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.