Welcome to Eureka Street

back to site
Forgot your password?
Subscribe

Keywords: The Sparrow

  • ECONOMICS

    Good for the economy

    • Justine Toh
    • 24 November 2022
    1 Comment

    When we talk about ‘the economy’, we assume there’s only one worth knowing about: the market economy. That’s why we speak about the economy and GDP in the same breath: we treat the sum of goods and services produced and sold — and the profits we hope they’ll add to the bottom line — as our measure of the health of the nation. Which would be fine if the market economy was the only one that existed. 

    READ MORE
  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Ownership

    • Jamie Dawe
    • 06 December 2021
    1 Comment

    I own my proclivities and short comings / I own the transgressions of those which have inflicted wounds some unhealed /  I own the sublime moments of subjective joy / I own little but I am rich in compassion / I own not the land it owns me

    READ MORE
  • RELIGION

    Dawkins delusion: the legacy of New Atheism

    • Tim Robertson
    • 27 February 2020
    16 Comments

    Contrary to their claims, the New Atheists do have a creation myth. It goes something like this: emerging from darkness into the light, Enlightenment thinkers cast off the shackles of religion and, in so doing, ushered in an age of reason. For the likes of Richard Dawkins, a founding member of the movement, this is an article of faith, and he’s spent recent years casting himself not just as an heir of this tradition, but also as its modern day guardian.

    READ MORE
  • AUSTRALIA

    The problem with taking politics out of climate change

    • Jeff Sparrow
    • 21 February 2020
    15 Comments

    The common-sense enthusiasm for depoliticising environmentalism — voiced most recently in relation to the bill proposed by the conservative independent Zali Steggall — pushes in entirely the wrong direction.

    READ MORE
  • ENVIRONMENT

    Writing in the apocalypse

    • Brian Matthews
    • 06 February 2020
    3 Comments

    I’d never heard of McKenzie Funk until I came across his marvellous review essay, 'Smoked Out'. I eagerly read on beyond the genial opening paragraphs and almost immediately, I found myself on familiar, if deadly, ground.

    READ MORE
  • INTERNATIONAL

    Climate crisis spawns clowns not statesmen

    • Jeff Sparrow
    • 09 December 2019
    29 Comments

    If the dark days of 1940 provided an opportunity for a chancer and publicity hound like Winston Churchill to emerge as an inspirational leader and reputed giant of the 20th century, why hasn't the catastrophic breakdown of the natural world done something similar for the likes of Boris Johnson, Donald Trump and Scott Morrison?

    READ MORE
  • AUSTRALIA

    Class and climate drive Melbourne Cup hostility

    • Jeff Sparrow
    • 06 November 2019
    27 Comments

    I can't imagine how anyone could look at the Melbourne Cup and see a vision of the 'fair go'. On the contrary, much hostility to horse racing — this year's Cup attracted the smallest crowd since 1993 — stems from a perception that its rituals celebrate grotesque inequalities.

    READ MORE
  • MEDIA

    Campaigning journos are failing Assange

    • Jeff Sparrow
    • 24 October 2019
    7 Comments

    Assange's latest court appearance coincided with the launch of the Right to Know campaign, backed by the major press organisations in Australia as well as the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance. To its immense credit, the MEAA has consistently defended him. But many prominent Australian journalists have not.

    READ MORE
  • ENVIRONMENT

    No time to be polite about climate

    • Jeff Sparrow
    • 08 October 2019
    20 Comments

    No-one should be fooled: the politicians and commentators who condemn civil disobedience are the same politicians and commentators who attack the UN for passing resolutions on carbon; who tell scientists to get back to the lab when they speak out on politics; who do everything they can to keep climate out of the parliament.

    READ MORE
  • ENVIRONMENT

    The 'kettle logic' of climate denial cultists

    • Jeff Sparrow
    • 19 September 2019
    13 Comments

    Like the flying saucer people documented in When Prophecy Fails, they don't change their minds based on new material. Rather, the discomfort fresh edvidence causes them results in a renewed proclamation of their denialism, as they double down on that identity. The rhetoric might change but the structure remains the same.

    READ MORE
  • INTERNATIONAL

    El Paso shooting and the rise of eco-fascism

    • Jeff Sparrow
    • 07 August 2019
    4 Comments

    The widespread despair about climate change, and the seeming inability of progressives to offer a solution, provides fertile soil for ecofascism to grow. In a sense, given the scale of the crisis, their apocalyptic vision of an environmental race war can sound more realistic than the pallid centrist nostrums that everyone knows won't work.

    READ MORE
  • INTERNATIONAL

    Religious freedom feint has Liberals in knots

    • Jeff Sparrow
    • 17 July 2019
    9 Comments

    The conservative base wants religious protection for Christians, but has a long history of vilifying Muslims, who, presumably, could also claim protection from any new law. One struggles to imagine a law that might enable a footballer's right to send homophobic tweets, while enabling courts, parliaments and schools to ban burqas.

    READ MORE