Posts by Mr Mark
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Derek and Clive
Absolutely !, thanks 3410. In fact probably Derek and Clive Live.
"Get out the Cab !, get out of the bleedin Cab !".
"I'm not going to change your sheets again, Mr Hastings".
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The Dagenham Dialogues
by Peter Cook & Dudley Moore
Ooooweeee ! That sounds very much like the title I've been trying to remember for years and years. Wayyyyy back in the early 80s, when in't 7th Form, I had a 'free period' (as we called it in those days, no double entendre intended), and I spent a brilliant hour in the school library reading the collected Pete n Dud scripts (from either Not Only But Also or Do Not Adjust Your Set).Only a year earlier, an English guy turned up in the 6th form (his family had emigrated from UK) with what was then a banned audio tape of Cook and Moore doing some hilarious improvised stuff whilst pissed out of their heads in the early/mid 70s. Can't quite remember the title, but still remember most of the dialogue. I was never able to think of the Queen Mother in quite the same way again.
Oh and thanks for the clip Recordari.
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Jesus, I sounded like I had one hell of a chip on my shoulder in my last comment.
Let me assure you I really do love the middle class. Of all the classes, it's one of my very favourites.
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Tom
Much of the social conservatism and public racism in Australia is simply evidence of a vigorous and thriving working class, who don't give a flying fuck for middle class sensibilities. It only seems weird to New Zealanders because in this country the working class have been destroyed as a political force and the only voice heard in public discourse is that of our (largely) neo-liberal middle classThe irony, Tom, is that you regurgitate precisely the same derogatory assumptions about the working class (red-neck social conservatives, openly racist) as those frequently made by middle class commentators (Neo-Liberal or otherwise).
As someone who grew up in a blue-collar family with a strong liberal-Left tradition, I really resent the broad caricatures of working people (deeply conservative, conformist, simple-minded "little battlers") so often presented by smug middle class journalists (and always grounded in little or no evidence).
My experience is of a significant degree of diversity among lower and lower-middle socio-economic groups when it comes to major 'moral' / social issues. There's more liberalism on some issues than you might expect ( not to mention more conservatism among middle class groups). And that's backed-up by the demographic analysis of opinion polls on these issues (which I've been working on over the last few years - although, admittedly, only for the 1965-1995 period).
I think you'll find that when there is a clear conservative majority on any particular issue, it's as much a middle class as a working class majority.
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The politics seemed weirdly backwards and conservative...
gender roles are more narrowly defined than in NZ
Last time I was in Sydney (2005), we looked through the Yellow Pages for Car Hire and found an ad that shouted "No Bloody Women...You Don't know how to Bloody drive!!!". Must be the Aussie sense of humour - definitely wouldn't see the light of day in NZ.
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Ahhhh !!! I've just fucked up BIG TIME.
Yesterday I suggested Craig Ranapia wrote a letter to the Dominion Post a few years ago supporting George W's invasion of Iraq and warning of the imminent danger of Saddam's "weapons of mass destruction". This is what happens when you write something off-the-cuff, based on a vague memory, and without even remotely verifying your facts.
Because I've just checked on the Index New Zealand newspaper site and found that Craig certainly did have a letter on Iraq published in 2003 in that newspaper but his argument was the polar opposite of the one I suggested. He was in fact casting absolute doubt on the supposed threat from Iraq and its purported links to 9/11.
So I unreservedly apologise to Craig for this monumental fuck-up. And I think I'll keep a particularly low profile for the next few weeks out of sheer unbridled shame. Certainly the last time I'll make that sort of accusation without some verification first !!!.
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He (Craig Ranapia) does fill the flag-waving National member niche for us with great panache
Indeed. I still remember angry, yet highly-articulate, outbursts in the letters section of Victoria University's Salient from a Mr "Craig M Ranapia, Young Nats" in the late 1990s.
And then, a little later, in 2003, I seem to have a memory of Mr R writing relatively angry letters to the Dominion Post in support of George W's invasion of Iraq. If memory serves me right, there was much talk in R's letters about the imminent danger of Sadam's "weapons of mass destruction".
On another note, Russell confirms my growing feeling that he's superbly liberal on what might be called 'moral' or 'identity' issues, but tends toward the slightly Right of Centre on Economics. Or is that too simplistic, Russell ?
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webweaver
There's also a poll on the Herald's front page with the question "Who has been most discredited by the Act leadership row ?" - Heather Roy 15% / Rodney Hide 77% / No one has been discredited 8 %. All of which...does not bode well for Mr Hide or the Act party as a whole.
Actually, that's got me worried now !
ACT are hoping for 8 % of the party vote and exactly 8 % of respondents believe no one has been discredited !!!
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Splitters !
Dang, Andre - you got in before me !
Which forces me to head off in a different direction and say "I mean, where's it gonna gestate ?, in a box ?".
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Can I just interject at this crucial moment to point out that I am almost certainly of the same generation as Philip Matthews ?
Like Philip, I did MacBeth for 6th form English (oops, sorry actors and luvies !!!, "The Scottish Play". Oh Jesus no, whatever have I done ?!!! Just the mere mention of MacBeth brings weeks of bad stage luck to any actor reading this. Oh God, I can only apologise).
Anyway, moving right along, we were shown precisely the same famous Polanski film - definitely, as Philip says, GORY - heads hacked-off with swords all over the place. Tragically, I can't quite remember the nude scene Philip speaks so fondly of.
I remember the teacher making each of us read out excerpts of the play. I was so bored rigid that I decided to do it in as authentic a Glaswegian accent as I could manage - got a laugh (and a smile from a particularly good-looking girl) so that was the main thing.
After the film, the teacher brought up the whole Sharon Tate/Manson family saga. Amazingly, she and I were the only ones in the class who'd ever heard of it, so she had me explain to the rest of them the whole gory episode (and, in the process, the hard realities of life). We were all the same age, of course, but I like to think that from then on I became a kind of Father-figure to the naive young pups - giving the youngsters a bit of fatherly advice and the occasional clip round the ear whenever they needed it, bless them :-)
All occurred in precisely the same year as a certain Springbok Tour ever so briefly discussed on another thread by myself and the said Philip.