-induced loneliness in rural NSW communities.

It was also difficult for those who found themselves being “pruned”. These people, many of them men, became lonelier when they realised much of their existing friendships weren’t as close as they’d thought.

Many people felt they and others had lost the habits of social interaction during COVID, making it difficult or impossible.

One middle-aged male said:

Feels like life and society have permanently changed even after most of the pandemic has ended […] You can make plans and act towards them, but they can (and usually do) come undone in moments.

Such lost habits may take substantial time to be regained.

Some people made the most of what they had

COVID exposed gaps in our digital preparedness. Those who already had extensive or active online networks described an easier transition to lockdown. One older female respondent noted she:

for decades had many online relationships all over the world. This has facilitated my ease at moving to online.

This reflects research findings that online interaction that supports existing connections and stimulates new ones can help reduce loneliness.

Read more:
Does social media make us more or less lonely? Depends on how you use it

Some people with physical disabilities celebrated digital interaction. As one person said:

I am an equal on Zoom.

This is in keeping with research finding positive impacts of videoconferencing on loneliness for frail older people.

Zoom couldn’t fill the gap

However, despite some positive experiences, our work found digital contact was overall not a sufficient substitute for lost physical contact and social needs.

As one female respondent said:

Online alternatives help a lot, but it’s not the same and not enough.

Some lacked digital literacy, and described a difficult transition to videoconferencing:

I hate chatting ‘cause I’m a slow typer. I hate Skype, in part because I hate seeing myself on screen and hate other people seeing me.

Having to “go digital” made pre-existing anxieties worse for some, while others felt left behind:

It has been an isolating experience because I keep hearing how others are always staying connected via these methods.

Many people simply missed the “physicality” of face-to-face interactions; the “atmosphere” of public spaces, the chance to “dress up”, and physical intimacy and contact.

Connection in a post-COVID world

Still, many fell back on the ease of digital communication compared to “difficult” face-to-face encounters even after lockdown lifted. One middle-aged female said real-life interactions now felt “tiring”.

This is concerning because it points to the seductive power of digital communication as a “substitute” for physical interaction.

Research shows online interaction can increase loneliness when it fails to support (often more meaningful) existing relationships, and instead “displaces” them with less meaningful or shallow digital interactions.

The internet might improve life for those who can’t physically interact due to remoteness or physical incapacity. But if the convenience of digital communication displaces regular (often higher-quality) interactions, it could exacerbate isolation and loneliness.

With lockdowns having receded, we should look at ways to reconnect physically with friends, rather than relying increasingly on digital means to bridge the loneliness gap.

This story is part of The Conversation’s Breaking the Cycle series, which is about escaping cycles of disadvantage. It is supported by a philanthropic grant from the Paul Ramsay Foundation

Marlee Bower is Academic Lead, Australia’s Mental Health Think Tank, which is funded philanthropically by the BHP Foundation. She is a board member of The Haymarket Foundation.

– ref. We asked the public about being lonely during lockdowns. For many, Zoom calls weren’t enough – and some still haven’t recovered – https://theconversation.com/we-asked-the-public-about-being-lonely-during-lockdowns-for-many-zoom-calls-werent-enough-and-some-still-havent-recovered-185586

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kathomi Gatwiri, Senior lecturer, Southern Cross University

For Black African young people in Australia, social media can be especially fraught – a place they witness footage of anti-Black violence, contend with an “othering” gaze and encounter racist trolling, posts or comments.

Despite these challenges, social media can offer Black African young people in Australia safe spaces to engage in positive expressions of afro-Blackness, as our new study shows.

Our study, published today in the Australian Journal of Social Issues, was an ethnographic study of the social media activity of 15 young people (16–25) who self-identify as African and live in Australia.

Participants consented to being followed and/or “friended” on social media so as to observe their online practises over a six month period. They were also interviewed about their experiences on social media.

Our study reveals how these young people are using social media to challenge anti-Black narratives and reclaim some of their racial dignity.

Read more:
Battlegrounds: highly skilled Black African professionals on racial microaggressions at work

Racial dignity and anti-Black racism

One of us (Gatwiri) has defined racial dignity as:

the immutable, unconditional worth of Blac/k people as human beings. To be racially dignified is to be seen through a humanised lens, and to be afforded basic respect, compassion and recognition in interpersonal and systemic contexts.

Anti-Black racism is a unique form of racism especially directed towards dark skinned Black people.

Research on blackness argues there is something particular and specific about the visibility of Black bodies that triggers the imagination of white Australia. They are “read” as too un-assimilable, too different, too foreign, too dangerous, too visible, too everything.

Zuberi (age 25) also highlighted how anti-Blackness produces hyper-criminalisation of Black people. This results in over-policing by the community and the criminal justice system. He reflected on one example:

We were walking back to the train station, and we were topping up our Myki. And there were two inspectors, standing a few metres from us, on the side. And this was probably about 9pm, a bit late. and they were like “Those people are always up to no good.” And then my cousin’s like, “What? What do you mean?” Like he got very angry and I think in those kinds of moments you kind of question […] you question a lot of stuff.

Real world experiences of anti-Black racism can inform the way young African Australians experience social media and participate in racial discourse online.

Our other journal article from this study reported how Black African Australians used social media to spotlight and engage in positive expression of afro-Blackness. But they were also terrified of making white people uncomfortable, which could invite racial trolling or racial abuse online.

King (age 18) reflected on his attempts to separate himself from the “African gangs” label often attached to young Black African people in Australia. This informed the design of his online avatar and profile photo, curated to evoke a “friendly” persona:

People sometimes they just look at your profile and they think you’re a bad person or a bad influence based on your picture. They’ll assume that you’re like other Black people they’ve seen in their life, they’ll assume you’re the same person.

When confronted with racist content on their newsfeed, most participants made deliberate choices to stay away from the comments section, colloquially considered a “cesspool of hatred”. Zuberi explained:

You do see things on social media but I try to not get involved with it as much […] And for that reason, I choose not to look at the comments.

Creating online boundaries and communities

The young people in our study reported digital spaces were safer than physical, offline settings in the white-majority Australian context.

Many used social media functions – such as block, delete, mute and unfollow – to effectively bypass racism online. They also used the “close friends” and “private stories” features to share their racial experiences.

This allowed people to engage in the kind of self-representation they chose – including posting pictures of themselves or discussing their experiences – within a “safe digital space”.

Social media was also particularly useful in connecting Black African youth who are geographically separated from each other. Many reflected how useful these connections are, often noting they were the “only Black kid” in their school or neighbourhood.

Social media therefore became a place where participants sought out connections that dignified and validated their experiences.

Nya (age 18) told us these communities helped her to form a positive sense of identity as a young Black woman in Australia:

I’ve created a communal space on every single platform which has made me feel comfortable with myself […] I feel like I belong to the wider Black diaspora […] I actually didn’t grow up with Sudanese people, I grew up in (location removed for privacy) which is very white. So yeah, I created a community and I have connections and I like it.

Fear of racial trolling persists

Human rights lawyer Nyadol Nyuon, has said racial trolling is provoked by the belief that discussions about racism are a lack of gratitude “for the hand that fed you.”

Participants in our study also expressed awareness about the types of content they could and could not post, demonstrating how the fear of offending white people in digital spaces continued to shape their online practices.

As Mark (age 25) said,

I try to be quite careful in digital spaces because anything to do with race, you never know who is going to use that against you.

Using certain social media features allowed our participants to bypass traditional media and instead engage in self-presentations of their own making. This way, they were able to reclaim aspects of their racial dignity by developing positive pro-Black narratives online.

Read more:
The power of no: Simone Biles, Naomi Osaka and Black women’s resistance

This story is part of The Conversation’s Breaking the Cycle series, which is about escaping cycles of disadvantage. It is supported by a philanthropic grant from the Paul Ramsay Foundation.

Claire Moran does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. How young Black African Australians use social media to challenge anti-Black narratives and reclaim racial dignity – https://theconversation.com/how-young-black-african-australians-use-social-media-to-challenge-anti-black-narratives-and-reclaim-racial-dignity-185504

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Thea van de Mortel, Professor, Nursing and Deputy Head (Learning & Teaching), School of Nursing and Midwifery, Griffith University

We’re now pretty used to swabbing our nose to test for COVID when we have a scratchy throat or new cough. But should we also be using our rapid antigen test (RAT) to swab our throat, as some social media sources suggest?

As people with an Omicron infection often get a sore throat early on, they reason that Omicron is found first in the throat. So swabbing the throat and nose together, some social media sources say, is more likely to accurately detect an infection.

A sore throat is more common with Omicron than Delta. However this doesn’t mean you should use your nasal RAT to swab your throat for Omicron. It’s best to follow the instructions on the packet.

Remind me, what are the different types of RATs?

There are several different ways to test for COVID using a RAT.

Oral samples can include saliva (spit into a tube), saliva from a tongue or cheek swab, or a throat swab (tonsil area).

Nasal samples can be collected from the front (anterior), middle or back (nasopharyngeal) of the nose.

There are also many different brands of RAT. Their ability to detect a positive case varies depending on the brand, the variant, whether the person has symptoms, and their viral load at the time of the test.

Read more:
Taking your first rapid antigen test? 7 tips for an accurate result

What do studies say about RATs for the nose vs throat?

It’s complicated. The time lag between researchers conducting a study and its publication means studies that compare sampling methods were largely conducted before Omicron, or before the widespread use of RATs.

A systematic review of 23 pre-Omicron studies found nasal and throat samples tested together were more sensitive (meaning they accurately detected a positive case) than nasal samples alone: 97% vs 86%.

However, these were swabs taken independently (with two separate swabs – one for the nose and one for the throat) and then combined at the point of testing the sample, rather than taking a combined nasal/throat swab (where the nose is swabbed then the throat is swabbed with the same swab, or vice versa). They also used PCRs rather than RATs.

A study conducted during the Omicron wave tested 49 people with PCR-confirmed COVID who had both nasal and throat swabs. It found 86% of positive cases were picked up by nasal swabs on a RAT compared with 47% detected by throat swabs, and 89% by both methods.

This suggests Omicron is not more easily detected in the throat. Adding a throat swab did not pick up many extra cases (3%).

However, a preprint study, which is yet to be peer-reviewed (checked by independent scientists), reports conflicting results.

In this study, individual nasal and throat swabs both detected 64.5% of infections. But some nasal samples tested positive when the throat swab was negative and vice versa. Doing both tests individually picked up around 89% of positive cases.

When individual nasal swabs were compared to a combined nasal/throat swab, the nasal swabs picked up around 68% of the cases, while the combined swab picked up around 82%.

In summary, of the two recent studies that include an Omicron sample, the published study found that nasal swabs were much more effective than throat swabs at detecting COVID. And if the results of both tests were combined, only 3% of extra cases would be detected.

The preprint (unpublished) study reports conflicting results, suggesting a combined nasal/throat swab would pick up an extra 14% of cases.

Read more:
Just how accurate are rapid antigen tests? Two testing experts explain the latest data

Does Omicron appear first or at higher levels in the throat?

A survey found those with Omicron were 9% more likely to report a sore throat than those with Delta, whereas the latter were more likely to report a runny nose and sneezing.

However, when comparing saliva from a throat swab to a deep nasal swab in a study of 624 people, researchers found more virus (known as viral load) in the deep nasal swabs than in saliva tests. A test is more likely to detect a positive case when the viral load is higher.

The researchers found more virus in the nasal swab regardless of the day the specimen was collected, which suggests the virus doesn’t appear earlier in the throat.

Detection of COVID in saliva from the throat was 4% less likely in Omicron compared to Delta cases, which suggests Omicron doesn’t increase the viral load of saliva in the throat either.

However, it’s important to note, the nasal swabs we take at home are unlikely to go as deep as those in this study, which could affect the results.

Other things to consider

The type of swab also differs, depending on whether it is designed for a nasal or oral test, and may not always be appropriate to sample a different area, because of differences in swab shape and flexibility.

The pH (a measure of acidity) also differs in the throat and the nose, and altered pH can affect COVID test function, and therefore could potentially affect the result.

So what should you do?

The website of Australia’s regulator, the Therapeutic Goods Administration, recommends performing either a nasal or oral test, as the instructions direct.

Likewise, the US Food and Drug Administration recommends RAT instructions are followed to the letter.

While the UK’s National Health Service (Britain) website refers to swabbing both the throat and nose, this is using a RAT kit that is made to do both.

As there is currently no clear evidence that Omicron appears in the throat earlier or at higher levels, and RATs are designed and tested for the specific area being sampled, it makes sense to continue to follow the test instructions.

If you wish to swab both areas, it’s best to use two separate tests designed for those areas.

Read more:
Can you use rapid antigen tests in children under 2 years old?

Thea van de Mortel teaches into the Griffith University Infection Prevention and Control postgraduate programs.

– ref. When RAT-testing for COVID, should you also swab your throat? – https://theconversation.com/when-rat-testing-for-covid-should-you-also-swab-your-throat-184732

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Bjorn Sturmberg, Research Leader, Battery Storage & Grid Integration Program, Australian National University

The Black Summer bushfires devastated parts of the Eurobodalla region in New South Wales. Then earlier this year, the area was hit by floods. As climate change threatens to bring more severe and frequent extreme weather events, how can we help future-proof such communities?

One way is to build electricity systems that can withstand natural disasters. That was the starting point of a three-year project we’re undertaking. The project has just reached a milestone: selecting eight sites where microgrids – small, self-sufficient energy systems – might help boost disaster resilience.

Smart site selection for new technologies is crucial. Too often, projects have been parachuted into communities without enough consideration, leading to poor outcomes for both project operators and residents.

The climate and environmental crises demand innovations in our everyday infrastructures. If these changes are to be accepted and adopted en masse, we must find the right fit between communities and infrastructure. Here, we share what we’ve learnt so far, in the hope other regional communities might benefit.

A model community

Microgrids are small-scale electricity networks that can be used as part of, or separate to, the main electricity grid. They usually involve a range of local electricity sources, and can supply power when communities are cut off from the main network – such as during a storm or fire.

But the form that microgrids should take is unclear and contested. A microgrid could be limited to servicing a handful of essential shops during disasters, or it could power the whole community all year round – protecting it from electricity market volatility as well as disasters.

The Eurobodalla Shire is a picturesque coastal region with a growing population.
During the Black Summer fires, power supplies were lost across large parts region and the outage lasted several days.

Our project is working with Eurobodalla communities to determine if microgrids are right for them. We aim to model using microgrids coupled with renewable energy – including household, commercial and community solar, and small- and medium-scale batteries.

Read more:
Floods left thousands without power. Microgrids could help communities weather the next disaster

Context is everything

Under the previous federal government, Australia’s approach to emissions reduction was narrow and technology-centred.

The new Labor government – elected on the promise of climate action – has the opportunity to move to a community-based approach. This should ensure any new infrastructure integrates with people’s lives, values, and aspirations.

Such an approach requires proponents and funding bodies (both government and private) to genuinely listen to communities’ needs – right from the early design stage.

If local circumstances are not considered, a trial can be plagued with problems. These include:

• technical systems that do not address the community’s real problem, such as power outages at crucial times
• confusion and cost overruns for local installers and supply chains
• disgruntled trial participants who rightly reject or abandon the new technology.

Read more:
Tesla’s ‘virtual power plant’ might be second-best to real people power

Listening to local voices

So how did we decide which communities to work with? One guiding principle was to elevate local voices in the decision-making process.

For the selection of sites we held discussions with organisations including the local electricity network company, a prominent community group focused on sustainability and the Eurobodalla Shire Council.

Based on our initial discussions and a literature review, we compiled a set of indicators to help identify which communities would most benefit from the resilience boost that microgrids offer. The indicators include:

• population size, age and income
• rates of people with disability
• cultural and ethnic diversity
• the frequency and duration of past power outages
• layout of the town and electricity network
• a community’s visions for its future.

In the case of the Eurobodalla region, we also considered communities’ past experience of traumatic disasters, and subsequent “consultation fatigue” following the many investigations into the Black Summer fires.

While our assessment was project specific, we’ve made our framework freely available here so it might inform future technology trials.

From these indicators, we selected eight communities ranging from small hamlets of less than 100 residents to larger towns with more than 2,000 residents.

All were found to be vulnerable to natural disaster – for example, they may have had high residential occupancy rates (as opposed to holiday lettings), or lots of elderly people and those with disability. These communities also had high rates of rooftop solar installation.

The project team will now speak to residents and businesses in each community about their future energy needs, and whether microgrids might have a role. We’ll ask questions such as:

• what, if any, microgrid designs appeal to you – ranging from backup power for community shelters to large systems servicing an entire community?

• what, if any, business models do you support, ranging from current market structures to more active roles for the local council or citizens?

By the end of the project, we hope to have identified which, if any, communities wish to move forward with microgrids. For those that do, our project will provide the initial social research and technical feasibility studies on which to build proposals and potentially apply for federal funding.

Looking to a clean energy future

As the climate emergency worsens, there is too much at stake to adopt the “decide, announce, defend” method of technology roll-out. Community-based approaches will better build the widespread support needed to accelerate climate action.

And the recent energy crisis on east coast showed natural disasters aren’t the only threats to electricity supplies. As the national electricity market grapples with a perfect storm of challenges, technology to help communities become energy self-sufficient makes even more sense.

Read more:
The national electricity market is a failed 1990s experiment. It’s time the grid returned to public hands

Bjorn Sturmberg has received funding from the State and Federal governments, including from the Australian Renewable Energy Agency. for work related to solar, batteries, microgrids, and electric vehicles.

Hedda Ransan-Cooper has received funding from the State and Federal governments, including from the Australian Renewable Energy Agency for work related to solar, batteries, microgrids, and electric vehicles.

Johannes Hendriks has received funding from the State and Federal governments, including from the Australian Renewable Energy Agency for work related to microgrids, and electric vehicles.

Pierrick Chalaye has received funding from Federal government, including from the Department of Industry, Science, Energy and Resources for work related to microgrids.

– ref. The clean energy revolution isn’t just a techno-fix – it’s about capturing hearts and minds – https://theconversation.com/the-clean-energy-revolution-isnt-just-a-techno-fix-its-about-capturing-hearts-and-minds-183341

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amanda Levido, Research Fellow – Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for the Digital Child, Queensland University of Technology

Recent outrage surrounding a young children’s toy “vlogger” set echoes moral panics of the past, particularly when words such as children, play and digital come together.

Aldi recently released a new range of wooden toys, including the Vlogger set for children aged 3 and older. This set has sparked discussion on Twitter, including criticism.

As researchers who explore the ways young children are growing up in the digital age, we want to move this conversation past any initial shock.

Instead of feeding into any moral panic, we would suggest taking the time to consider what children can get out of playing with such toys. They might benefit from activities like practising the making of digital media and mimicking the real-world practices of the adults in their lives.

Children live in a digital age

Digital technology is increasingly part of children’s everyday lives. They are being introduced to media-making practices at younger ages than in the past.

Children don’t just watch their favourite content online. They produce their own media when they film what’s happening around them.

Read more:
Online and out there: how children view privacy differently from adults

Children also observe adults’ own media practices. Many Australians create their own digital media content.

And most future jobs are going to require digital skills.

Not only is social media entertainment a legitimate and growing industry, learning how to communicate through media-making practices is important for children now and to build upon in the future. Young children might use filters on video calls with family but as they move through their tween and teen years they may have to make video presentations at school or choose to connect with friends through video-orientated platforms such as TikTok, SnapChat and Instagram.

Whether we like it or not, this is the reality for many young people.

People do have concerns about children online

Of course, there is ongoing concern about children online.

Controversy about child influencers or “kidfluencers” continues to fuel debate about the presence and exploitation of children in online media entertainment. A notorious example was DaddyOFive, where children’s reactions to “pranks” by their parents were shown on YouTube. Other examples include popular YouTube content of children unboxing toys and the rise of “micro-microcelebrities” – young celebrities who derive their exposure and fame through their parents’ sharing or “sharenting”, online.

Read more:
When exploiting kids for cash goes wrong on YouTube: the lessons of DaddyOFive

These examples understandably call for greater consideration of how children are represented online. It’s essential to critically examine exploitative commercialisation practices and champion children’s right to privacy. At the same time, it’s important to remember that not all media produced by and for children are inherently bad or harmful.

Children are at some stage likely to produce media and share things online. Organisations such as Common Sense and Australia’s eSafety Commissioner provide useful resources for families to help children navigate the production and consumption of online media in guided and considered ways.

Through this lens, toys like this Vlogger set could also be considered a resource for parents and educators to start conversations with young children about what it means to make content online.

Read more:
Posting a child’s life for the world to see is a privacy issue

Children need to learn media literacy

Wooden toy versions of digital devices, such as cameras, laptops, phones and tablets, are common.

We understand it can be unsettling to think about children playing with toys that reflect our own media practices. However, if we consider the shifting practices of media production and distribution, it is possible to understand that children can learn important ideas from these toys. They can begin to develop early understandings of media literacy and how to use technology.

Take the vlogger set, for example. In media production, lighting is an essential part of ensuring we can communicate our intended meaning to our audience. We can create mood, convey emotion and set audience expectations. Through exploring the ringlight feature of the vlogger toy children are learning how to apply media languages.

Through playful exploration and imagined production, children can start to think not only about what they share but how they share and who they share with.

Read more:
We live in an age of ‘fake news’. But Australian children are not learning enough about media literacy

Let the children play

Children’s imaginative role-playing toys have many benefits. These include being able to act out real and imagined situations, especially when parents are involved with play. There are countless versions of these toys, including chef sets, doctors kits, cleaning sets and tool belts.

While adults might buy these sets in the hope that their child will be inspired to start a career journey, we don’t expect every child who plays with a chef set to become a chef. We would hope one day they’ll learn to cook since that’s an important everyday life skill.

Read more:
Can toys really be ‘educational’? Well that depends on the parents

The vlogger toy is no different. Some might argue it encourages children to be YouTube stars or influencers. And if some children want to be part of that profession (and it is a legitimate profession for some), then they can look back at the cute photos their parents took of them and maybe posted online, using the vlogger set, and remember where it all started.

Amanda Levido is affiliated with the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for the Digital Child.

Aleesha Rodriguez is affiliated with the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for the Digital Child.

– ref. Relax, it’s just a ringlight for kids. Toys like the ‘vlogger set’ prepare them for a digital world – https://theconversation.com/relax-its-just-a-ringlight-for-kids-toys-like-the-vlogger-set-prepare-them-for-a-digital-world-185139

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Warwick Smith, Research economist, The University of Melbourne

Australia’s new federal treasurer, Jim Chalmers, spoke regularly in opposition about a well-being budget and the need to measure more than just the traditional economic indicators.

He was even mocked for it by his predecessor, Josh Frydenberg, who joked about him “fresh from his ashram deep in the Himalayas, barefoot, robes flowing, incense burning, beads in one hand, well-being budget in the other”.

Chalmers hasn’t been deterred. The day he was formally sworn in as treasurer he reiterated of the need for better ways to measure progress:

It is really important that we measure what matters in our economy in addition to all of the traditional measures. Not instead of, but in addition to. I do want to have better ways to measure progress, and to measure the intergenerational consequences of our policies.

This commitment presents an important opportunity to address the many critical challenges Australia faces – from housing affordability, to the environment and Indigenous justice and reconciliation.

Just as importantly, it is an opportunity for neglected conversations – about what progress means, and what we want from our lives and for future generations.

Read more:
5 charts on Australian well-being, and the surprising effects of the pandemic

The limits of measuring ‘growth’

The traditional measures of national progress to which Chalmers was referring are primarily economic indicators: growth, employment, inflation and exports.

The biggest headline measure of economic progress is gross domestic product – or the very similar gross national product (used by the US government from 1934 to 1991) – which tallies economic activity by counting the total dollar value of all of goods and services sold in a year.

GDP as a measure of progress has always had its detractors. Even economist Simon Kuznets, who laid the the groundwork for measuring GNP in the 1930s, regarded it a poor measure of national welfare.

Read more:
Beyond GDP: here’s a better way to measure people’s prosperity

Serious public discussion about GDP’s limits and alternatives kicked off in the late 1960s and early 1970s. In March 1968, three months before he was assassinated, US senator Robert F. Kennedy railed against “the mere accumulation of material things”:

Our gross national product counts air pollution and cigarette advertising and ambulances to clear our highways of carnage. It counts special locks for our doors and the jails for the people who break them. It counts the destruction of the redwood and the loss of our natural wonder in chaotic sprawl […]

Yet the gross national product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education, or the joy of their play. It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages, the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of our public officials.

In other words, GDP measures some things that don’t improve our lives and doesn’t measure many things that do.

Measuring what matters

The aim of a well-being approach is to better measure the things that matter, thereby improving the focus of policy makers.

Economic outcomes are not the only basis on which Australian governments make policy decisions, but they do receive disproportionate attention. That’s in part because it is relatively easy to measure things in dollars.

Employment is obviously important, but we also need to look beyond the headline numbers at the types of jobs, their security and the pay and conditions. Also important is the quality and access to education and health care (mental and physical) as well as the quality of our environment.

Read more:
GDP ignores the environment: why it’s time for a more sustainable growth metric

Australia had a world-record 28 years continuous economic growth before the COVID-induced recession of 2020. Did this solve all our social, environmental and economic problems? Far from it. Indeed higher incomes have caused and amplified some of those problems.

Australia had a framework in 2004

Chalmers has mentioned New Zealand’s Wellbeing Budget process, introduced by the Ardern government in 2019, as an inspiration.

In fact, New Zealand’s Treasury, along with other international well-being budget approaches, were inspired by the well-being framework the Australian Treasury established in 2004.

But the Australian framework was scrapped in 2016 under then treasurer Scott Morrison.

There is now an alliance of governments who have adopted well-being approaches, includeing Iceland, Finland, New Zealand, Scotland and Wales. Leading the field, however, is Bhutan, which has had Gross National Happiness as the main goal of government for decades.

The lessons from these governments is that a well-being approach must be embedded in every level of government and throughout the public service.

As Jane Davidson, who was a key Welsh government minister through four versions of Wales’ well-being framework, has said, it must be clear to everyone what it means to have well-being as a goal and how to get there.

High-level measurement and goal setting, without a clear public service reform program, will likely just lead to business as usual, embellished with the language of well-being.

Another critical element is accountability. It’s not enough to set goals and report on them. Ministers and public servants must be held accountable for their progress (or lack thereof).

In Wales, the Well-being of Future Generations Act 2015 established a Future Generations Commissioner to assist with the reforms, but also to scrutinise and hold the government to account.

Well-being work in progress

The Ardern government delivered New Zealand’s fourth Wellbeing Budget last month.

Read more:
A budget for the ‘squeezed middle’ – but will it be the political circuit-breaker Labour wants?

It’s a work in progress. Each year brings incremental improvements, including new methods to integrate well-being measures into traditional cost-benefit analysis.

Like Wales and New Zealand, the Australian government must be prepared to make mistakes and learn from them.

But the biggest step will be the first.

Read more:
Labour’s fourth ‘well-being budget’ still comes up short on the well-being of women

Warwick Smith is the Wellbeing Lead at the Centre for Policy Development, an independent policy research organisation and is a director of the Castlemaine Institute.

– ref. Beyond GDP: Jim Chalmers’ historic moment to build a well-being economy for Australia – https://theconversation.com/beyond-gdp-jim-chalmers-historic-moment-to-build-a-well-being-economy-for-australia-184318

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jacob Sunter, PhD Student, University of Adelaide

Recently screened at the Sydney Film Festival, Fire Island is a rom-com inspired by Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, the film breaking traditional conventions to feature gay romance as the plot.

The fact that it is streaming on Disney+ speaks clearly about how ordinary non-heterosexualities have become. While it might be surprising that it has taken this long for same-sex romance to reach the mainstream, Australian audiences might be forgiven for wondering about the significance of the title of the film.

The island in question is a barrier island off the coast of Long Island, New York City, featuring a unique and threatened environment that has long been a gay sanctuary, providing a space of freedom and expression at a time when same-sex activity was still illegal and gay communities highly policed.

Prohibition, hurricanes and writing

Fire Island always attracted history’s brightest queer figures. Overlooking the Great South Bay in 1857, Walt Whitman contemplated the “wrecks and wreckers” of Fire Island. Taking respite from his 1882 American lecture series, Oscar Wilde enjoyed several days at Cherry Grove’s Perkinson’s Hotel.

In the Prohibition years of the 1920s, Fire Island’s remote location attracted a new crowd of thirsty mainlanders. To New York’s gay theatre personalities, the Grove’s relaxed policing suggested freedom and safety, though they remained outnumbered by the island’s wealthy heterosexuals.

In the Great Hurricane of 1938, two thirds of the island’s cottages were destroyed. Amassing large debts in the effort to rebuild, straight locals rented their properties to a younger metropolitan crowd, a crowd who heard whispers of the island’s untamed beauty throughout New York’s downtown gay scene. By the 1940s, the island’s small contingent of gay theatre personalities grew to a vibrant queer majority, and Cherry Grove earned its name as America’s first gay and lesbian town.

In the 1940s and 1950s, Fire Island emerged as a creative and literary space. Far removed from the noise and distractions of the city, the island’s serene and quiet landscape offered a place to read, reflect, and compose. Its catalogue of queer writers included WH Auden, Patricia Highsmith, Tennessee Williams, Frank O’Hara, and Truman Capote.

In 1955, Capote drafted Breakfast at Tiffany’s while staying at Carrington House. This drive to create was occasionally at-odds with the island’s emerging party scene. In a poem as early as 1948, Auden ridiculed the “bosoms and backsides” that paraded across the beach, the “great” masses who “will be drunk till Fall.”

Disco to meat rack

Cherry Grove’s queer reputation only grew in the 60s and 70s. Gay vacationers began to reside in the Pines, Cherry Grove’s conservative neighbour. Contrary to Auden’s fears, the island offered a site of both sexual and artistic exploration.

As gay men cruised the Meat Rack, the wild terrain at the edge of Cherry Grove, Andy Warhol and David Hockney sought creative inspiration in the island’s erotic and visual cultures. Warhol examined this atmosphere of open sexuality in his 1965 film My Hustler, and Hockney experimented with photography while staying on the island.

The island’s impact extended further throughout the golden years of disco. Pines DJ Tom Moulton revolutionised the clubbing scene with the invention of the extended mix, first played at the Sandpiper discotheque.

Tensions stirred, however, between Cherry Grove’s established population and the affluent community of the Pines. In 1976, Cherry Grove drag queen Teri Warren was denied service at a Pines restaurant. Grove residents dressed in drag, boarded a water taxi, and stormed the Pines in protest. Dubbed the first “invasion” the event is repeated every 4th of July, though to a much warmer reception from the Pines locals.

The AIDS epidemic saw the devastating loss of many island residents. What once represented sexual freedom became largely a site of care, a place to politically mobilise and grieve.

Fire Island today

Once a place of primitive living conditions, without running water or electricity – a real retreat – the island now features cutting-edge architecture, pumping clubs and a vibrant party scene, from “tea dances” at the Blue Whale to the infamous underwear parties at the Ice Palace. It is within this culture that the film Fire Island places its action.

With the development of PrEP and greater awareness about sexual safety, the island’s culture of sexual experimentation has largely returned, though concerns remain that digital cruising apps such as Grindr and Scruff put these historical queer sites at risk.

While other gay and lesbian enclaves exist around the world, mostly they are suburbs, often on the way to gentrification. As non-heterosexualities become more acceptable, at least in some parts of the world, the need for queer people to cluster for safety and comfort is less pressing.

Yet Fire Island continues to be a gay mecca, its remarkable history and contribution to art and literature legendary despite the fact that its predominantly white, male, cisgender, and upper-class aficionados make this legacy rather exclusive. Centring on the experiences of queer Asian Americans, the film Fire Island underscores the island’s ambivalence as a safe haven for marginalised queer identities.

While its current reality might lack the romance of its former bohemian cache, it nonetheless remains a place where queers – some at least – can feel “normal”, part of the majority at last. This might be its enduring appeal.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Art, freedom and drag invasions: the history of New York’s Fire Island as a gay sanctuary – https://theconversation.com/art-freedom-and-drag-invasions-the-history-of-new-yorks-fire-island-as-a-gay-sanctuary-185214

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra

Anthony Albanese will be on the international road again next week. He’ll be at the NATO summit in Madrid, where the war in Ukraine will obviously dominate the discussions, which will also canvass China and climate change.

Albanese, who earlier attended the QUAD in Tokyo and visited Indonesia, isn’t going to be a minimalist when it comes to spending time overseas.

International conferences give an opportunity for the new PM to meet multiple leaders, gather information and signal continuities and change (for example on climate policy) in Australia’s national priorities.

A just-elected prime minister must be careful in deciding how much foreign travel to undertake, especially when there are problems at home and many ordinary people are doing it tough on their cost of living. At some point, being away too much stirs criticism.

But with NATO inviting four non-member countries – Japan, South Korea and New Zealand, as well as Australia – it would have been a hard invitation to turn down.

The trip includes Paris, in the wake of the Labor government settling compensation for the aborted submarine contract. This stop does seem something of an indulgence, although it could give an opportunity to explore co-operation with France in the Pacific.

Albanese clearly also wants to visit Ukraine. He indicated on Wednesday this would depend on advice from Australian security agencies.

The PM has been equally peripatetic domestically. He’s already been to all states and territories since the election.

Ministers have also been early overseas travellers: among them Foreign Minister Penny Wong, whose second home now seems to be the Pacific, and Defence Minister Richard Marles, who had what was seen as that (maybe) ice-breaking meeting with his Chinese counterpart in Singapore, before a visit to India.

A particularly important trip was Home Affairs Minister Clare O’Neil’s visit to Sri Lanka this week. One of Labor’s fears has materialised as people smugglers start to test the border. The government acted quickly, with O’Neil’s diplomacy and a $50 million humanitarian aid package for the country. Australia will also fund, as announced by the Coalition government, thousands of GPS trackers to be installed on Sri Lankan fishing boats.

The trickle of boats, none of which has reached the Australian mainland, is not serious so far, but the government knows the risks if it is not quickly cut off.

In general, we’re seeing the new government highly active on multiple fronts, driven by circumstances, particularly with the energy crisis, as well as by choice. It was notable this week that after months of the former government playing down COVID despite the significant number of deaths, Health Minister Mark Butler stepped up the messaging about vaccination and treatment, including launching a public campaign.

Beside the intense front-of-shop activity, a good deal of change is being set in train in the government’s back office, the public service.

Labor signalled in the campaign it wanted to remuscle the bureaucracy, after it had been run down and demoralised by the Coalition government.

Read more:
Albanese government mobilises diplomacy and aid in effort to counter Sri Lanka people smugglers

Scott Morrison downplayed the bureaucracy’s advisory role, outsourced much of its work to consultants, failed to implement some of the more important recommendations of the Thodey review of the service, and arbitrarily sacked a number of departmental secretaries.

This week Albanese wielded a small axe of his own, removing the secretary of the Foreign Affairs Department, Kathryn Campbell (Penny Wong was no fan, and Campbell had a history with Robodebt), and the head of infrastructure, Simon Atkinson.

Immediately after the election Albanese appointed Glyn Davis to head his own department, indicating he’s determined to leave the public service in better shape than he has found it. Davis is a policy wonk with extensive administrative experience and a reform bent; he was a member of the Thodey review.

The changes this week reinforced the point. A former senior bureaucrat, Gordon de Brouwer, also a member of the Thodey review, is returning as “secretary for public sector reform”.

In this context, on Thursday night one of Australia’s most distinguished recent public servants had some advice. Frances Adamson is a former ambassador to China, served as foreign affairs adviser in PM Malcolm Turnbull’s office, and later headed the Foreign Affairs Department. Adamson – who is now South Australian governor – knows the bureaucracy inside out.

In an oration named in her honour, she outlined what she described as four “encouragements” and one “entreaty” to public servants. They amount to an agenda for improvement.

Read more:
Head of Foreign Affairs Kathryn Campbell ousted in public service shake-up

First, she urged the full implementation of the Thodey review “in letter and in spirit”. The effect of the recommendations that were not taken up would be to give senior public servants more independence and protection.

Second, Adamson exhorted public servants to “think more broadly about our times and what they require of you”.

“This is a time for steadiness, for listening and consultation, close collaboration, and a renewed appreciation of and respect for expertise in policy development – whether on the economy, climate change, China or homelessness,” she said.

“A time to grow that expertise in a purposeful way through recruiting and development and to share it widely. And, certainly, time for frank, fearless, well-informed, creative and constructive advice.”

Her third “encouragement” related to the culture of the public service: the importance of fostering “a genuine sense of belonging that goes beyond the ways we typically think about diversity, equity and inclusion”.

“Belonging,” she said, “is about meaningful work, relationships, agency and accountability.”

Fourthly, Adamson stressed the importance of public servants having good relationships with counterparts in other levels of government. Although she didn’t go down this path, co-operation between federal and state governments will be vital if the Albanese government is to secure its aim of improving productivity.

Adamson’s “entreaty” was about integrity. “The 2022 election campaign should not leave us in any doubt about the importance the Australian people attach to integrity and the structures required to support it,” she said.

“Acting with integrity is how the service maintains the confidence and trust of the public. Indeed, integrity is one thing that does shift community attitudes and trust in government, so it is one of the tools that public servants have in strengthening public institutions.”

Adamson concluded that “the quality of public service contributes to a nation’s strategic weight […] Australia’s strategic weight in turn contributes to the stability, security, prosperity and development of our region and its character.”

The better the quality and robustness of the advice coming from the public service, the greater the chance of the Albanese government leaving the sort of “legacy” to which its prime minister says he aspires.

Michelle Grattan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Grattan on Friday: Anthony Albanese has a lot on the go in the ‘back office’ of government – https://theconversation.com/grattan-on-friday-anthony-albanese-has-a-lot-on-the-go-in-the-back-office-of-government-185695

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jacqueline Peel, Director, Melbourne Climate Futures, The University of Melbourne

A major new climate case to stop Woodside’s controversial Scarborough gas project going ahead has been filed by the Australian Conservation Foundation (ACF) in the federal court this week. ACF lawyers argue that the potential for the project’s emissions to harm the Great Barrier Reef must be assessed.

While the case has only just begun, as legal experts, we see this as a landmark challenge.

Gas is often presented as a “transition fuel” towards a green economy. Woodside argues the Scarborough development will help to reduce global emissions by replacing coal with “cleaner” gas. But scientists say gas must rapidly exit the global power sector to keep the Paris Agreement’s 1.5℃ temperature goal in reach.

Indeed, a 2021 study found if the full Scarborough-Pluto project goes ahead, it’ll release over three times Australia’s current annual emissions.

ACF’s case against Woodside will be an important test of Australia’s new climate credentials. It will also fundamentally confront the question: what role, if any, will gas play in the energy transition?

The next frontier of climate litigation is gas

Australian climate lawyers are no stranger to challenging approvals for coal mines in the country. The ACF’s case brings similar strategies to the Scarborough gas project.

Woodside’s Scarborough-Pluto gas project proposes to drill and pipe gas from off the coast of Western Australia, mainly to supply natural gas to countries in Asia.

The company has said their oil and gas projects are consistent with their science-based, Paris-aligned reduction targets for scope 1 and scope 2 emissions, which include emissions directly released from the project, such as leaking methane. But this doesn’t include the scope 3 emissions, which are associated with burning gas by overseas customers.

Read more:
The ultra-polluting Scarborough-Pluto gas project could blow through Labor’s climate target – and it just got the green light

As the 2021 study concluded, the Scarborough gas project will cause an estimated 1.37 billion tonnes of cumulative emissions by 2055.

Despite these potentially significant climate change impacts, the Scarborough gas project has never been approved under Australia’s environmental protection law, the EPBC Act.

This is because Australian law allows all offshore gas and oil projects to be assessed under a streamlined process by the offshore regulator, the National Offshore Petroleum Safety and Environment Management Authority. The EPBC Act also doesn’t include a “climate trigger” requiring the climate change impacts of projects to be assessed.

Lawyers for the ACF will argue the project is likely to have significant impacts on the heritage values of the Great Barrier Reef.

They’ll point to the broader carbon footprint of the project, arguing the burning and consumption of the gas in other countries will increase greenhouse gas emissions in the atmosphere, thereby increasing global average surface temperature, and increasing the risk of mass coral bleaching in the Great Barrier Reef.

Until an environmental impact assessment has taken place, lawyers say Woodside must be restrained from developing the Scarborough gas project.

An uphill battle?

The ACF’s case has only just begun and will likely encounter headwinds in efforts to make out its novel claim.

Last year, we saw the disappointing result in the Sharma case, where the federal court unanimously overturned a finding that the federal environment minister owed Australian children a duty of care to prevent harm from emissions caused by approving a coal extension project.

Indeed, other challenges to the Scarborough gas project in the WA supreme court have not found success, nor have challenges to another gas project, Narrabri, in NSW.

But the ACF case takes a different tack. It uses an application for an injunction to allow evidence be given about how the Scarborough project impacts the environment. On the other hand, previous challenges to the Scarborough gas project focused on the decision-making process.

And in recent years there have also been other notable cases in the Rocky Hill litigation and the KEPCO mine, where the courts have refused to approve new fossil fuel developments on environmental grounds.

Read more:
Today’s disappointing federal court decision undoes 20 years of climate litigation progress in Australia

Between a climate crisis and an energy crisis

The ACF’s case against Woodside’s Scarborough gas project is linked to much broader tensions between the need for urgent climate ambition, the global and domestic energy crisis, and arguments around needing gas as a transition fuel.

Globally, the validity of gas as a transition fuel is being tested.

Last year, the International Energy Agency published a pathway for the planet to reach net zero emissions by 2050. Under this pathway, there would be “no new oil and gas fields approved for development […] and no new coal mines or mine extensions”.

Read more:
4 reasons why a gas-led economic recovery is a terrible, naïve idea

And this month, Climate Analytics published analysis saying gas “must exit electricity generation rapidly after coal – as early as 2035 in rich countries, and by 2040 for the rest of the world – to keep the Paris Agreement’s 1.5℃ limit in reach”.

Even Woodside’s own investors are questioning the company’s pathway in the transition to net zero, with nearly 50% of shareholders voting against its climate report, as it lacked detail and overly relied on carbon offsets.

At the same annual meeting, though, Woodside’s shareholders voted resoundingly in favour of the company’s merger with BHP’s petroleum arm. This cemented BHP’s move away from fossil fuels, and significantly increased Woodside’s oil and gas portfolio.

If the ACF case succeeds, it’s likely to be harder for future gas projects of this scale to be approved.

Beyond any courtroom result, cases such as the ACF’s challenge raise public awareness and conversations among policymakers about the future trajectory of the clean energy transition in this country. And this case could break new ground.

Jacqueline Peel receives funding from the Australian Research Council for a Discovery Project on Advancing Investor Action on Energy Transition (2022-2024).

Ben Neville receives funding from the Australian Research Council for a Discovery Project on Advancing Investor Action on Energy Transition (2022-2024).

Rebekkah Markey-Towler is undertaking a PhD associated with funding from the Australian Research Council for a Discovery Project on Advancing Investor Action on Energy Transition (2022-2024).

– ref. Why this new climate case against the high-polluting Scarborough gas project is so significant – https://theconversation.com/why-this-new-climate-case-against-the-high-polluting-scarborough-gas-project-is-so-significant-185578

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Gail Iles, Senior Lecturer in Physics, RMIT University

Last Saturday, a two-seater SIAI-Marchetti S.211 jet took off from Essendon Fields Airport in Melbourne with an expert aerobatic pilot at the controls and a case full of scientific experiments in the passenger seat.

Pilot Steve Gale took the jet on Australia’s first commercial “parabolic flight”, in which the plane flies along the path of a freely falling object, creating a short period of weightlessness for everyone and everything inside.

Parabolic flights are often a test run for the zero-gravity conditions of space. This one was operated by Australian space company Beings Systems, which plans to run regular commercial flights in coming years.

As Australia’s space program begins to take off, flights like these will be in high demand.

What was on the plane?

The experiments aboard the flight were small packages developed by space science students at RMIT University. As program manager of RMIT’s space science degree, I have been teaching these students for the past three years, preparing them for a career in the Australian space industry.

The experiments investigate the effect of zero gravity on plant growth, crystal growth, heat transfer, particle agglomeration, foams and magnetism.

Scientific phenomena behave differently in zero gravity than in labs on Earth. This is important for two main reasons.

First, zero gravity, or “microgravity”, provides a very “clean” environment in which to conduct experiments. By removing gravity from the system, we can study a phenomenon in a more “pure” state and thus understand it better.

Second, microgravity platforms such as parabolic flights, sounding rockets and drop towers provide test facilities for equipment and science before it is sent into space.

Read more:
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Lab on a plane: a mini ISS

Last Saturday’s flight was a success, with the six experiments recording a variety of data and images.

The plants experiment observed broccoli seedlings throughout the flight and found no adverse reactions to hyper- or micro-gravity.

Another experiment formed a crystal of sodium acetate trihydrate in microgravity, which grew much larger than its counterpart on the ground.

The biggest zero-gravity lab is of course the International Space Station (ISS), where studies of plant growth, crystal growth and physical science phenomena are commonplace. At any one time 300 experiments are taking place on the ISS.

Turning a benchtop experiment into a self-contained science payload for space is not easy. Each one must be rigorously tested before launch to make sure it will work once it gets there, using parabolic flights or other testing platforms.

Going ‘zero-g’

There’s a common misconception that you have to go into space to experience microgravity. In fact, it’s the condition of freefall that makes things apparently weightless and that can be experienced here on Earth too.

If you throw a ball to a friend, it traces an arc as it flies through the air. From the moment it leaves your hand it’s in freefall – yes, even on the way up – and this is the exact same arc that the aircraft flies. Instead of a hand, it has an engine providing the “push” it needs to travel and fall through the air, tracing out a parabolic arc as it goes.

Even the International Space Station is experiencing the very same freefall as the ball or the aircraft. The only difference for the ISS is it has enough velocity to “miss the ground” and keep going forwards. The combination of the forward velocity and the pull towards Earth keep it going around in circles, orbiting the planet.

Human spaceflight

Parabolic flights in the USA and Europe occur every two or three months. On the flights, researchers conduct science, companies test technologies and astronauts receive training in preparation for spaceflight missions.

As a researcher at the European Space Agency and former astronaut instructor, I am a veteran of five parabolic flight campaigns in Europe. I’ve completed over 500 parabolas on board the Novespace Airbus A300.

While I have never become sick on these flights, up to 25% of people aboard do vomit in the zero-g conditions. This is why they are sometimes called “vomit comets”.

Why now?

So why does Australia need parabolic flights all of a sudden? Since the Australian Space Agency was established in 2018, several space projects have received funding, including a lunar rover, four Earth-observation satellites and a space suit.

For these projects to succeed, all their various systems and components will need to be tested. That’s where parabolic flights come in.

As the demand increases, so too will the Australian aircraft. Beings Systems has plans to offer a larger aircraft –- such as a Lear jet – by 2023, such that researchers and companies alike can test their equipment, large and small, without leaving the country.

In addition to reading exciting scientific papers on the latest phenomena observed in microgravity, we’ll begin to see footage of satellites testing deployment of their antennae and people donning and doffing spacesuits on board parabolic flights.

Gail Iles does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Australia just flew its own ‘vomit comet’. It’s a big deal for zero-gravity space research – https://theconversation.com/australia-just-flew-its-own-vomit-comet-its-a-big-deal-for-zero-gravity-space-research-185601

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra

Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, is facing extradition to the United States after this was given the green light by the British Government. Assange faces charges of espionage over the publication of classified information about US actions in the Iraq War.

Barrister Greg Barns has worked pro bono on Assagne’s case for the last nine years as part of the Australian Assange campaign.

Barns argues the Assange issue “goes to fundamental questions like freedom of the press and freedom of speech.”

The election of the Albanese government has reignited calls for Australia to do more to try to bring Assange home.

“We’ve certainly been heartened by the approach taken by the new government,” Barns says.

“I think Anthony Albanese himself has been committed for some time now in his public statements and certainly been supportive privately of Assange’s position. He’s made that clear in a number of statements with a theme really that this has gone long enough.”

“There has been a marked change in rhetoric on the part of Mr Albanese, but also I think in his very telling statement that he did not want to pursue this matter through megaphone diplomacy, which we respect, because of course you’re dealing with Australia’s closest ally.”

“He wants to do something, but he wants to do it in a way that respects the friendship between Australia and the United States.”

On what US President Joe Biden should consider when it comes to the relationship with Australia and the issue of Assange, Barns notes Biden has “given a number of speeches now talking about democracy and the importance of democratic values”.

“This is an opportunity to assert those values by saying that freedom of speech and freedom of the press are fundamentally important in a democracy and in the democratic world. And so there are certainly plenty of avenues and plenty of reasons why President Biden might deal with this matter.”

“This case has gone on too long. There are fundamental principles at stake and it’s time to end it.”

Michelle Grattan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Politics with Michelle Grattan: Greg Barns on the battle to free Julian Assange – https://theconversation.com/politics-with-michelle-grattan-greg-barns-on-the-battle-to-free-julian-assange-185690

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alexander Gillespie, Professor of Law, University of Waikato

The concern about gangs and gang-related violence in New Zealand continues to be highly politicised. Government ministers are under constant media scrutiny and political pressure, with both sides trying to look more staunch on crime than the other. The problem is that these debates often lack history, context or vision.

Every generation panics intermittently about crime, especially when it concerns gangs and youth. One of the earliest New Zealand examples was in 1842 when 123 male juveniles who had been transported from Parkhurst Prison in England began roaming the streets of Auckland.

Although a plea by the head of police for a prohibition on further deportations was accepted, the country realised it had a problem.

The following years saw the introduction of new legislation, such as that designed to deal with “vagabonds and rogues” (including the particularly troublesome “incorrigible” ones). This overlapped with generic laws designed to protect public order and keep criminals locked up.

Crime did not stop, but it did evolve. It was recognised as “organised” in the 1920s, well before the first post-WWII counterculture emerged. But the country was so shocked by youth behaviour in the 1950s that a dedicated committee on “Moral Delinquency in Children and Adolescents” was established. Its findings on the sexual morality of teenagers were posted to every home in the land.

It was not a huge success. By the late 1950s there were around 41 “milkbar cowboy” gangs in Auckland and 17 in Wellington. By the early 1960s, more enduring brands like the Mongrel Mob and a New Zealand chapter of the Hells Angels were beginning to put down roots.

Six decades of a growing challenge

Since then, politicians have swung left and right, wielding sticks and then carrots to deal with the issue. As we examine in our recent book, People, Power, and Law: a New Zealand History, government responses have moved from involving isolated ministries towards multiple overlapping agencies approaching the problem strategically and holistically.

There has also been a plethora of legislation. As well as the continually evolving criminal law, there have been laws on everything from fortified houses and the recovery of criminal proceeds, through to the prohibition of gang patches in public spaces.

Read more:
Despite claims NZ’s policing is too ‘woke’, crime rates are largely static — and even declining

While the practicality of many of these laws is questionable, the fundamental point is that none has stemmed the tide. Gang membership reached about 2,300 by 1980. It took nearly 35 years to reach just under 4,000 in 2014, but then only seven years before the numbers doubled again to 8,061 in 2021.

Gang members are over-represented in crime statistics. As of mid-2021, 2,938 people in prison had a gang affiliation – approximately 35% of the prison population.

In many ways, these people have joined gangs for similar reasons the Parkhurst boys got together in the early 1840s: alienation, identity, purpose, respect, friendship, excitement, security and even economic opportunity.

Read more:
How coronavirus is changing the market for illegal drugs

Drugs and gangs

But today’s gangs are not the same. Their scale, methods and social impact (especially overseas) have all changed. They’ve become mobile, transnational enterprises worth an estimated 1.5% of global GDP.

The ever-expanding global supply and demand for illegal narcotics has impacts everywhere. Although New Zealand Customs’ illegal drug take was down during the pandemic, the overall trend is one of growing seizures and a diversity of offshore suppliers.

Read more:
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Drugs are obviously attractive to gangs. In the first quarter of 2021, methamphetamine, MDMA and cocaine netted an estimated NZ$77 million through illegal distribution.

The previous quarter was even higher, with about $8.5 million generated every week. The estimated 74 tonnes of cannabis consumed in New Zealand each year may add up to $1.5 billion to the total.

A bipartisan approach

Solving a problem of this scale will require a strategic shift away from treating organised criminal groups like a partisan political game. It’s an intergenerational challenge that should ideally be a cross-party issue.

One way to achieve this would be through a new framework law that encourages whichever government is in power to focus consistently on illegal activity by organised groups. It should begin with a detailed review of what has worked and what has failed legally, socially and culturally.

There would then need to be an agreed system of political accountability set against known and transparent targets and indicators. But laws and policies designed to deter and punish criminal activity must also be seen in a wider context.

Read more:
Policing by consent is not ‘woke’ — it is fundamental to a democratic society

The law does not exist in a vacuum. The rights of victims of organised crime should be measurably enhanced. And the rights of freedom of association and freedom from discrimination due to group identity need to be reconciled.

We also need to accept that gangs will not simply disappear. Areas for co-operation on shared lawful projects should be found. Helping people safely leave organised criminal organisations would be another priority.

Perhaps the most critical aim of all will be to slow gang recruitment. Of course, that is a fundamental challenge well beyond any single policy or program – to create an inclusive society where the pathways, opportunities and benefits of being a lawful citizen outweigh the alternative.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. New Zealand needs a new gang strategy – political consensus would be a good start – https://theconversation.com/new-zealand-needs-a-new-gang-strategy-political-consensus-would-be-a-good-start-185677

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Angela Conquet, PhD Candidate, The University of Melbourne

Three years in the making, Rising’s much-anticipated first edition brought to Melbourne’s festival-deprived audiences a rich program featuring 225 events.

With former Chunky Move founder and choreographer Gideon Obarzanek as co-director, it was only natural to expect a dance-heavy presence with eight local and international productions.

The works ranged from incredible local performer Jo Lloyd and her dancers in dialogue with drummer Jim White and guitarist Emmett Kelly, to the exquisite Indonesian dancer and choreographer Rianto’s ritualistic Hijra’h, but there were three works which I felt particularly captured something of this post-pandemic age.

Jurrungu Ngan-ga/Straight Talk

Marrugeku’s productions have often been straight talk – powerful invitations to reflect on the devastating effects of ongoing colonialism as experienced daily by Indigenous people and other marginalised communities.

Their works are almost always the result of intercultural collaborations, expressed through complex choreography expanding into spoken text, multimedia installations and diverse styles of dance.

This production is no different, inspired by ideas and experience contributed as material by choreographer Dalisa Pigram’s own grandfather Yawuru leader and senator Patrick Dodson, Kurdish Iranian writer and former Manus Island detainee Behrouz Boochani and Iranian-Australian scholar-activist Omid Tofighian.

Jurrungu Ngan-ga tackles the devastating consequences of Australia’s entrenched, government-sanctioned fixation with punishment through detention and incarceration.

The show brings together a cast of nine dancers of multiple backgrounds (from First Peoples, refugee, transgender and settler communities) who also contribute their embodied stories and histories to the piece.

It starts with a subtly exquisite solo, the dancer embracing the space with ample movement flowing freely. As it unfolds, movement becomes cagier, as if restrained, constrained by invisible barriers. It prefaces the next solo, a man pacing in a cell of light watched by a camera. He is in turn surveying by us watching the camera footage.

This is a man caged in a prison, caged in a body, and the movement – no longer ample – pulsates with repressed anger.

From here, the choreography grows into dizzying ensemble moments, including a surreal moment when the dancers navigate their way through a stage occupied by glowing crystal chandeliers lowered to the ground.

There is everything in this piece, from police abuse to spit-hoods to video surveillance, to naked bodies dumped on the floor with a muffled thump, to names of those who have perished in police custody or in detention. There is abuse and humiliation and moments of protest, of fury, and joy, wild and unapologetic.

The choreography is a breathtaking tour de force delivered by fierce bodies telling their dire stories. Although nothing is accusatory here, there is no breathing space for the audiences but to take it all in. As the final solo arrives, soothing and somewhat majestic, ears still resonate with the powerful rapping “this is Australia”.

This is Australia at its ugliest, in its fear of everything not from here, of everyone “not like us”, a mirror talking back at us.

Jurrungu Ngan-ga is truly a piece of its plagued times, viscerally sharp and brutally raw, so raw that it cuts to the bone, and the call to action at the end may well be the only way to catch the breath.

Read more:
Comic anticlimax in Nat Randall and Anna Breckon’s Set Piece

The Dancing Public

Danish choreographer Mette Ingvartsen’s The Dancing Public is also a piece about plagued times and as visceral as Marrugeku’s, yet very different.

We step into the dimly lit space. The music is raving and Ingvartsen, mingling with the audience, is inviting everyone to spread around. Some are starting to move with the music as they inspect the space. Then Ingvartsen gets up on one of the three platforms placed here and there, and starts to dance.

Furiously, relentlessly, her body pulses, throbs, possessed by the beats, convulsing in trance-like gestures.

As she dances, she chants about the unexplained hysterical mass dancing episodes that started in the 1300 in south of France and continued over time. People danced till they dropped, their feet covered in blood and their minds covered in fog. It was the time of mediaeval plaques and poverty.

She joins the crowds again and dances with anyone as she swirls her way to the other platform to tell us some more. She keeps dancing. There is no sweat dripping off her body, no heavy breathing. She is fury unleashed and it is mesmerising to watch. We forget about dancing.

Suddenly, she hurls her body over the platform railing and leaves it hanging there, in a rare moment of stillness, no sweat dripping, and we, with her, suspend our breath. And the dancing kicks off again, and goes on and on and at the end, she leaves us alone, to dance… or not.

If Dancing Public is about the public dancing it fails. The contagion from one body to the other does not take. Participatory dance shows are always tricky – they really depend on the audience mood and the dramaturgical tricks giving the cues. They also depend on who is in the room, and in Melbourne, given the ticket price, it wasn’t exactly the crowd most inclined to dance.

Dancing Public is indeed an experiment that needs to be experienced with the body, through the body. It is all that we have missed during these last two years. And here lies the merit of this show, in it turning a story from the past into some important questions for today: would we have all taken to the streets dancing if confinement had continued?

Could this be a new form of protest in our heavily policed socially-distanced post pandemic reality? Dancing manias were considered a threat to public order as crowds could be neither controlled nor explained.

In this sense, this show is more an invitation to consider our relationship to social norms, to being together, to acting collectively. How we respond to this invitation will depend on who is ready to let go.

Read more:
From creepy clowns to the dancing plague – when phobias are contagious

Multitud

At the start of Multitud, from the Uruguayan choreographer Tamara Cubas, the 72 volunteer performers are part of the audience – then, they step onto the stage, one by one, facing us. Bodies standing tall, lit by discreet fluoro lights.

Suddenly one bends, like a broken puppet, then another. Some fall to the ground, some crouch. Some rise back up, some don’t.

Later, they start running in circles. The circles grow into a spinning whirlwind.

They all coalesce into a vortex of piled, panting bodies, pulsing like magma, until they breathe as one: one single breath. A pause, and they erupt into a thunderous laughter. It is hilarious. It is hysterical, too, as they come together again into a crowd, frenzied and threatening this time, out of control, taking aim and tugging ferociously at a teenager in a green jumper.

They are vile.

The teenager stares at us as we witness what may turn into a public lynching. But the crowd calms down and there is silence and stillness again as they all watch us, the teenager and the attackers. In this suspended moment, one piercing cry is made of everyone’s cry. There is fury and anger and tears, real tears.

One wonders if we have caused them, placid witnesses of someone’s misery. Appeased, the crowd slowly disintegrates and retreats in the shadows backstage. In their final coming together, somehow they have lost their clothes. No, they have exchanged their clothes, nonchalantly at first, with sharper precision as they take or give, some are naked, some wear the wrong shoes, clothes fly everywhere, scattered now on the floor, some keep searching, some let go.

Multitud places the directions and the power of the actual choreography in the hands of the group – they decide where to start, what to do, how to end. They can opt out too. Every night is different. Every time is different.

Multitud succeeds where The Dancing Public fails. This, too, is an exquisite reflection on being together and acting collectively, yet this is about what holds us together as a collective.

This is not choreography for the masses, rather it is a multitude of relations between individual bodies, each affecting or being affected by the other. It is about being in communion; attentive, alert, attuned to the other. Then we become responsible for what we do collectively.

Multitud is fiercely political and delicately poetic, a tribute to what dance can (still) do in times of plague.

Read more:
Writing movement: why dance criticism matters

Angela Conquet does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. How Rising festival brought us dance in times of plague – https://theconversation.com/how-rising-festival-brought-us-dance-in-times-of-plague-183642

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rick Sarre, Emeritus Professor of Law and Criminal Justice, University of South Australia

The judge in the trial of Bruce Lehrmann, the staffer alleged to have raped Brittany Higgins, ruled on Tuesday, “regrettably and with gritted teeth”, that his trial will need to be delayed.

This was because of the media coverage and social media attention that followed Logie Award-winning journalist Lisa Wilkinson’s acceptance speech (she won a Logie for her coverage on The Project of the Brittany Higgins allegations).

In the speech, Wilkinson thanked Higgins for trusting her and The Project team with the story, and for changing the national conversation around allegations of sexual abuse.

Lehrmann’s lawyers successfully argued the speech was a potential “contempt of court”.

Chief Justice Lucy McCallum said:

“What concerns me most about this recent round is that the distinction between an allegation and a finding of guilt has been completely obliterated… The implicit premise of [the speech] is to celebrate the truthfulness of the story she exposed.”

One might have thought the exceptional umbrage taken by the courts against the media’s reporting of the George Pell case might have made the veteran journalist a little more cautious about referring to matters that are either currently or imminently before the courts.

According to news reports, Wilkinson had been warned by ACT Director of Public Prosecutions Shane Drumgold that her speech could delay the trial if it made reference to the case, but he reportedly didn’t want to listen when Wilkinson started to read it to him beforehand, offering that prosecutors “are not speech editors”.

Wilkinson reportedly told him she was not expecting to win, so the speech would not likely be made.

There’s also the complication that the prosecution reportedly plans to call Wilkinson as a witness in the trial.

Read more:
Cleo Smith interview: does Channel Nine run the risk of being in contempt of court?

What is ‘contempt of court’?

So, what caused the judge to make her ruling to stop the case in its tracks, and list it for trial at a date yet to be determined?

It’s the law designed to ensure all criminal trials are fair and it’s guided by the principles of “contempt of court”.

Contempt of court can arise if any words or actions by the media (or indeed anyone who makes a public statement) are deemed to interfere with the administration of justice, or constitute a disregard for the authority of the court.

The principle of contempt law that pertains to this case is that a jury must decide the guilt or innocence of an accused on the basis of the evidence before them, and not to allow other considerations to taint their deliberations.

This could include commenting publicly on the credibility of a victim’s story, stoking the public’s disdain of an accused by a storm of social media, or calling for a social evil to be tackled. This is referred to as sub judice (“under a judge”) contempt.

Back in February this year, Channel 9 came perilously close to being in contempt of court after airing material that could have been deemed to have a tendency to prejudice the judge’s consideration of a sentence for the man convicted of kidnapping Western Australian four-year-old Cleo Smith.

There need only be evidence the content – whether it be a media article reporting a speech, a social media post, or some other public discussion – could have a tendency to affect the thinking of the jurors in their deliberations. Actual proof that it did, in fact, influence jurors isn’t required. If successfully argued, a trial can be shifted to another jurisdiction, or delayed, or, potentially, aborted permanently.

That’s what Lehrmann’s lawyers asked the court to consider. “This speech did not need to be made,” his barrister Steve Whybrow said. He added that his client had no interest in delaying the trial, but he wanted it to be a fair trial.

What’s clear is the speech had the potential to prejudice the imminent trial. Justice McCallum ruled the matter would be better dealt with when the dust has settled on Wilkinson’s acceptance speech, and the social media storm has died down. There would not have been a media lawyer in Australia who would have been surprised by the ruling.

The timing of the Logies was unfortunate. Wilkinson should have been counselled more wisely to generalise her remarks.

Warnings should have been heeded

Parliaments around Australia are facing growing calls to overhaul their contempt of court laws, with many advocates arguing the status quo does not meet public expectations.

But that’s a broader question about freedom of speech. In this instance, freedom of speech was not an issue. It was clear the case could be prejudiced, and the warnings should have been heeded.

No-one has made the allegation in Australia yet that Wilkinson’s remarks are in contempt of court, and only the judge can rule on that if she be so minded.

Whether there are legal ramifications for Wilkinson remains to be seen, but one could have some sympathy for her. Wilkinson had spoken with Drumgold on June 15 to discuss the evidence that she would give at the trial. Drumgold warned her against commenting publicly on Higgins’ case, but clearly not strongly enough.

Given the costly and annoying rescheduling that is now needed, Drumgold is probably regretting he didn’t simply give Wilkinson a firm “no”.

Rick Sarre is a member of the SA Council for Civil Liberties and the Australian Labor Party.

– ref. Why was the Brittany Higgins trial delayed, and what is ‘contempt of court’? A legal expert’s view on the Lisa Wilkinson saga – https://theconversation.com/why-was-the-brittany-higgins-trial-delayed-and-what-is-contempt-of-court-a-legal-experts-view-on-the-lisa-wilkinson-saga-185585

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Gita Mishra, Professor of Life Course Epidemiology, Faculty of Medicine, The University of Queensland

New research shows women who have had a miscarriage or stillbirth, have an increased risk of stroke – when blood can’t get to the brain, because of a blocked or burst artery. That risk increases with each miscarriage or stillbirth.

Trying to establish this link is difficult because it requires following a large number of women over a long period of time and having reliable data on women’s experiences. Our study, published by the British Medical Journal today, is the first to conclusively show the link between pregnancy loss and stroke.

Many women are unaware their experiences during pregnancy can be an early marker of later health dangers. Our findings show their doctors should be alert to their increased risk.

It’s possible infertility, miscarriage, and stillbirth could increase stroke risk because of other health issues. These could include endocrine disorders (low oestrogen or insulin resistance), inflammation, problems with endothelial cells that assist in blood flow, psychological disorders, unhealthy behaviours (such as smoking) or obesity.

Heartbreak then stroke risk

Our research is based on pooled data from 618,851 women who took part in eight separate studies in Australia, China, Japan, Netherlands, Sweden, the United Kingdom and the United States.

The women were aged between 32 and 73 when they were first enrolled in the studies and were followed up for an average of 11 years.

The study showed that over the time they were studied, 9,265 (2.8%) women had at least one non-fatal stroke and 4,003 (0.7%) women had a fatal stroke. Overall, 91,569 (16.2%) women had a history of miscarriage while 24,873 (4.6%) had a history of stillbirth.

Among the women who had ever been pregnant, women who had reported a miscarriage had a 11% higher risk of a non-fatal stroke and 17% higher risk of a fatal stroke compared with women who have not had a miscarriage.

The risk increased with each miscarriage, so that women who had three or more miscarriages had a 35% higher risk for non-fatal stroke (from incidence rate of 43 per 100,000 “person years” to 58 per 100,000) and an 82% higher risk in fatal strokes (from 11.3 per 100,000 person years to 18 per 100,000) compared with women who had never miscarried.

Stillbirth also significantly increased the risk of stroke.

Among women who had ever been pregnant, women who had a history of stillbirth had a 31% higher risk of non-fatal strokes (from an incidence rate of 42 per 100,000 person years to 69.5 per 100,000) and a 7% higher risk of fatal strokes.

Again, the greater the number of stillbirths, the higher the risk of later strokes, with women who had had two or more stillbirths having a 26% higher risk of fatal strokes (rising from 11 per 100,000 person years to 51.1 per 100,000).

The study is the first to show links with stroke subtypes: stillbirths were linked to non-fatal ischaemic (blockage) stroke or fatal haemorrhagic (bleeding) stroke; miscarriages were linked to both subtypes.

Our study strengthens findings from a previous systematic review that found similar results but showed limited evidence linked to stroke subtypes.

Of the possible explanations for these links, problems with endothelial cells (which control vascular relaxation and contraction as well as release blood-clotting enzymes) might lead to pregnancy loss through problems with the placenta. These problems also relate to how blood vessels dilate and get inflamed or blocked during stroke.

Read more:
What causes miscarriages? A doctor explains why women shouldn’t blame themselves

Adjusting for known risk factors

Our findings were adjusted for many of the known risk factors for stroke: body mass index, whether the women smoked or not, whether they had high blood pressure, or diabetes. The numbers were also adjusted for ethnicity and education level.

By adjusting for risk factors, we can isolate the increased risk likely linked to the number of miscarriages or stillbirths the women.

Read more:
Remind me again, why is salt bad for you?

What should women and their doctors do with this information?

When doctors do a heart health check, they look at the risk of cardiovascular disease overall – that is, heart disease, heart failure and stroke. By considering these risks, doctors assess and predict the risk of future disease.

The current Australian guidelines recommend heart health checks should be conducted regularly for people aged 45 to 74, or for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples from the age of 30 – this is when the risk of cardiovascular disease starts to increase.

The guidelines recommend medication (blood pressure medication and/or lipid-lowering medication such as statins) when the risk of cardiovascular disease is greater than 15% in the next five years.

These guidelines are currently being updated by the Australian Chronic Disease Prevention Alliance (which includes the Cancer Council Australia, Diabetes Australia, Kidney Health Australia, National Heart Foundation of Australia and the Stroke Foundation), but more recent international guidelines recommend medication at lower levels of risk.

Read more:
I’m approaching a ‘milestone’ birthday. What health checks should I have at my age?

No matter what your risk of cardiovascular disease is, the best way to prevent having a stroke is by living as healthy a lifestyle as possible: stopping smoking, eating a healthy diet, having a moderate alcohol intake and doing regular exercise.

These lifestyle measures lower risk for everybody, but doctors will try particularly hard to help people do this who are at long term risk.

Our research shows miscarriage and stillbirth are signals a woman is at increased risk of cardiovascular disease. These events occur many years before a woman develops other risk factors, such as high blood pressure, diabetes or high cholesterol.

Women who have experienced a miscarriage or stillbirth should discuss these with their doctor. Knowing you have a higher risk of stroke is opportunity to monitor your health and make lifestyle changes that can help prevent stroke.

GPs need to ask about women’s reproductive histories and be aware of recurrent miscarriage and stillbirths as potential predictors of stroke risk.

Gita Mishra receives funding from National Health and Medical Research Council and the Australian Government Department of Health.

Jenny Doust receives funding from the National Health and Medical Research Council and the Medical Research Futures Fund. She is a member of the National Heart Foundation Clinical Committee.

Chen Liang does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Women are at greater risk of stroke, the more miscarriages or stillbirths they’ve had – https://theconversation.com/women-are-at-greater-risk-of-stroke-the-more-miscarriages-or-stillbirths-theyve-had-185490

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sarah Wayland, Senior Lecturer Social Work, University of New England

About a year ago, many of us were in lockdown. State premiers fronted the media every day to reveal how many people had tested positive for COVID and how many people had died.

The number of deaths were prominent in news bulletins. We would lament the sadness of it all, until the next day’s data arrived.

A year later, Australia has an average of about 50 COVID deaths a day. We have had more than 9,300 COVID deaths since the pandemic began. Yet, these deaths are barely mentioned in the Australian media.

We seem to have lost the collective opportunity to acknowledge lives lost. And when we don’t talk about these traumatic deaths, there’s a long-term impact on those left behind.

Read more:
COVID has changed how we live, how we die, and how we grieve

Is traumatic loss different?

All grief is hard to cope with. But when grief is combined with the type of trauma we’d see with a violent or sudden death, we can see something different over the long term.

If the media doesn’t discuss the losses, this can complicate the traumatic grief and lead to something called prolonged grief disorder.

This type of grief can extend far beyond the first year after the loss. People yearn for their life before their loved one was taken away. This impacts their capacity to keep moving forward, long after the death occurs.

Read more:
Health-care workers share our trauma during the coronavirus pandemic – on top of their own

How does this apply to COVID?

People who have lost a loved one to COVID can feel lonely and isolated. They can also develop prolonged grief disorder.

It can be traumatic to say goodbye under hospital restrictions or losing the opportunity for grief rituals – viewings, funerals and sharing the loss with others – despite many others going through a similar loss.

People who develop prolonged grief disorder after losing a loved one to COVID may find they have more severe and prolonged grief responses. This can lead to adverse outcomes such as an increased pre-occupation with their grief, intense emotions and difficulty connecting with their life after the loss.

But if we look to Australian media, it appears the community is no longer focused on the faces of those lives lost.

What has the media got to do with it?

Media coverage has long been intertwined with how we grieve.

When the media publicises first-person accounts of people’s lives, images or faces of people who died, or continually updates the toll of lives lost, this has an impact on those left behind, especially if there was a sudden and traumatic death.

This type of media coverage allows viewers to collectively empathise with people left behind, placing stories against the abstract statistics of death. The community can share in that sorrow vicariously and the media exposure increases the community’s understanding of what that loss means.

We’ve seen examples of this on social media, for instance with the @FacesOfCOVID Twitter account, which pays tribute to five or six people a day who have died of COVID.

However, we haven’t seen the equivalent tributes, on a daily basis, in the mainstream media.

If we don’t pay tribute to lives lost, this can affect people left behind in many ways:

• fewer shared images, names or acknowledgments limits how many people hear about someone who’s died, so fewer can express their grief

• families lose the chance to say to others “this is the person I have lost” to show people their pain

• people who have also lost someone don’t get to see others bearing the same pain.

Read more:
The five stages of grief don’t come in fixed steps – everyone feels differently

Each traumatic loss affects many others

More people are impacted by a sudden or traumatic loss, such as a homicide or suicide, than we once thought. One study suggests as many as 135 people are significantly affected. For each COVID death, another study shows up to nine people are impacted.

Irrespective of whether there are nine or 135 people feeling the ripple effects, the number of deaths we have experienced in Australia tells us thousands are living with the grief of a traumatic COVID death.

This grief will shape people’s experiences of the world, dulling possibilities for joy, making it difficult to accept the finality of a loss. This will be exacerbated by how little we focused on those losses as a community.

A lack of media coverage of COVID deaths means we have also lost moments of shared empathy – a space for others to see people who are travelling the same path.

Sarah Wayland does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. COVID deaths are now barely mentioned in the media. That changes the very nature of grief – https://theconversation.com/covid-deaths-are-now-barely-mentioned-in-the-media-that-changes-the-very-nature-of-grief-184837

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Grose, Climate projections scientist, CSIRO

It’s an offhand joke a lot of us make – it’s freezing, can we get a bit more of that global warming right about now?

But how should we really conceive our day-to-day weather in the context of climate change, especially when Australia’s east coast is enduring a colder-than-normal start to winter? Here are four ways.

Read more:
Why is it so cold right now? And how long will it last? A climate scientist explains

1. Put the weather in a long-term context

The recent cold conditions in some parts of Australia haven’t been seen in decades, but they aren’t unprecedented. In Melbourne, for instance, the first two weeks of June were coldest since 1949. In Brisbane, they were the coldest since 1990.

Under the global warming trend, cold events such as these are becoming less and less likely. But Australia naturally has a variable climate, which means they, of course, still do occur.

And given Australia’s instrumental records go back only 112 years (a relatively short length of time), it’s actually still possible we’ll see new record cold temperatures, even in a warming climate.

Still, record hot temperatures in Australia are being broken 12 times more often than cold ones.

The climate would need to be warming incredibly fast for there to be zero cold records broken, and even faster still if we were to see no cold weather at all. No one suggests this is the reality.

2. Zoom out for a wider view

Let’s look at an individual day – say, Tuesday June 13 – using Climate Reanalyser, a platform for visualising climate and weather datasets.

That day was certainly colder than the 1979-2000 average in eastern Australia and Tasmania. But it was warmer than average in parts of Western Australia and many places around the world, including large parts of Africa. Meanwhile, parts of the United States and Europe were experiencing major heatwaves.

On this day, the global average was 0.3℃ warmer than the 1979-2000 baseline, and this baseline was around 0.6℃ warmer than the pre-industrial climate.

This is exactly what you expect from weather variability in a warming climate – variations day to day and place to place, but a consistently warmer climate when you take the wide view.

Read more:
After the vicious cold snap, here are our tips to warm up while keeping your environmental footprint down

3. Look at the climate indicators with more ‘memory’

Looking at the weather day to day is a bit like watching the live share market updates from one stock exchange. To understand the trends and the bigger picture, you need to track it over time and space.

Given instrumental records only go back so far, scientists can use climate indicators found in nature. Glaciers, for example, respond to temperature over time, with almost all glaciers around the world receding in response to a warmer climate.

The oceans have longer memories than the atmosphere. Ocean warming is clear in, for instance, the East Australian Current, which now extends further south, bringing warmer water down the southeast coast. This, in turn, is driving fish species further south and devastating kelp forests.

Perhaps the most reliable indicator of warming planet is the total “ocean heat content” – the total amount of extra energy stored in our oceans, which can store a lot more than the atmosphere. There has been a rock-steady increase of ocean heat content in recent decades.

Read more:
How climate change made the melting of New Zealand’s glaciers 10 times more likely

4. Consider the concept of attribution

Determining whether climate change helped make a particular weather event more likely or more severe than it would have been – whether a cold snap, a heatwave or flooding rains – requires a formal attribution study, which looks for a climate change “fingerprint”.

Overall, the planet has warmed 1.09℃ since pre-industrial times. And since 2012, the human caused climate change fingerprint has been clear in any single day of global weather.

Thanks to event attribution studies, we can confidently state that cold extremes are now less likely than they would be in a world without climate change, while heatwaves and extreme heat events are far more likely.

For example, climate change made the recent devastating heatwave in India and Pakistan 30 times more likely.

Our weather intuitions

Our intuitions and common sense are great tools for navigating our day-to-day life and making decisions. But our first-hand experience is rooted at the scale of centimetres to kilometres, seconds to days.

Our brains are not perfect data loggers over decades, and our memories are subjective. Vivid childhood memories of hot asphalt on our young feet, cars with hot vinyl seats and houses with no air conditioners affect how we compare the past to today. And we aren’t exposed to all weather, especially us city dwellers who spend a lot of time indoors.

Pulling at our intuitions about cold weather to comment about climate change can be compelling. United States senator James Inhofe famously brought a snowball into the senate in 2015 to claim that if there’s cold weather then the climate can’t be warming.

While this was widely mocked at the time, these appeals do tug at our instincts to turn to our experiences to understand the world.

To get out of these local scales, we need to feed our intuitions some more input. So, data are important.

With data, we can inform and guide our intuitions and overcome our natural focus on the local scale. To be convinced the climate is warming, we need to watch the long-term trends and expect the wiggles.

And just like in places such as southern Australia where the climate is drying, we still expect some wet years, we still expect cold spells in a warming climate.

It is instinctual to downplay or doubt the idea the climate is getting warmer when you’re feeling cold right now. But next time, consider these four points.

Read more:
If you’re renting, chances are your home is cold. With power prices soaring, here’s what you can do to keep warm

Michael Grose receives funding from the National Environmental Science Program.

– ref. 4 ways to understand why Australia is so cold right now despite global warming – https://theconversation.com/4-ways-to-understand-why-australia-is-so-cold-right-now-despite-global-warming-184834

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Renee Adams, Professor of Finance, University of Oxford

The gender diversity of thought leadership in finance is lower than in most other academic fields, our research shows. Finance ranks 132nd out of 175 fields with a representation of only 10.3% women among its thought leaders. Yet these women outperform their male peers.

How did we measure this? The impact of an academic’s ideas can be quantified using academic citations – how often their work is referenced in research published by other academics. We consider thought leaders to be academics who have been ranked among the top 2% in their respective fields by citations in the Scopus database.

We found the percentage of female thought leaders in finance is lower than in economics and in the fields of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM).
It’s surprising since finance is a younger field than economics and so might be expected to be less traditionally male-dominated. The field of academic finance was carved out of economics in the early 1940s.

Our evidence on thought leadership is consistent with other evidence that women are less represented in finance academia than in economics. This is true at every level, from incoming PhD students through to full professors.

We see the under-representation of women in finance both among academics and more broadly. A 2020 Deloitte report noted:

“All but six of 111 CEOs at the 107 largest US public financial institutions (including four with co-CEOs) are men.”

Read more:
Gender equity. The way things are going, we won’t reach true parity until the 22nd century

Why are so few women in finance?

The fact that finance is less gender-diverse than other maths-intensive fields suggests standard arguments about women’s preferences with respect to STEM subjects cannot explain their low representation in finance.

Country-level culture is also unlikely to explain women’s representation in finance. As our research shows, finance thought leadership is geographically concentrated. Only 20% of finance thought leaders are located outside the USA or UK.

Instead, we argue the culture of academic finance is less welcoming to women than it is to men. We provide two pieces of evidence for this argument.

First, we show that individual female thought leaders in finance have more impact than their male peers, as measured by citations per paper, their academic rank and a composite score of six citation metrics (total citations, H-index, Hm-index, citations of single, first and last-authored papers). This finding is especially striking given evidence that women’s research is less likely to be cited. Female thought leaders in finance also have relatively more impact than they do in economics or other STEM fields.

These results suggest the obstacles women face in finance are greater than in other fields. The individuals who overcome these barriers outperform their peers.

Second, we show that women’s beliefs about the level of innate talent needed to succeed in finance, instead of motivation and effort, are not correlated with women’s representation in finance thought leadership, but men’s beliefs are. These results are consistent with the idea that men’s beliefs represent a greater barrier to equality in thought leadership, role modelling and education in the “masculine” field of finance than in other fields.

Read more:
As women decide Australia’s new leaders, what is going on with academic leadership?

Lack of diversity is a handicap

The finance sector is a bedrock of the world economy. It’s the third-largest industry in Australia, accounting for 8% of economic output. The lack of diversity in thought leadership for such an important sector is problematic for several reasons.

Diversity of thought and innovation are linked. Lack of diversity means the finance industry may be less innovative than it could be.

The finance sector may also be less welcoming to women than it should be. The general public does not always embrace finance despite its importance. Stockmarket participation is low in some countries and demographic groups, as is financial literacy.

Trust in finance might be higher when finance professionals are more similar to members of the general population.

Read more:
Women are dropping out of economics, so men are running our economy

What can universities do about it?

Women are also less likely to enter the field of finance after graduating. They make up only 35% of MBA enrolments in Australia (41% in the USA). The absence of female thought leadership, role models and educators in finance may help explain women’s under-representation in MBA enrolment and in the finance sector.

To overcome the inequality of finance, the culture of finance academia must change. But culture cannot change on demand.

The leadership of academic finance associations and our universities should provide opportunities for introspection, reflection and discussion of these issues. We should start by discussing why academia seems to be focused primarily on producing more science, rather than better science.

Read more:
The push for ‘researcher entrepreneurs’ could be a step backward for gender equity

We should also acknowledge the role of gatekeepers and take steps to diminish their influence. Universities, academic associations and journals should increase the transparency of their operations. The process through which positions of power are filled, like those of university deans and journal editors, should be transparent. Opportunities for individuals to exercise their voice without repercussion should be provided.

All these organisations must demonstrate a commitment to unbiased decision-making as a core element of good governance. Only when the rules of the game are clear can there be a hope of changing the rules to level the playing field.

In the past, Renee Adams received funding from various research agencies for other research projects.

Jing Xu does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Female finance leaders outperform their male peers, so why so few of them in academia and beyond? – https://theconversation.com/female-finance-leaders-outperform-their-male-peers-so-why-so-few-of-them-in-academia-and-beyond-178893

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Phil Lewis, Professor of Economics, University of Canberra

Australian shoppers are facing a crisis in the fresh-food aisles.

Iceberg lettuces that cost $2.80 a year ago have doubled, or tripled, in price. Brussel sprouts that cost $4 to $6 a kilogram are now $7 to $14. Beans that cost $5 to $6 a kilogram are now more than double – and five times as much in remote areas.

That’s if you can even find such produce. Supermarket shelves for leafy greens are often bare.

This is a strong hint as to why prices have risen so much. As well as growers facing higher input costs – in line with pressures pushing up food prices globally – these price hikes are being driven by lack of supply – with crops and stores wiped out by rain and floods in eastern Australia.

Read more:
Why is lettuce so expensive? Costs have shot up, and won’t return to where they were

The price hikes have led to calls for supermarkets to impose price caps to ensure shoppers can still afford to feed their families healthy food.

But price ceilings on goods or services rarely, if ever, work. Prices play an important role in allocating resources efficiently. They send a signal to both customers and suppliers. To arbitrarily reduce prices would only increase shortages – both now and in the longer term.

Supply, demand and market equilibrium

The laws of supply and demand are fundamental concepts in economics. The law of demand says buyers will demand less of an economic good the higher its price. The law of supply says sellers will supply more of a good the higher the price. There are some rare exceptions, but generally these laws describe all markets.

British economist Alfred Marshall was the first to illustrate the interaction of these two laws graphically, in his 1890 book Principles of Economics. Market equilibrium (balance) occurs at the price and quantity where demand equals supply.

If the quantity supplied falls, the market response is for prices to rise, achieving a new equilibrium. If the quantity supplied falls but prices remain the same, demand will outstrip supply, leading to shortages.

Fresh fruit and vegetables are particularly prone to significant price fluctuations because they are perishable and cannot be easily stored for a long time. This why seasonal price fluctuations are common.

Higher prices provide a signal both to consumers and producers. They tell consumers to buy less and switch to alternatives. They provide an incentive for producers to grow more – though this process is fairly slow given the time needed to grow and harvest fruit and vegetables.

But eventually, if the market is left to its own devices, prices will eventually return to “normal”, consistent with historical prices.

Capping the price, on the other hand, will benefit those lucky enough to grab supplies when they available. But it will likely reduce supply even further, by affecting the decision of producers unwilling to supply at below-market prices.

It could also lead to a “black market”, with some customers sourcing supplies by other means at higher uncapped prices.

Evidence from rent controls

The economic theory of price caps is well supported by empirical evidence. The best-known involve rent controls, which are used in US cities such as New York City and Los Angeles, and in European cities such as Stockholm, Berlin and Dublin.

Rent controls mean some are lucky enough to find an affordable apartment. Many others miss out – or engage in “deals” with landlords to get around the controls.
The most disadvantaged tend to lose out most since landlords can discriminate in favour of what they consider the “more desirable” tenants.

As Stanford University economist Rebecca Diamond has written:

While rent control appears to help current tenants in the short run, in the long run it decreases affordability, fuels gentrification, and creates negative spillovers on the surrounding neighborhood.

As with housing, so too with broccoli and cabbage.

Read more:
Why the NZ government is right to rule out rent controls as a housing crisis solution

We’ve seen this all before

So generally price caps are to be avoided.

If there are suspicions of wholesalers or retailers exploiting shortages, this is best handled by the Australian Consumer and Competition Commission. Though “price gouging” is generally not illegal, the consumer watchdog can prosecute companies for makes misleading claims about the reasons for price increases and for unconscionable conduct (in the case of extreme gouging for an essential good).

What else can be done? Only what consumers have always done, which is to substitute relatively cheaper goods for those becoming more expensive.

We’ve seen this before. Queensland’s floods in 2011 destroyed vast crops of bananas and watermelons, causing prices to skyrocket. Shoppers switched to other fruits. Banana farmers recovered. Prices dropped.

These high prices for lettuce and such now may be a shock, but they are not a sign of market failure requiring intervention. If we let the market do its thing, shortages will end and prices return to “normal” – at least until the next natural disaster.

Phil Lewis does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Why capping food prices won’t work – and will actually make things worse – https://theconversation.com/why-capping-food-prices-wont-work-and-will-actually-make-things-worse-185492

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Bruce Isaacs, Associate Professor, Film Studies, University of Sydney

A new Baz Luhrmann film caused a stir this year at Cannes – again.

In 2001, Moulin Rouge opened the grandest of all film festivals with the grandest of modern musical extravaganzas. The film garnered praise, disdain and bewilderment in equal measure, but marked the festival’s continuing love affair with the cinema of Lurhmann.

The next fanfare was Luhrmann’s quixotic imagining of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby (2013), again opening the festival, again to a somewhat mixed critical response. Critics seemed to love and hate Gatsby (and Luhrmann) in equal measure.

But what do critics matter? I was at one of the early Australian screenings of The Great Gatsby in Dendy Newtown and was transfixed less by the film than the entire row of seats immediately in front of me comprised of teenagers in tuxedos, tails and the risqué couture of the 1920s flapper.

I marked the so-called era of excess with a shared bottle of wine; these high schoolers had imported an entire aesthetic mode of expression.

Gatsby took US$380 million worldwide on a US$100 million budget, generated a chart-topping contemporary soundtrack and prompted millions of spectators to reread Fitzgerald’s novel.

Read more:
The Great Gatsby: death by glitter or a thought-provoking spectacle?

The new Baz Luhrmann spectacular Elvis premiered in Cannes and opens this week in Australia.

The critical world is again anticipating what will come of Luhrmann’s signature self-indulgence, inflated budget and artistic grandiosity. Peter Bradshaw’s early review opens with: “Baz Luhrmann has given us another pointless explosion of super-spangly sparkles in celluloid form.”

To be honest, I agree with everything Bradshaw wishes to signify in his dismissive statement. The film is super-spangly (as was Elvis, as is the film’s director). It is explosive in its audio-visual kinetics. It is also, time and again, narratively unhinged.

And yet, midway into the first act, seeing that performance of Austin Butler’s Hayride, with the camera orchestrating shot reverse shot encounters between adoring, orgasmic women (and a young man singled out) and Elvis’s crotch (I kid you not), I realised, in spite of my reservations about an Elvis biopic years in the making, I had fallen in love with the film.

An auteur in Hollywood

There lies the critical rub and the tension that makes Luhrmann so fascinating as a contemporary film auteur. I valued the film precisely for what other critics have lambasted: its fluid, playful, elaborate pointlessness.

My question to Bradshaw and other like-minded critics of Elvis is: should cinema be pointed? Or, perhaps more provocatively, we could ask: must a work of art have a point?

Luhrmann is an iconoclast. His version of Elvis, Elvis’s “story” (for whatever that signifies) and Elvis’s music was never going to be a straight-ahead history.

But he is an iconoclast who nonetheless must make money for his investors.

These investors – the heart of the American studio filmmaking system – are fickle and changeable. Careers are made and extinguished on a single film. How, then, does iconoclasm subsist within an industry that enforces homogeneity to guarantee a financial return?

Read more:
To make films is human, to Baz Luhrmann, divine

Each of Luhrmann’s Hollywood films wishes to reconstruct history as audio-visual spectacle. Luhrmann’s films are the past in vibrant, saturated colour, flowing in Catherine Martin’s creative costume design. The films are anachronism in sound and music composition.

Luhrmann’s history is historical projection. These histories are his idiosyncratic fantasies.

This is precisely how Luhrmann sets about the task of making Elvis meaningful now.

He begins with a simple premise: the traditional biopic genre, strait-jacketed by our desire for fidelity to historical truth, is not adequate to the task of putting Elvis on a cinematic screen.

The genre is also not adequate to the task of turning Elvis into a financial commodity for export on screens, red carpets, music video montage pieces, fashion houses and digital streaming platforms.

Luhrmann’s reconstruction of the genre is, to use Bradshaw’s terminology, an aesthetic explosion.

An artistic triumph

The film is an artistic triumph because it is less about Elvis the historical figure than Elvis as a social, cultural, political and sexual phenomenon.

Luhrmann uses his mastery of film to take what could have been a flaccid history and make it into a full-blooded, euphoric, eroticised audio-visual spectacle.

Austin Butler’s chameleon-like turn is less a screen performance than an embodied imagining of what Elvis represents as a cultural signifier, realised in a glorious moment in which Luhrmann cuts between Butler’s and Elvis’ failing bodies in a 1977 performance of Unchained Melody.

I’m convinced Luhrmann’s only genuine fidelity in this film is to Elvis as a cross-cultural, historically fluid body: in all its eroticism, grandiosity and tragic disassembling.

Read more:
How Elvis permanently changed American pop culture

Bruce Isaacs does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis is super-spangly, explosive, narratively unhinged – and an artistic triumph – https://theconversation.com/baz-luhrmanns-elvis-is-super-spangly-explosive-narratively-unhinged-and-an-artistic-triumph-184161