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The Forum > Article Comments > My reaction to the floods? Couldn’t care less > Comments

My reaction to the floods? Couldn’t care less : Comments

By Brian Holden, published 17/1/2011

No matter how flooded citizens in a wealthy country are, national wealth will still keep them pretty dry.

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Well I too was annoyed by the media's coverage...but that is what they do. At least there were no bare-faced lies reported as facts as per war coverage.
As for caring...how could one not? Did the author *seriously* not feel some pain for the victims even though he didn't know them?
Just because the media babbles and the politicians preen it doesn't mean the event itself is somehow tainted.
Rhian is spot on about hierarchy of concern.
Viking is also spot on: We'd like to care, but we cannot go around pumping money into corrupt nations. Democracy involves community cohesion and some bottom-up activism...if we see a deserving people then we will help. Sad choice to have to make (for those of us that can feel empathy for strangers...even foreign strangers with racial differences)...but the only rational one we can make. It's kind of like sympathy for historical disasters...sad but not *too* sad.
Posted by Ozandy, Tuesday, 18 January 2011 3:05:03 PM
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Hmmm, severe storm warning for Brisbane and SEQld this afternoon.

Must be some of that tiresome, 'repetitive' news the article was talking about.

Totally insensitive of BOM and the news media to report it. Shouldn't even be mentioned unless it is happening in some overseas country, whereupon we should all flail ourselves in apology for our democratic system of government.
Posted by Cornflower, Tuesday, 18 January 2011 4:06:16 PM
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Brian,
I endorse your comments wholeheartedly.
The whole thing has been turned into a massive publicity stunt.
Maybe we can skip the Australia Day Bullsh!t this year? We've already had it!
Posted by Squeers, Tuesday, 18 January 2011 4:57:46 PM
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Brian, this is unquestionably the saddest thing I've read or heard thus far in the flood response... as someone whose house was flood damaged, I have been overcome with the generosity of total strangers, whether it be helping in the clean-up or simply conveying empathy. There's no expectation that everyone in Brisbane or Qld felt similarly but to be so cold and calculating in your response is frightening to read.
If you were really honest with yourself, as you seem to pride yourself on, I'd suggest checking in to a mental health specialist to address an obvious inability to emotionally connect at all with a local natural disaster and its widespread consequences - perhaps there's some undiagnosed Aspergers Syndrome tendencies that reportedly afflict a large percentage of older Australian men.
Posted by wooldog, Thursday, 27 January 2011 3:47:14 PM
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