Diary of Your Week: Living in Sydney.

This week we have a great comment from James McCarthy about living in Sydney. James was a contributor on our recent Olympics discussion.  It is a vivid and warm picture he paints of living in one of the most beautiful cities in the world.  Over to James:  If you live in Sydney and you love music and theatre, as I do, you can make a reasonable guess that you will end up inside the Sydney Opera House quite regularly. And you would be right.

Is this fish too expensive to save?

Yesterday the UN body charged with protecting the world’s endangered species, The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) strongly rejected an American call to ban the commercial fishing of the Blue Fin Tuna, which they claim is in serious decline, at a Doha Conference.  Most countries at the conference argued it should be managed by the fising nations involved in this trade and that stocks are sustainable with the right managment.

Are there limits to protest?

In Thailand hundreds if not thousands of red shirted anti-government protesters are donating their blood in order to collect it in bottles to throw at government buildings as a ritual sacrificial offering. They claim this is a demonstration of love for their country.  Is this a protest too far?

Doing a good job or being true to your conscience?

Is this just another story about a man that cannot deal with his own sexuality? It seems so, for Californian State Senator Roy Ashburn who has come out as gay, who has a voting record that has opposed every social initiative to support gay rights in California.

However, Senator Ashburn says that he did the right thing by supporting the views of his majority conservative constituents. He is quoted here in The Christian Science Monitor as saying: “My votes reflect the wishes of the people in my district,”

Are we remembering war the right way?

Remembrance Day is a date that stands out in my mind. In my formative years in Australia, it was always a big day in the cultural life of the country. 

For Australians the Great War of 1914-1918 is a watershed in the wider historical conversation we have as a nation. It could be argued that with the blood of these many young Australians we became in our minds, truly one nation. 

And because of this, I’d be very interested to discuss whether Remembrance Day should solely be about paying tribute to those who’ve died, or whether it should also warn us against ever going back to war.