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August 2005 | |
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Interview: On Holiday Unions: One Day Longer Industrial: Never Mind the Bollocks Politics: Spun Out Economics: If the Grog Don't Get You .... History: Taking a Stand International: The Split Legal: Pushing the Friendship Poetry: Simple Subtractions Review: Sydney Trashed
Parliament The Soapbox The Locker Room International Postcard
Iemma�s Dilemmas
 Back To The PastAFL-CIO Not The Only WarBe AfraidFrame UpWe Love MorrisANew DevelopmentA Readers Suggestion
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The Locker Room A Concept Is Born
The Locker Room is a bit antsy this month as it is still coming to terms with the fact that it can't go across the road after work and have a smoke and a beer with the workmates. The reason this column left home at sixteen was to get away from this sort of helpful consideration as to what others thought was best. Why the hell someone would like to live a long and healthy life in a society so boring is beyond comprehension. It's not as if all those Pilates doing suckers are exactly flocking to the pubs now that the hostelleries been liberated from all that fun. It is a conservative age and the wowsers have the field. All is lost. Next we will all be expected to be valuable members of society. It occured to the Locker Room that this was the case last month when a civic minded Novacastrian decided to do something the Knights had failed to do and lay a tackle. The fact that he did this by jumping the fence at Broadmeadow incurred the wrath of the powers that be with suggestions from everything from his being barred from future NRL fixtures (he should be so lucky), to having his skin flayed in public, his house destroyed and salt cast on the foundations. Alas the days of audience participation at the footy are long gone, despite the fact that the crowd loves how it breaks the monotony of the sport being played. When was the last time you saw a happy, tail-wagging doggie getting involved in the action? It's been too bloody long. When was the last time you saw a crowd boo a streaker? The reason they don't is because the crowd loves it. Nonetheless, the humourless bastards that run this world are determined to criminalise everything that doesn't involve being a longer working and lower paid wage slave. Sports rot from the outside in. This is as true as your foot being at the end of your leg. Unfortunately this extension of the KISS principle flies wonderfully over the heads of the potatoes that have decided to make everything better for us whether we like it or not. The reason they cannot mesh their view of what is best for us all with the dark reality of what the mob likes best is because they are afflicted with a "vision". We've all heard some bullet headed banana at a microphone droning on about his or her vision for football, cricket, soccer, basketball, netball or curling. It's usually featured in the sports news during off season behind the report that John Elias is out of gaol and set to line up with the Moscow Knights this season. The problem is their vision is often somewhat blurred behind a lot of managese that sounds innocuously evil, but actually means nothing. Problem being, it gives them license to strip anything worthwhile from the anarchic joy of sport and replace it with four tonnes worth of steaming buckets of Hyundai. For chrissakes, we had people complaining that Leichhardt Oval was too crowded last month! Too crowded? It's like saying you had too much fun. There's always the exit if the thrilling energy of a surging mass of humanity proves too much for you. If you want comfortable seating, good food and a pleasant atmosphere then sign up for Foxtel. Going to the football was never meant to be pleasant, it was meant to be exciting. The purveyors of the vision thing have never been big fans of the mob. Their idea of excitement is capital depreciating accounting methods. They govern through focus group, which is mistake, as all people are born liars and will constantly tell you what you want to hear. It's the sort of dangerous mistake that leads to executive government. Now, because of the vision thing, they want to make cricket interesting and footy boring. I hope they all die of emphysma from passive smoking. Phil Doyle down in back play late in the second half
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