Bernie. Give us a break. Wilma, Mick, most "stolen" Aborigines, all British child migrants and other hard-done by post-war babies need to get things into perspective.

I was born the same year as Wilma. I had an alcoholic grandmother, an insane mother, abusive step-father and lower working class childhood when times were economically tough. I was belted at home, I was belted by the Christian Brothers, I was abused psychologically and physically and generally treated as a lump that needed to be belted and forced into being a good citizen who understood their place in society.

Life was damn tough for all those people. But it was tough for all lower working-class people from that era. I've never met anyone from that background that has anything positive to say about the times - or their upbringing. My earliest memories include screaming women as bailiffs threw their furniture and belongings onto the footpath because they'd missed their rent a second week and screaming wives and kids when Dad came home pissed and proceeded to belt them all. Life, as per Hobbes, was nasty, brutish and often short.

I have nightmares too. But I've gone on to fight my way up to a career, family and life without needing the Church, nuns, Brothers, government or public to prop me up or give me cash to compensate me for my hard start.

Give me a break. How much has Wilma ever done to help herself before asking me to feel sorry for her. Anyone pregnant at 17 in those days knew what would happen. Anyone who ran afoul of the police or welfare or just about anybody knew what happened. Wilma's not the only kid beaten up by coppers.

Just give me a break. Or don't. I'll make my own breaks just like I've always done thanks without asking for anyone's pity.

Kevin

Give us a break yourself mate.

We can do without self-righteous moralising - look at me, I made it so what's everyone else bleating about. Not everyone is a 'good' as you think you are.

Maybe you made it in your own terms, Kevin, but your lack of compassion and understanding suggests to me there are important ways in which you still haven't made it.

FRank..... your response to Kevins story amazed me... how insensitive and repugnant...

Kevin and I don't agree much, but for goodness sake.. he has exposed his jolly heart here and you trampled on it and spat on it..shame.

Kevin.. at least now I am gaining an inkling of why your usual thoughts about Religion are so negative...how could anyone have a positive image about it with such an experience of life.

I encourage you mate.. to go one step further, just as you were able to separate yourself from the entanglement of your past and make a life, try also to separate the truth about Christ from the abuse of those claiming to act in His name. You will surely find that He is everything those people were not... but should have been.

WILMA..... I read the story, and while things were very harsh yes.... 2 things stand out in her story.

1/ When she escaped..where the heck did she plan to go ?
2/ She was not willing to make the most of the situation, she simply rebelled.. with no other options available.
I mean..if you are going to rebell.. at least have an objective, a plan, but she seems to have rebelled simply for the sake of "I don't like this" and as the story unfolds, things got worse for her because of that rebellion.

I didn't see much in the story of harsh treatment which was not related to some rebellion by her...

Did I miss it ?

Bernie has written this story from the perpective of his own experience of incarceeration.. that stands out like dogs privates.

BD, for the most part, I have to agree with you. FrankGol's attack was completely unjustified, and serves only to show him as LESS compassionate.

Wilma's actions do seem thoughtless, but I guess they are the actions of a girl, one that doesnt necessarily have the mental skills to reason things through. Perhaps it has been those with greater reasoning ability that have been the ones to succeed despite the odds.

Life can be pretty hard, no matter what generation you were born into. My dad was the generation prior to this one, and he did it pretty tough. My grandmother was orphaned in 1916 (at about 9yo) and had a pretty hard life. My mother was abandoned in a Victorian boarding school while her parents moved to Cairns with her younger sister (mum was just 7 when left behind). I consider myself to be very lucky in comparison to the older generations of my family. Life IS better now, at least for most.

I must agree with Kevin, I was wondering if Graham Young had bought a job lot of Bernie Matthews yarns cheap in a garage sale (shame he could not find a bunch of Andrew Bolt ones whilst he was at it).

I started to read one of Bernie’s diatribes and all he is describing is the simple fact, not all people have the same starting opportunities in life.

The real world is not a “level playing field”.

My childhood was more fortunate than many but my parents were, by no means materially wealthy or able to give me or my siblings all that they would have wished for us.

That said, life is a game. However, it is not the hand we are dealt which matters but how we play it out that counts.

“How we play” is determined by whether we decide to view ourselves as victims as well as the decisions we make our ethics and the calculated risks we are prepared to take.

Do we expect others to make exceptions for us because of our childhood disadvantages, colour of our skin, size of the plum stone in our mouth or do we determine that what we expect is dependent upon our own sense of dignity and belief in who we are and more importantly, what we can aspire to be?

I never accept abuse by officials acting, supposedly, with public authority but we have seen it all before. The real failing does not come from the corrupt officials but from those who had a duty of oversight and could (but failed to) intervene when challenged with evidence of abuse, the bishops and senior managers of the institutions and public bureaucrats who simply took the money and washed their hands of their public responsibility.

That said, regardless of the hurt, we should do two things, improve the system of accountability to make abuses impossible and move on!

As Kevin said “I'll make my own breaks just like I've always done thanks without asking for anyone's pity.”

I believe I try to do the same, good on ya Kevin!

Good afternoon to you,*KEVIN and **COL ROUGE...

I agree with both of you with respect to Bernie's piece. Wilma's account of her early life as described by Bernie is very sad, to say the least.

Bernie does possess that rare capacity to engender discussion on issues that have directly affected his life, in toto. Further, I believe that Bernie's own lamentable cirumstances, have surely endowed him most admirable, to provide splendid commentary, on such specific issues, as those that have regrettably impacted on Wilma earlier life.

However, KEVIN'S circumstances are not dissimilar to those that so negatively impacted upon my Father's earlier life too. Came up through the Great Depression, and then there was WW 2 et al.

I suppose what I most admire about my dear Dad, KEVIN, and many many others, was the mere fact that these QUALITY men and women used their inordinately tough up-bringing, in order to form their own strong character traits, that have stood them in good circumstances today.

KEVIN, I 'dips me lid to you my friend'. Absolutely ! And COL ROUGE, as I said earlier, I totally agree with your sentiments on this one.

Cheers...sungwu.