I vote we all go to Colin James' home for a party. Given his philosophy I'm sure it will be unlocked when we arrive, have dope growing in the spare bedroom and Colin will arrive, sans seatbelt, in a car with bald tyres after his latest BASE jump. Of course he'll have ignored advice to watch his weight and probably still smokes 40 a day--stoopid health warnings.

Colin, people may be more aware and protective, possibly over reaching in this respect. It's the problem of listening to the mob who tell you how to live. But hang on Colin, aren't you one of those people with all the advice too?

Colin please stop your Corporate Training and let your clients get involved in their own training, Let them drive their own trucks under the bridge they invested their capital in doing their chosen enterprise or do they they need to be bottle-fed.In these "Risk Management" times with the catch cry of "Public Liability" a lot of the fun,excitement and trepidation has been smothered out of various activities.

We in Western Australia have had a spate of fatal road accidents in the past week and one our "Harvest Terrace" wonders comes out and wishes all drivers to undergo ten-yearly tests of their driving competence. As soon as someone dies in a road accident a bed of flowers materialise these days. Some twenty-five years or so ago a teacher and some children got lost and perished in Tasmania. All the states started "Bushwalking and Mountain Climbing Leadership Training courses" and sprouted a whole hive of "expedition trainers" Did James Cook or Ferdinand Magellan have an army of nannies aboard when they did their voyages of reconnaisance or did they venture forth boldly irrespective of the consequences?
In my high school the motto which was that of the Earl of Athlone was "Fearless and Faithful".

Colin, in the era of the elderly truckie, there were less than 10 million people, everyone spoke Aussie, the environment was fine, people weren't packed like sardines into boxes piled on top of each other. You could go to any place in the country and be welcome, all signage was in English. Now we have suburbs where there's no English written or spoken, we have growing religious conflict. Freedom is being curtailed (by bureaucrats) and about two million people living here who can't communicate with us, nor want to.

Our choices have been eroded to only having goods provided by multinational monopolies using slave labour overseas, (bureaucrats did this). Religious nuts from all factions constantly trying to return us to the past of religious enslavement. Constant lies by politicians, lobbyists, advisers, big business and bureaucrats. They Promise a better life but we get worse services, infrastructure, health, lower wages entitlements, higher prices, charged to drive on our roads (not polies, management or the bureaucracy). Our ways of life turned upside down to give power to religious cultural minorities, (more bureaucratic political correctness destroying this country).

Considering the amount of work Colin has done for the elite, I take this as an insult to point out what he has been a party to causing. Just another ploy to try and push the blame away from the elite onto the people. Colin you and your ilk have done this to us, no one else. Lets hope your god rewards you justly.

As for god being dead, I bet 90% of the people of this country would be happy if those who follow the violent fantasy could accept that their god only deals in death and leave him to it somewhere else.

What's going on? Free 'choice' advocates are on a roll. And it's all so individualised and psychologised shying away from any discussion of broad policial or economic context. It's as if free choice sits out there in the ether waiting for the brave to seize the moment. Poor old Peter Costello doesn't seem to understand that sometimes the barrier to your choice is another person's greater power to make a pre-emptive choice against you.

Some irony! Politicians like Costello and Howard repeat ad nausea the mantra, "It's all about choice" to defend the new IR laws, tax-payer subsidies for wealthy private schools, sale of public assets, and so on. Tony Abbott demonstrates a particular skill in using 'choice' without blushing to mean its opposite. 'Choice' is one of the worst of weasel words and it's prudent to make sure your crap-detector is in good working order whenever the weasles are at work.

When will the pro-choicers concede there's a strong interactive relationship between life style and life chances? Choice and freedom don't exist in a socio-economic vacuum and there are obvious limits to individual effort and character when it comes to making important choices such as whether to send your child to Melbourne Grammar or to have your facelift done at The Freemasons' Hospital or to pay full fees for law at Melbourne University or to buy a house in Vaucluse. Lots of decent Australians just never dream of making such choices (or even more modest ones) - not because they are unintelligent or unmotivated, but because they haven't got the money to do so and can see no reasonable prospect of doing so in their lifetime. (I hasten to add that many also decide against such choices for other good reasons.)

Colin, I think you've spent too much time training people. Time to get out and about.

And think about it Colin. If young Timothy and his mates didn't wear knee pads, elbow pads, head protection etc our hospital would be full of those who threw caution to the wind. If you needed to go to hospital you'd have to put in a bid with ebay and you'd probably be told to get ready for your admission...in 2012!

For crying out loud - I say, good on you Colin, time someone out there realised that it is not the doom and gloom situation everyone has been conditioned to think it is.

I see reports all over the place of bad things happening to people, the muggings, the accidents etc. We don't hear about the vast, vast majority of people who make it home fine each night, instead we choose to worry about the few who don't.

I've been to my fair share of nightclubs and walked some dodgy areas, and so have many of my friends - I haven't yet felt fear, and I haven't been in a violent situation - what's more, nobody I know has either (by this I mean in an unprovoked violent situation).

Now, I can worry when I walk at night, or I can walk confidently, happy in the knowledge that it's never happened before.

Okay. So one day I will probably learn otherwise, and suffer for it - but you know what? Until that day happens, I'll know a happy confidence that the fearmongers have been denied, and I think it's damn well worth it.
Whats more, it's vulnerable people that are targeted - so in a way, being confident and happy is a protection.

I can hear you screeching in response, 'just wait until you're a victim'.
Yeah, well, I hope even after I become a victim, I can put that behind me.

Crime is not soaring, and while domestic violence is on the increase, this doesn't seem to be feared in the same way as that 'all terrifying unprovoked attack.'

Well excuse me for having a little optimism. I know it's not all peaches and cream out there, but damnit, it's not the apocalypse either.

Go rollerblading.
Take a skydive.
If you trip and fall on the steps, acknowledge you slipped, and don't try to sue someone to make a quick buck.
And repeat after me 'the world is not about to end, the sun is shining, and things really aren't that bad'.

Be afraid. Be very Afraid. The Judas Goat is among us.

Judas Goat: A Judas goat is a trained goat used at a slaughterhouse and in general animal herding. The Judas goat is trained to associate with sheep or cattle, leading them to a specific destination. In stockyards, a Judas goat will lead sheep to slaughter, while its own life is spared.

At a time in human history when:

* The world's population is approaching 7 billion and so called civilised governments who know a collapse is inevitable, boost unsustainable immigration strategies to fill their personal coffers in preparation for THEIR OWN survival

* Information, Energy, property and Governments themselves have been monopolised by a handful of global corporations like Westfield and MacBank and PBL.

it would be foolish to listen to those goats who tell you NOT to be fearful.

These modern day monsters have us in a bind and now are seeking to monopolise our water and food supplies. We had a near miss when Howard tried to sell the Snowy water rights. If he is elected again it will give him the mandate to complete this sale.

Be fearful!

And know that you CAN keep voting Governments that do secret deals (and give pretense to backflip on secret deals) with private enterprise into oblivion. And keep voting them into oblivion till they understand WE will not be betrayed and that WE want the fears they are immigrating and workplacing into our lives substantially redressed.

Australian Governments be on NOTICE.

We know what's goin' on.

I get somewhat frustrated when I continually hear of the world's unsustainable population.

here's a few crucial points to take note -

Yeah, the population is increasing too fast.

But only throughout the poorer areas of the world.

Australia's birth rate is unsustainable. Our population would drop without immigrants. This is echoed throughout the affluent first world.

At the same time, we can't tell the poor to stop having babies. In the third world, your children support you when you grow old - you need them. Funnily enough, the first world is just learning this now as the elderly proportion grows out of whack.

So this population boom is only happening to the poor - what's the solution?

Make them not so poor!

The western world is incredibly wasteful, and at present there is enough to go around if we share it a little more.

But instead we tell ourselves that there isn't enough, and we need to hold on to what we have, and the third world keeps on getting more populated.

Eventually we won't have a choice, and the world will become truly multicultural. It will be a painful process when it happens and our environment will be in a sorry state, but at least we'll start learning from our mistakes.

Chris well said but...

I was sitting at home last week when the kids from the street were on holidays from school.

They ranged in age from about 5 to 12 both boys and girls. They were racing thier push bikes along a track in the bushland opposite. A little boy gets a shovel (it was taller than he was) from somewhere and then all proceed to build a dirt hump on the path to jump over. They were having a great time, almost no helmets no padding and probably a few cases of gravel rash.

As the week passed they had built an obstacle course, some older kids helped and they all took turns to play. No harsh words, no tears just squeals of delight.

I talked to my neighbour about how great it was to see the kids having so much fun, she agreed and said that the parents were taking it in turns to keep an eye on them but from a distance.

I understand your article but in my experience it is definately not the norm. Must be a city thing.

That's great to hear Steve. I would be one of the parents watching out of delight, not fear.

There is a problem though. It is driven by our litagious society with, in turn, obsessed focussed on insurance.

A short while ago, on my Son's 10th birthday, I lead about 8 boys through the bush in our suburb (we're in the Dandenong ranges in melbourne), along a small creek, climbing over slippery logs, squeezing between bamboo, it would soon be dark so we had torches. It was great adventure for them and a wonderful way to learn coordination, discovery, and being responsible if you miss up and fall in the tiny creek.

Then we hear someone screaming at us to get off their property. (Being a creek alongside a dirt road I would be surprised if it was technically his property). This fellow, about 50, came 200 metres down from his house and started swearing at my lunacy for taking these boys for this little walk. He stated he was worried if something happened that he might be sued.

Pleeeeaaase!

We do have a communal responsibility to enable our children to discover, learn and conquer.

Maybe there are too few of us with enough integrity who would take responsibility for their own actions (and not sue - even if they could get away with it) that the community is not prepared to take the risk?

Sad. Very sad.

I miss cracker night. High risk, certainly. Every year we heard stories of kids who'd blown their eyebrows off, letterbox pranks, the melted palms that resulted from holding a big bunger for too long.

But it was also the best fun we had all year. It was the only thing that got our parents as excited as we were. The risk and the wonder of it got Mum out of the kitchen, Dad out of the office and us away from the TV to join the neighbourhood around a communal bonfire. We compared injuries for weeks afterward and made friends in the process.

Sparklers were for littlies or whimps. Now even they are reduced to the indignity of being confined to birthday cakes, spattering crap all over the icing.

KAEP... BWWAAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

You're hilarious!

You take a benign article full of analogy loosely discussing risk and choice, and turn it into a government conspiracy?

Time to head out for some more kitchen foil to make yourself a new hat.

The one you've got on isn't blocking out *the voices* anymore.

As a little girl every time I was told not to climb a tree because I might fall and hurt myself I went out and found a higher tree to prove I could do it, that I was responsible enough to climb the tree and not fall. My father would load the 4 of us very young kids into the car when he was very drunk and drive us to our nana's place - no-one told him not to back then in 1960, it was a fun sport to drive as pissed as a newt.

I was told I couldn't have a bicycle though because it was too dangerous, so I didn't bother to learn to ride one.

I think you have to be a bit careful where your kids play but wrapping them in swaddling is pointless - if you do that they turn into nasty little bullies like John Howard.

What is really funny though - I heard Paul McGeough give a speech to the National Heritage last year and he was talking about people on talkback radio getting wound up about kids throwing their shoes onto the power lines.

He said "I have just come back from a country where they had no shoes", and in the Herald today he says now they have no schools.

When we walk our suburbs we see people living behind walls but I refuse to even bother to lock my doors when I am here.

I am told not to trash the government because they will come and get me - yet I abuse them daily and I have not been taken away.

We have gone from being a nation of pioneers to a nation of wimps.

And our leaders blow up countries and dispossess and kill - they are the ones who should be afraid, our victims.

Have you noticed that Howard expressed his regrets for the 190 or so people killed in Mumbai because "muslims" did it, but he has not once mentioned the 100,000 or so dead in Iraq because we did it?

As I watch the news and see the unfolding horror in Iraq, Mumbai, Gaza and Somalia to name a few and having seen the depths of human squalor and genuine government neglect first hand in Africa, Indonesia, India, the Philippines and other places I am astounded by the reaction to my piece.

We live in a virtual paradise by any standard. We have peace, security, incredible services, a virtually corruption free system and a regard for the value of every individual life that lives in this country that is unparalleled in my experience. This country works. Sure there are the usual vagaries of greed, incidents of capricious cruelty, occasional abuses of power both personally and professionally however, and here is the true blessing, we get on remarkably well. We have been conditioned however to always look for the pimple on the face of beauty and make it catastrophic.

And to those who think teaching and training are professions where we hold ourselves up as demi-guru’s who preach puerile propaganda promoting status quo agendas and who have no ‘real world’ appreciation whilst captured in our own bubbles of ignorant self importance – well clearly you have an opinion. I would love to know what this is predicated upon. My experience of facilitating learning is that it requires skill, empathy, appreciation of contexts both personal and professional, a deep understanding of the neurological, psychological and emotional dynamics associated with learning and knowledge acquisition and a profound respect for people of every stripe and ability. Teachers in the Australian community seem to be held in contempt and this is profoundly sad and a disquieting. But that’s another topic entirely.

Have to agree with you Colin. Surely parents can help their kids to take measured risks. So go rollerblading - with a helmet and gloves, but not full body armour. Climb a tree in the yard, but not one over concrete. Although, you shouldn't need to put your hand on the stove to learn that it's hot.

How else do we learn judgement, discrimination (in the selection sense), how to weigh up risks vs benefits? The things that make it easier to navigate the adult world.

P.S Amazing how many people bring a pre-prepared rant to an unrelated topic. Could they be given their own corner in the sand pit instead?

Colin, in your insulated world everything looks rosy to you. Our political system is totally corrupt, or don't you consider paying politicians (donations) to get big businesses agenda up under the false pretence, politicians work for the people. Politicians use public funds to give back the donations, calling them subsidies or research grants, or cutting their tax burden, lifting development restrictions to suit big business. No small business gets breaks from charges, taxes and legislative requirements, but big business gets them everyday, as well as our money.

If you lived in the real world, you'd see few decent services available to the people, little support for those slaving to support your elite brigade of social cannibals. You've developed your spin well, sitting in your box in a city, with services you can afford. How often do you travel on a bus or train, have you ever tried getting public transport, living beyond cities. I bet you don't have to battle to pay mortgages, essential services or struggle to find the money for food to support the grotesque profits monopolies squeeze from the public. Whilst providing less and less.

Our education system is ineffectual in providing literate and responsible people. When people teaching others, have spent their lives in schools, the only outcome is an educational shambles. The poor pay effective tax rates of up to 80%, whilst your ilk claims everything and pay little if any tax.

People fear not being able to find a way to remove your ilk from power, before we lose all our freedoms in the name of false security, economic growth and religious dogma. Wages and conditions are being eroded, working times extended and prices increased. The country gets less than $10 a barrel for its oil, they add more than 700% mark-up before refining, is it any wonder we have little faith and lots of fear regarding our future. You go to jail if you protect your life, whilst the attacker gets compensation. Try getting justice from government or multinational companies, nothing to fear eh.

Colin brings clarity to an increasingly befuddled society.
An obsessively protective culture is destroying individuality.
This is typified by the growth of "counsellors", persons thriving on society's Pavlovian conditioning to conform.

For example, there is a death of a school student. In rush the "grief counsellors" who often blur the fact that death is a NATURAL part of life.In the process, the unfortunate children then are forced to pass the responsibilty for understanding death to someone ELSE, instead of learning to cope with grief in their own way with their friends.

A person slips on a wet floor - out rush the writs to ensure that the person need never learn to observe the surroundings, take care, thus take responsibility.

There is a saying: "a person who never made a mistake, never made anything".
Spot on! We learn by getting things wrong, not by being shielded from
experience.

I remember when interviewing Dick Smith for a Scouting PR film, he referred to his firm belief in the value of 'responsible risk taking". His successes epitomise this idea.

Part of Australia's historical psyche is to "have a go".
Doing so, in the knowledge of the risk, gives an important opportunity for individuality and determination to flourish, and for self confidence to emerge from experience.

One of the worst aspects of our mollycoddled community, as well as the careless "she'll be right" belief, is the "they'll fix it - the authorities have it under control - it's the law" approach.

Rubbish!
W.E. Henley summed up personal responsibilty well when he penned in "Inviticus": ".....YOU are the captain of your fate, YOU are the master of your soul".

I spent my children's early years in Africa, geographically situated between two warring factions, with Caspars at the end of the streets, and men with AK47s hiding behind trees. Instead of Winnie The Pooh posters my children had mock-ups of land mines and bombs on their walls so they could run like hell if they saw anything similar in the back garden. As a journalist I sat with men in the rubbish and the excretement of suburban streets(yeah, dying -unlike the sanitised tv "violence" -really does cause one to void one's bowels and twitch and fit)holding their hands as they died. Three times in one year we arrived home to find we had been cleaned out of everything we possessed. My children started losing friends from the age of three to guns and bombs and knives - and every single member of the family had been shot: some recovered and some died.

We have been back in Australia for eight years and now have a large group of friends, acquaintances and colleagues: - no-one we have met here has ever come home to a bare house, been attacked, raped, sodomised or tortured by strangers, nor had limbs hacked off from bombs or mines or machettes.

Yet the sun bronzed, laconic Aussie has turned into a timid fear- monger who jumps at imaginary shadows.

I wish that all those who live in fear would get on a plane and go see what life is like in the rest of the world. I guarantee they would kiss the ground at the airport when they got back and would stride through the silent night streets laughing their heads off.

What are we really scared of?
I thought that was already decided back in 1948 when "1984" was written by George Orwell
We are afraid of Big Brother.

Romany, good on you. I have friends from Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Sudan and other horror spots who tell me their horror stories, their stories of torture and death and destruction - most of which has been inflicted on them by the machinations of the west.

I am currently reading Ann Jones' book Kabul in Winter, about the history and plight of women in Afghanistan. Not much of it is new as I have friends who were forced into marriage at 12, had 6 kids by the time they are 21 and are worn out at 35. Young boys faced with being used as human mine clearers and Iraqis who had to flee Saddam -now their families come and say it is worse than ever.

In Sydney they whine about trains, yet we blew up the trains in iraq - we commiserate with Spain, London and Mumbai but don't say a word about what we did in Iraq.

We whine about the price of bananas, the price of petrol, blah, blah, blah.

We have become soft, lazy and selfish - I swear Howard has had the water supply laced with lashings of mogadon.

We have a totally corrupt system for sure but at least we are not being bombed.

I do agree that there is an over reaction when in comes to fear in the public. However, there does need to be a reaction.

Apart from that horrible attack on that innocent little girl and all the other atrocities around the world, in my own area a 19 year-old girl was knocked off her bike and raped, a person my wife knows had his hand smashed (25 pins) when a person threw a bottle from a car and it hit his hand whilst he was cycling - not to mention the usual petty crime.

Now a female would be foolish to go out alone in that area until the police catch the grub. That is police advice - not mine.

The fellow who had his hand smashed is unlikely to encounter those hoons again. The police say that throwing dangerous objects is a bit of a trend amongst young folk. They say that there is nothing they can do. (Just as well the thugs aren't Muslims or we'd never here the end of it. "Muslim Terrorist Hoons Attack Cyclist" would be the headlines not to mention Bolt who'd spin so much his head would pop off.

I often think that all an Islamic propagandist has to do is read out aloud our western newspaper reports to convince their dupes that we are a bunch of decadent hypocrites.

One more point, don't get me wrong, I am opposed to frivilous money- grubbing cases and a child rapist and rapists - well I hope and pray there is a hell for them, however, I actually want a rapist who can prove that pornography influenced his behaviour to sue a porn publisher or give evidence so that a victim can sue the living life out of pornogaraphers who help provoke this kind of abuse.

Ultimately, criminals are responsible for their decisions, but I think it is about time the porn industry takes some of the flack (and I mean bigtime crippling flack, for the part they play in the degradation of respect for women and children in our society).

Did it ever occur to anybody that this little boy trying out the rollerblades was hyper-sensitive and/or had other issues and was scared and he needed padding and his mothers protection and encouragement as otherwise he wouldn't have attempted rollerblading and that once the little boy became more confident the padding would no longer be needed and nor would the mother have to be next to him.

Why does everybody always jump to conclusions and always want to discredit the parents. Every child is different, we have to give parents more credit and the benefit of the doubt, some children need more protection and support just to get them to attempt things as their emotional intensity and reactions to situations and even pain can be extreme.

I think the biggest fear people have is of being ridiculed, discredited and ostracized yet it seems to be something that Australians seem to delight in.

Yolanda I accept your point entirely... the circumstances of that particular child are not known nor those of intent of his parents. What the scenario does portray is a symbol of the fear that does seem to pervade our lives. So the scene was not to be taken or even examined literally but serves to provoke conversation on the culture of fear that seems to be growing in the Australian psche.

Apologies, Jolanda, excuse the misspelling of your name...

Colin the biggest fear that people have is that of becoming the targets and victims of bullies and of people with power that have no qualms about trying to destroy the reputation or standing of others to enhance their own position and for their own pleasure and delight.

I think that your other example of parents watching their children whilst swimming at the beach was also not a good example. The beach is a very dangerous place and parents should at all times supervise their children.

The problem today is that not enough parents are supervising their children and teaching them right from wrong and standing up in their children’s defence when they are being treated unfairly and unjustly. The attitude that life is tough get used to it gives power to those that abuse it. Parents need to get more involved, not less, because children are not born with the ability to resolves issues and make good choices, it is something that needs to be taught and helped to develop. Leaving children to fend for themselves usually just allows the most aggressive and violent bullies to rule whilst the adults sit back and do nothing. What does that teach our children?

Given that it was obvious that the truck driver hit the bridge, what else was he going to say. That he didn’t do it!

Sitting on an handed down rusty bike I learned that I could stop if I kept the mulberry tree infront of me until I became used to the brakes. A multitude of smashes and bruises later, I had taught myself to ride. We went to local water holes as a group, we all went to the toilets never alone, we walked together at night never alone.

We had 9 million people when I was young, we now have 21 million. We had quiet streets with a few of the towns hoons, and you could cross the street straight away because drivers alowed you. We lived life innocently as children should have, there was no adult talk around us, we didnt think of war all we thought of was fun.

My children see death, war, hatred, starvation, disease, abuse and cruelty.
Your opinions on the meerkat generation didnt include lists of how we should behave.
1. When at the beach ensure you have a magazine, sunglasses and valium to enjoy your rest time while the children are watched by life guards who dont get paid but will enjoy saving their life due to the increased density in the flag areas in summer.
2. Women start using the mens toilet to teach your sons how to use the silver stream, we are an equal society let men use the girls too.
3. Most importantly, these are the future adults of the world and if you dont allow them to have psychological and physical pain to be tied to how will they be able to exist in the future?
Following your advice, I realise that I am too caring and loving to my children, I should block out what may happen and just let them live and if the worst happens; so be it, life goes on.....I am curious that the man with the truck accepted blame because no one was hurt, would it have been a face without a smile if he had. My kids dont wear knee pads to rollerblade, but they do hold my hand to cross the street.

One thing to consider -

Growing up, I knew one kid who was a pretty healthy sort, certainly a better athlete than I, though he never really competed in many events, or played many games for that matter.
As he grew up, he developed a serious case of asthma and allergies and by the time he was in his senior years in high school, he was quite frequently home sick.

Having visited his home, I was amazed at how clean and pristine everything in there was - it was more like a museum than a home, and his mother cleaned everything with a zeal that was verging on obsessive compulsive.

Don't get me wrong - I do strongly believe in having a clean household, within reason.

I later learned that children raised in pristine environments don't get the opportunity to develop resistances and antibodies that are important for fending off germs.

Now I don't know if having a 'bubble-like' protected childhood is what caused his asthma, and I have no idea if it was what caused his allergies, but I do know he missed out on a lot of experiences and was socially awkward at times.

I do believe it is possible to love your children to death - if they don't scrape their knees a few times while growing up, they'll never learn to fend for themselves. Maybe this is why there are so many twentysomethings still living with their parents.