Keywords: Friends Of The Abc
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AUSTRALIA
- Marnie Vinall
- 27 April 2020
2 Comments
The notion that we’re stronger together and we all just need to be kind to each other is reinforced by our leaders, from celebrities and public figures, and broadcast widely across social media. Yet something is missing from this encouraging messaging set to keep our spirits up and that’s the need to offer kindness within, too.
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AUSTRALIA
- Danusia Kaska
- 08 April 2020
5 Comments
The COVID-19 pandemic came swiftly and without any warning to turn our lives upside down. But while many of us are living the routine of our lives very differently now, people who are homeless or those at risk of homelessness are experiencing this pandemic in an acutely difficult way.
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ARTS AND CULTURE
- Julie Perrin
- 06 April 2020
4 Comments
While I stay by my mother, I glean only the edges of the news; already the horror of the fires has been at full stretch. In the quiet room where my mother lies, I think of people trying to sleep in unfamiliar environments, refugees from the fires.
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AUSTRALIA
It’s a stressful and anxious time for many people. Yet, the expression to ‘look for the helpers’ whenever a crisis occurs is an apt one in this situation. People are looking for social connectivity and ways to express kindness to others in practising social distancing under direction of medical experts.
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ARTS AND CULTURE
- Robert Whalley
- 30 March 2020
4 Comments
All this is pleasant and unremarkable, except that we were just briefly discussing which future events are likely cancelled in light of the announced pandemic. It’s an unexpected morning topic for conversation before coffee. But it’s appropriate with the increasing concerns on flattening the curve of contagion, illness, infections, acute complications and death.
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AUSTRALIA
- Marnie Vinall
- 19 March 2020
4 Comments
Although this is a necessary step to stop the spread of COVID-19 — and especially in order to protect those most vulnerable in our communities such as the elderly and immunocompromised — being confined at home is going to take its toll on the mental wellbeing of many of us.
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ENVIRONMENT
- Michele Madigan
- 10 February 2020
26 Comments
Senator Matthew Canavan made his long awaited, if predictable, announcement: Australia’s long lived intermediate radioactive waste will be stored, and the low level waste deposited, at the Napandee site in the Kimba region of South Australia. It still came as a jolt to most of the farmers and others rightly fearful of the plan to host nuclear waste which even the government now admits will remain toxic for an unimaginable 10,000 years.
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AUSTRALIA
- Vivienne Cowburn
- 31 January 2020
18 Comments
The modern 'old maid' is no longer confined to the attic. She's in the workforce, the senate, leading in the community. Yet while gender norms are being deconstructed and cultural ideas of femininity are evolving, the idea women exist only to procreate still persists. Women are not only supposed to have children, they're supposed to want to.
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AUSTRALIA
- Neve Mahoney
- 22 January 2020
11 Comments
My dog I've had for 14 years dies, and I decide to spend two days in bed. I look online and see that more than a billion Australian animals have died in the fires. Guilt spirals on top of guilt. How gauche, to feel this private grief, when there is such public grief already.
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AUSTRALIA
- Matt Tyler
- 02 December 2019
9 Comments
Dominant ideals of masculinity do not materialise out of thin air. They are produced and reproduced by people, institutions, policies and other social forces, and there are places in Australia where efforts to promote or defend traditional ideals of masculinity seem particularly energetic.
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ENVIRONMENT
- Cristy Clark
- 21 November 2019
4 Comments
As we pare back more and more, I have started to realise that there is a risk in taking things too far. The consumer orgy of the past may have been unsightly, but gift giving itself also serves a valuable social function, and we may be at risk of throwing out the baby with the bath water.
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AUSTRALIA
The latest underspend of the NDIS budget has reached the eye-popping amount of $4.6 billion. Every single one of these dollars is a dollar not getting to disabled people. Every single dollar represents change not being delivered. It's a door being closed, a phone call not being answered. This is getting worse, not better.
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