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Five of Sydney's prestigious GPS schools have boycotted competition with another member of their association, The Scots College, because it is accused of undermining the spirit of competition in school sport by offering inducements to lure students with sports star potential. This undermines what the GPS code of ethics calls 'the spirit of the amateur' that promotes character, resilience and teamwork ahead of winning.
The Feast of the Grand Final has a great deal in common with celebrations in other religious traditions. Events such as Christmas and Easter are celebrations of the stories that help fashion the identity of Christians. Telling these stories each year helps us create our own new stories about the values or beliefs we follow. The Grand Final has its own stories that tell us about ourselves, as well as rituals that personalise those stories for each of us.
Gillard's pick of Nova Peris as Labor candidate for the Senate in the Northern Territory could be a signal that she will try to get on the front foot this year. Since her famous misogyny speech last October, she may have decided not to die wondering but to crash through or crash. This poses an interesting dilemma for Abbott and his team.
He was a notorious transgressor on the football field, and the last years of his life were a sustained transgression. Terminal sickness has its own code. It is normally handled and propitiated by silence. Jim Stynes seemed to do it a different way.
By showing the wider community that an Aboriginal footballer could be smart as well as strong, Artie Beetson set an enduring example to all Indigenous people about what they could aspire to, on and off the sporting field.
When I appeared on Q&A with Christopher Hitchens, a young man asked whether we can 'ever hope to live in a truly secular society' while the religious continue to 'affect political discourse and decision making' on euthanasia, same-sex unions and abortion. Hitchens was simpaticao. I was dumbstruck.
Police look on benignly; clergymen bless them; politicians turn up to watch. But can any activity where players set out to damage their opponents be called a sport? And should such an activity be allowed to draw on the country's medical resources to mend that damage?
It seems appropriate that Jason Akermanis was sacked in the middle of an election campaign. The tensions between conflicting interests that led to his sacking have also been exhibited in the election campaign. But in politics they have been negotiated much more disreputably.
We assume aid is 'helping people'. But the 2006 White Paper on Australian Aid specified its purpose to help countries 'reduce poverty and achieve sustainable development, in line with Australia’s national interest'. We'd be mortified if a church agency came out with such a self-serving clause.
Timana Tahu left the NSW State of Origin team after racist comments by assistant coach Andrew Johns. AFL heavyweight Mal Brown described Aboriginal players as cannibals. Why is it an insult to call someone black?
When I first heard of the Melbourne Storm tragedy, I laughed. My attitudes to games had remained stuck in an ill-spent childhood in which a little cheating was part of playing games. Even now, I confess, I enjoy stories of cheating done in style.
The salary cap in sport is one of the last remnants of Australian egalitarianism. This is one of the reasons why the Melbourne Storm's behaviour is so offensive. It is an offence against one of the values Australians hold so dear, especially at Anzac Day — a fair go.
13-24 out of 40 results.