So this is news...

Watching the news today was quite upsetting. For quite some time I have been becoming more and more upset with the quality of Australian journalism (of course in this context the term "journalist" and "journalism" will be used very loosely). Since when has the news needed Hollywood flair, cinematography, and crappy page three tabloid style reports.

I know I shouldn't have been expecting a miracle from Channel 9 in the first place, but tonight was atrocious. When watching the news on commercial TV, you are only given 30 minutes in which time they are meant to update you on the important goings on in the local coverage area, the nation and the world. The nightly news is not some cheap, crappy current affairs programme (that comes on after the news, especially in the case of Channel 7 and 9), the nightly news is a brief overview of the goings on in politics, war, and common local affairs.

So when I turned on the news tonight and was bombarded by a story of how speeding in school zones is increasing, I was wondering if this could be counted as newsworthy. Perhaps in a newspaper where the reader is given over 100 pages in which to read what they choose, but in a 30 minute news broadcast (including ads) this seemed highly irrelevant. To go on with this apparent news report, they used amazing lines such as this...

even with a rising road toll Australians keep speeding, especially in school zones

I would firstly like to say that I in no way encourage or promote speeding. I don't believe that there is such a thing as "safe speeding" and that speed limits should at all times be obeyed. But I would love to know how many road related deaths due to speeding happen in school zones, or even if there is a link between the INCREASE in the road toll to the INCREASE of speeding offences in school zones. This to me seems like a completely redundant statement.

Now my main gripe with school zones and speeding is that if a school zone were implemented for the safety of the children leaving the school between the specified times, then perhaps there would be better notification and signage. A sign saying that "this is a school zone" does nothing for the driver who actually may have no idea of the time (without looking at a clock), have no idea if its school holidays (without having childres), and perhaps through complacency may not realise that they have entered a school zone.

Only a limited number of school zones actually have flashing lights to make drivers aware that the school zone is active. Even then, when the safety of our children is at stake, are a couple of flashing lights enough?!?!

The simple answer is NO. There is no cost too great, no precaution not worth taking when the safety of young children is concerned. So what does this mean? Does it mean that the councils and local governments don't care enough, or just don't care...? I think they do care, but not about the safety of our children. Its this lack of caring, lack of warning of school zones that leads me to believe that for the most part they are in place simply as a revenue raising mechanism. Don't get me wrong, I think the school zone idea could be great if implemented with the safety of children at the forefront of the agenda. However this does not seem to be the case, as the lack of appropriate signage places revenue as the primary agenda and the safety of children arriving and leaving school as a secondary agenda.

In light of this, and to get back on topic of the appalling state of the Channel 9 news team. In their report on motorists speeding in school zones, they showed the signage, although as I mentioned before it is sorely lacking (you'd think if they were to show such a one sided tabloid report they would at least have shown the type with flashing lights), and then they confronted some of the drivers who had just been fined by the police patrol they were with.

And here is a teacher who had two children in the car

And here is a P plater not long out of school herself

It is already quite apparent by the above that the report was never interested in showing the flaws in the school zone system in order to increase the awareness of drivers. It was simply a tabloid fabrication to entertain the poor souls who lap this crap up as news.

I'm not even going to start talking about Tracey Grimshaw and that talentless hack of a reporter. Perhaps that will be the fuel of another blog entry in the future - but needless to say she is hopeless. Never in my life have I seen anyone less interested in finding the truth of a matter. Which is obviously not important to commercial news coverage in Australian anymore - I guess she fits right in then...

Please people - expect more from the news media we are receiving in this country, and when they fuck up - send an email calling them on their shit - will take you two seconds to do and if it happens enough they may start to take notice. Watch ABS or SBS news. Read independent online news papers and most importantly stay away from ninemsn.com and the Daily Telegraph...

I will never understand how something can be happy about appealing to the lowest common denominator. The publications we read are meant to aid in elevating our minds and ability to reason rationally... Instead they nurture the bigoted, illogical, and uneducated amongst us into believing that they are the best that they can be, and it's just not right.

Guilt and Chocolate

Two things which are very closely related for many of us. Guilt, and chocolate. Some of us feel guilty after eating chocolate, while some of us are guilty of not eating enough. I like to think I'm the later, although I am most probably the former.

Although it must be said that this thread has nothing to do with chocolate - even though it has a chocolatey theme... This thread is about guilt, and the abundance of which I feel for abandoning you, my readers for what seems like an eternity.

In some ways, blogging felt like the rebound girl you have after a long term relationship. I had just ended - rather abruptly - my relationship with facebook, and felt that something was needed to fill the void. Almost how many smokers take up chewing gum, or knitting... But this should not have been the case. Blogging shouldn't have been my rebound girl, as now I feel bad for abusing its trust and taking it for a ride. I plan to make a lasting commitment to the blog, not some sleazy cure to a to a distructive faux-social relationship. From here on in, I plan to stop using cheesy pickup lines and make a stand... Blog, if you'll have me back, I swear to be true to you!

But this isn't where the chocolate metaphor ends... Just as I was guilty for not being there for my blog, I didn't want to use it to distract me from other issue. As an example, how people use food to cheer themselves up, or to create a distraction from the obvious issues which plague them. I didn't want blog to be my post relationship my one night stand, or my wonderfully distracting, comforting, soothing, tasty, melt in your mouth chocolate.

I'm a uni student, and I felt that time spent blogging was time that could have been spent studying. The study never happened, either did the blogging, and in a period where scholarly creativity should have flourished, the void created by my lack of motivation and need for "procrastudy" (see earlier blog entry) became all consuming.

So now, although I have enough uni work to last well into the coming week, I am here, seeking to repair the fractured relationship I've had with my blog, and to apologise to it, and you in turn, for being a bad blogger.

Instead of fearing chocolate, and how complacent and fat it may make me - I will indulge in the chocolate of blog, and suffer the consequences of reality!