#Gaza #ABC #BreakfastNews #Pornography #MentionsOfFood

today’s trip out into no-man’s-land to scoff oatmeal/brew a cuppa coincided with news of gaza on the tele

i cannot be unbiased about fauziah - i don’t think she is terribly well informed, generally, and i don’t like her politics.

i don’t doubt her distress over what is happening in gaza was genuine, but i muted the tele anyway, before sitting next to fren who was struggling (with cruelly arthritic fingers) to manipulate her boiled egg.

fren asked why i muted tele.

cos, i said, we need to know what is happening, and we need to do what we can about it, and we need to know what we can do, but this is just pornography. there is no rational discussion of viable solutions, and no call for viewers to act. it’s sole purpose is to provoke an emotional response, and the response it provokes is one of impotence and hopelessness. it’s designed to make us feel like there is nothing we can do, so the people doing it can keep doing what they are doing.
this is not “news” this shit has been happening for 80 years and the establishment has been telling us the whole time that pro-palestinian thinking is wrong.

of course, i may be wrong. (I often am). but i am not a happy camper at the best of times, and not at my best in the mornings.
made my cuppa tea and escaped back into my room.

someone has emailed me a photo of a trip to echuca about 25 years ago. if you don’t mind all the touristy bits that make it so accessible, echuca is a magic, happy place.