A fish rots from the head down, and Australians no longer bother listening to the very fishy characters supposed to be running the country. What's the point, when we have a government two thirds of the population didn't vote for.

Perhaps if Barry Humphries had lived in his own country, he wouldn't have been "out of favour". But, as Australians have always had it in for 'tall poppies', particularly their own, he wouldn't have had much success here. And that brings us to Australia's big problem: we hate ourselves; or at least anyone after generation X does; and they are the ones who would normally "fight to defend their country". Now, we have the silly Opposition bleating about letting foreigners into the military because the useless locals don't want to be paid, even, to learn how to defend us.

This year, I didn't see anyone bothering to rubbish Anzac Day as they usually do. A sure sign that the evil bastards now in charge are satisfied that they have successfully undone everything that people supposed to be honoured by the Day fought and died for.

Taking the piss WAS a "national pastime"; now it will get you cancelled - or worse.

Thanks for this article, Graham. A tribute to a great Australian and what used to be Australia - a country that is no longer the 'best country in the world', as a few naive and nostalgic conservative commentators are still calling it.

I have taken a special interest in this for a very long time. As someone obviously not reared here, I get asked at times ‘What do you think of Australians?’
I always try to make my point without trying to offend & most of the time I get agreement.
When asked how I would describe an Australian I simply say what I feel & my honest description without any put-down whatsoever is ‘coarse’. Older people used to say about someone in this category ‘a rough Diamond’.
Now, these are the Australians I knew when I first arrived. The modern version has ousted the rough Diamonds many years ago when given the green light by Goaf &Co. The new version is an opportunistic, money hungry selfish, unpatriotic git !
The decent , unselfish is a dying breed being unceremoniously dumped by those who get paid massive salaries to manage this society !

I don't know how many young Australians would volunteer to fight for this country. What would they be fighting for?

Now if you included soldier settlements, education opps as mature students and so on, you might get a fair few.

That said I think conscription is the way to go to build better more patriotic citizens able to work in teams.

The old Australian who fought in WW11 is no more but replaced by a migrant sourced community that is all me, me, me and show me the money!

So, let's bring back conscription and a million-dollar prize for the conscript of the year.
Alan B.

Today's comics by and large are "crude, rude and unattractive". They have lost the ability to be funny without resorting to Language which would make a sailor blush.

David

We need a form of National Service before common sense is lost for good. Any unemployed say 18-20 should be given the opportunity to flush out education indoctrination & get exposure to common sense & real realty, not the gimme, gimme my entitlements version.
That way teachers could be guided back to being real teachers instead of Leftist indoctrinators ruining our young.
Those with their eyes on this country are laughing their heads off at the mentality of our school leavers who are already seen as not even a hurdle to take over this Nation. Just show them $$$ & they’ll sell their freedom for a few drugs & some liqueur at an idiot party !
The Left has a lot to answer for here !

I forced myself to watch that Melbourne Comedy show on TV & I lasted about 2 minutes before changing Channels.
They tell the audience up front how funny the performers are so they all clap as soon as there’s a pause.
It really is soul destroying what they now consider as funny .

Thanks for the article GY. Btw Jean-Paul Sartre became a Communist.

Sad to hear another of Barry Humphries generation dropping off the perch.

There is another famous absurdist from the Greek age- Aristophanes a critic of Socrates and conservative traditionalist perhaps.

http://www.britannica.com/biography/Aristophanes

Clouds

This play is an attack on “modern” education and morals as imparted and taught by the radical intellectuals known as the Sophists. The main victim of Clouds (423 bce; Greek Nephelai) is the leading Athenian thinker and teacher Socrates, who is purposely (and unfairly) given many of the standard characteristics of the Sophists. In the play Socrates is consulted by an old rogue, Strepsiades (“Twisterson”), who wants to evade his debts. The instruction at Socrates’ academy, the Phrontisterion (“Thinking Shop”), which consists of making a wrong argument sound right, enables Strepsiades’ son to defend the beating of his own father. At the play’s end the Phrontisterion is burned to the ground.

Old Bazz might be the Secular patron saint of Australia, but the Americans pinched him, and rebranded him as Mrs Doubtfire, the Secular symbol for failed Fatherhood and the disastrous end of the family unit.

CM

Interesting.
I think the slaves that outnumbered the Athenians of his time by seven slaves to one, were having much more fun than the Spartans being too conservative for such humour, as an aside.

Opps…posted wrong thread two above.

Thanks Diver Dan. Kudos.

Above everything else Graham Young, get it right. Barry Humphreys and Peter Cook did NOT found the Melbourne International Comedy Festival. They were paid headline and featured performers who had nothing, zip, zilch to do with the management or organisation of the event.