Perhaps my ambivalence is a defence mechanism. If I am not certain of anything that I do or say, then I do not have to take responsibility for anything. I wish.
Oscar Wilde, in one of my favourite books, wrote, “to define is to limit.” This line was said by Lord Henry Wotton in The Picture of Dorian Gray, whom I would not recommend viewing as any sort of role model. Dorian Gray does and it corrupts him. Unfortunately, I too seem to carry this philosophy to a fault.
I like to keep my options open. Instead of committing myself to one thing, I allow room for variation and unforeseeable changes or for another opportunity that I had predicted, and may have wanted to keep as a plan B.
My ambiguity certainly has its drawbacks. Indeed, it has gotten me into a number of very uncomfortable predicaments. By not definitely saying “no,” I am not saying “yes” – but people have either misunderstood, or taken advantage of this propensity for ambiguity.
Without trying to, my fluctuating decisions frustrated family and friends. It’s difficult to make plans by replying with “maybe,” instead of “yes,” or “I’ll try to get there in the evening,” instead of “I’ll be there at 6.”
Although I try to be punctual to appointments that I commit myself to, it is difficult for me to first commit myself to said appointments. On more than one occasion, I have shown up late to an event, not out of choice or fashion. Rather, until the very last minute before I had to leave, I was still flip-flopping over whether or not I should attend at all.
This uncertainty does not bring me pleasure. Quite the opposite. Never being able to make a decision for fear of making the wrong decision, in fact, can heighten my anxieties about almost anything. Going outside or meeting new people or eating a certain food or submitting an assignment or something else entirely. These worries make me more uncertain, which makes me worry even more. It’s a positive feedback loop, which is not as nice as it sounds.
I usually do not even realise that I am being indeterminate until someone points it to me or parodies my way of speaking. Once, I was making plans with a friend, deciding where to go and what to do. I cannot remember at all what I had said, but his response has reverberated around in my head ever since; “Oh my god, so vague.” He did not mean to be mean, at least that was not the impression I got. He was merely voicing his reasonable frustration about me not being able to stick to any sort of decision.
I do want to improve, though. If I don’t make my own decisions, I fear that I will end up merely drifting along, with no clear purpose or reason. Or worse, someone else may try to make these decisions for me. While that would take away a degree of the responsibility that I so fervently try to avoid, I do want to live my own life.
This year, I will try to be more certain. No, I will be more certain. Maybe.
Originally published in Woroni Vol. 72 Issue 2 ‘To Be Confirmed’
Think your name would look good in print? Woroni is always open for submissions. Email write@woroni.com.au with a pitch or draft. You can find more info on submitting here.
In 1977, NASA launched two Voyager spacecrafts, the first of their kind ever to leave the solar system and venture into the vast, infinite space beyond. Within each of these spacecraft is a gold-plated record, a relic meant to convey to any other life-form it might encounter the entire human experience. On this record are images ranging from simple geometric shapes to complex, abstract works of art. And there are also 90 minutes of audio.
90 minutes.
90 minutes to capture all the sounds of the human species. How do you capture something so complex in sounds that might be incomprehensible to any other organism? How do you capture human emotion and convey it to something that might not even experience it?
Despite this monumental task, Carl Sagan and his team attempted to capture our sounds, our languages, and our music onto the record. Those 90 minutes are an intricate tapestry of audio from across time and space. There is a message from the UN General Secretary and greetings in 55 different languages. There is Mozart, and there is Beethoven. There are the fundamentals of sound itself, and there are those who have supposedly mastered it. Yet amongst these iconic, universal pieces of music is a blues song by a relatively unknown artist, Blind Willie Johnson. His song, ‘Dark was the Night, Cold was the Ground’, nestles amongst giants to capture one of the most integral emotions of what it means to be human, or as Carl Sagan put it, “cosmic loneliness.”
We know very little about Blind Willie Johnson. So little that there exists only one confirmed picture of him. We know he was born in 1897 in Texas and that his mother passed away shortly after. As a child, we know his stepmother blinded him by throwing lye into his eyes.
We know he then turned to playing the guitar, travelling around the state, preaching the Christian faith of which he was a devout follower. Johnson lived in poverty his entire life and struggled until the very end. When his house burned down in 1945, he had nowhere to go. So, he slept in the charred ruins where his bed once lay. Here, he contracted a disease; sources differ on whether it was pneumonia or malarial fever. When brought to the hospital, he was refused treatment. He died shortly after. His wife Angeline alleges that he was denied treatment due to his disability, while other sources say it was because he was black.
Within his discography is that very song on the Voyager Golden Record, “Dark was the Night, Cold was the Ground.” Yet it is not Johnson’s own composition. It is his three-minute adaptation of a song layered with history and meaning – a hymn sung on slave plantations, in black churches by preachers, and at funerals in the American South. Johnson’s rendition does not sing the lyrics in English or any other language. Instead, he moans in an anguish that captures and echoes the history of the song, of his own life, and the collective suffering of both. A history that is conveyed in three minutes.
It is a song that echoes our deepest vulnerability, transcending any language to convey to the great beyond the insular depths of our sorrow and loneliness. That is the song’s thesis when considered in isolation, but when we peer behind the notes into the stories that have shaped it, we see perhaps a more prescient idea of what it represents – persistence.
Our species has faced great horrors and resisted great evil to survive. We bear those scars and share them as a collective. Willie Johnson endured a profoundly racist country that not only considered him unequal to those he performed for but also looked down upon him for his disability.
Yet he persisted.
A man who had sight cruelly taken away from him created and captured a testament to our perseverance. Our sorrow and the collective loneliness that pervades our existence now hurtles through the vast expanses of space, seeing more of our universe than our species ever has.
The Voyager Golden Record was designed with longevity in mind and will likely outlast human civilisation. Our existence, however, is inherently ephemeral. We are collections of stardust that dance in sorrow for the duration of our lifespan, capable of great kindness and destruction, only to return to dust when our dance ends. But through our creativity and passion, we can create what transcends our own mortality into great, immortalised art.
In however many years, if ever, should the Voyager Golden Record meet any other civilisation, it might witness that very testament to our perseverance. Or it might never do so and keep exploring the universe in the darkest of nights, and the coldest of spaces, forever cosmically lonely.
Originally published in Woroni Vol. 72 Issue 6 ‘Dive’
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Comments Off on Greenwashing Our Drowning Futures: A Call to Action from the South to the North
We are not facing a climate crisis that is imminent in the distant future. But we are in the middle of a climate catastrophe as we speak. While here in Australia, much as in the rest of the Global North, we convene in siloed conferences and policy forums; discuss climate resilience and mitigation in hallowed halls and ivory towers; deliberate on what the future may hold in a still distant 2050 – a future with a projected global warming of 1.5 degrees Celsius – for millions of people across the world, 2050 is already upon them.
One-third of Pakistan has been submerged in the recent catastrophic floods. Between June to August this year, Pakistan’s southernmost provinces faced a 400 percent increase in their average monsoon rainfall. In addition to this, Pakistan is home to 7200 glaciers, the largest number in the world outside of the polar regions. Rising temperatures due to global warming are accelerating the Himalayan glacial melt in Pakistan at a much faster rate than previously anticipated by scientists.
Just in the recent catastrophe alone, 33 million lives were affected – more than the total population of Australia. This includes 16 million children, and 650,000 pregnant women without access to proper health services, with much of the infrastructure devastated. Four million acres of farmland has been destroyed, causing an acute crisis of food insecurity, and large swathes of the country are still underwater. While it has been estimated that the waters will take six more months to recede, the flood-ravaged lands are becoming breeding grounds for water-borne diseases – cholera, malaria, dengue – while experts warn the coming of a “second wave of death and destruction.”
Pakistan merits our attention for the sheer injustice of its people facing the worst brunt of climate catastrophe, while the country’s global share of carbon emissions is only less than 1 percent. An injustice that is compounded by a severe debt burden of $130 billion and crippling International Monetary Fund (IMF) conditionalities, including taxes on oil and electricity, at a time of an unprecedented disaster. Or the entrenched effects of colonial and imperial entanglements that relegate the country to a ‘no man’s land’ – whose worth is dictated merely by imperial interests and ‘strategic’ relevance to the Global North; and whose calls for immediate debt relief, as demanded by the Pakistani activist community, are drowned out by racialised tropes of ‘violence’ and ‘danger’. But Pakistan is also a glimpse into our collective future – a symbolic front for our advocacy as a country that is already ‘ground zero’ for the climate catastrophe and exhibiting the impact of the dreaded mark of 1.5 degree Celsius.
In this context, we are fast approaching the 27th Annual UN Climate Change Conference of Parties, or COP27. Previous conferences settled upon emissions reduction agreements as outlined in the Kyoto protocols or the Paris Agreement. Not only have these agreements been inadequate but they have also allowed governments to perpetuate climate vandalism through an ostensible facade of seeking climate solutions. Greta Thunberg called last year’s COP26 conference in Glasgow more of the same “blah blah blah”. She called for protests around the conference to reject the same old greenwashing, saying that “our hopes and ambitions drown in their empty promises.” The nature of the current climate catastrophes, if anything, expose the hollowness of such initiatives. Even if governments fully adhered to their emissions reductions as agreed upon in the Paris Agreement, the world would still reach apocalyptic levels of climate catastrophe everywhere in the coming decades. A worsening of the disastrous effects is already being felt.
The upcoming conference is set to be held in Egypt this year, even as Egyptian climate activists are protesting this charade of greenwashing and demanding more. The Sisi dictatorship has enforced draconian laws to limit access to information, including their country’s net carbon emissions and is continuing to warehouse hundreds of political prisoners in state prison cells. Recently, Alaa Abd El-Fattah, a high-profile democracy activist on a hunger strike, wrote a letter “about global warming because of the news from Pakistan” and raised concerns about the impending climate catastrophe that will reach us all. Highlighting the 33 million lives affected by the floods in Pakistan, he questioned the (in)adequacy of state responses as global warming continues. This letter, too, has been suppressed by the Egyptian authorities. Other democracy activists in Egypt have also called on climate activists around the world to not allow the Egyptian government to greenwash the dictatorship through the upcoming COP conference.
In Australia, we have a particular responsibility to answer these calls of solidarity from Egypt and Pakistan. Australia is one of the largest contributors to global fossil fuel emissions per capita, particularly from coal export emissions. These emissions are conveniently not counted in the Australian Labor Party’s latest climate bill. Such creative elisions and the absence of any enforceable targets have allowed the Labor party to plan a significant escalation of fossil fuel emission exports, by greenlighting the opening up of 106 new coal and gas projects whilst posturing to address the issue of emission reductions.
There is no lack of academic seminars on the impending climate crisis at the ANU. But beyond these siloed academic engagements, it is pertinent to ask where the university – as an institution – stands on climate change. It is imperative to move from knowledge production to action. The ANU itself has been the subject of a nearly decade-long divestment campaign. Students have overwhelmingly called for full divestment from fossil fuels in two referendums run by the student union ANUSA, first in 2014 and then again last year. The most recent data available to students indicates that our university still has large-scale investments in fossil fuel companies. There is also a shroud of opacity on the specificities of their investments. Without a clear breakdown of companies that ANU invests in, such as what they provided in 2016, we can’t be sure if ANU still invests in companies like Woodside Petroleum or big banks that finance coal projects as they did in that year. What we do know is that ANU’s infrastructure portfolio, which includes millions of dollars invested in the Kwinana gas-fired power station, actually increased its total carbon emissions by almost 23 percent last year. There are no enforceable targets in ANU’s investment portfolio as part of its ‘Below Zero’ campaign and its reports rely heavily on the discredited ESG exposure scores to demonstrate how environmentally sustainable they are.
That is why we have organised a speak-out for climate justice this Friday, the 28th of November to maintain the pressure. We cannot allow for the green-washing and climate vandalism carried out in our name. Or turn the demands for climate justice and debt relief from the Global South into “feel good” opportunities for the Global North to give paltry sums in “charity.” Despite the platitudes offered by elite institutions and state actors (be it ANU’s Socially Responsible Investment reporting, the Australian Labor Party, or those convening COP27) to set out tentative and non-enforceable targets, we are witnessing an unchecked expansion of fossil fuel extraction. Meanwhile millions of lives are already in the throes of disaster, their homes washed away, their farmlands and infrastructure devastated, with no return to normalcy in sight. This is only just the beginning. It is no longer tenable to discuss the climate crisis in terms of a projected future – when this future is already upon us.
Heba is a Pakistani student at ANU and Nick is a member of Socialist Alternative.
This article was written on the stolen land of the Ngunawal, Ngunnawal and Ngambri people. We pay our respect to Elders past, present and emerging and acknowledge that sovereignty has not been ceded. There is no climate justice without Indigenous justice.
Comments Off on How To Have Sex With a Trans Person
The first time I had sex with my partner, my chest was bound with kinesiology tape. It was an inelegant process: I cut the tape to size, covered my nipples with bandaids, layered it across each breast, pulling the flesh sideways and sticking it to my ribcage. I didn’t even notice it was on till we were getting intimate. Then I looked down.
I should take it off. She probably wants to see my boobs. She probably thinks it’s weird.
But I couldn’t. Not without getting into a very unsexy pose and ripping my skin off. So I left it and accepted that I was having sex with a bound chest.
And I loved it. It made me feel really comfortable. The following day I felt a glow of pride – someone had made me feel sexy the way I wanted to be sexy.
When I’d had sex before, I had stripped completely naked. Sure, seeing my breasts and having them be seen freaked me out. I didn’t think I had any other option but to get used to being uncomfortable during sex.
My partner showed me that this wasn’t true.
If you’re cis (not trans), I want you to read this article because maybe, one day, you’ll want to have sex with a trans person. And it can be daunting. It requires communication and understanding of each other. Thankfully, the requirement of an open mind and forgoing of sexual conventions allows an opportunity for really great sex.
FOR CIS PEOPLE
Before the Bedroom
It’s essential to take note of things that may make your partner feel feminine versus masculine. The kind of touch and the type of words you use while intimate can be quite powerful.
For a transmasculine person, this might be holding their arm while walking, sitting on their lap, or using compliments like ‘hot’ or ‘handsome.’ For a transfeminine person, touching their waist, putting your arm around them, and using compliments like ‘pretty’ or ‘beautiful.’ This doesn’t mean you are limited to these behaviours – they’re just things that can affirm your partner’s gender.
Using Toys
Whether you’ve used toys during sex before, it’s worth considering what they might mean to your partner. For cis, straight couples, sex toys can be a type of foreplay or a once-in-a-while thing. For trans people, they might mean a lot more. If this is the case, reevaluate your perception of toys. They don’t need to take away from the intimacy of sex, and they don’t mean that either of you are incapable of manually pleasing the other. Try to keep an open mind, and if neither of you is experienced, head to Fyshwick and take a look through the sex shops. You’re bound to find something that makes both of you feel good.
Understanding dysphoria
Dysphoria is the discomfort trans people feel with their assigned gender at birth, ranging from mild unease to extreme distress. It can be a big part of someone’s life or not present at all. Either way, it’s often exacerbated during sex, so it’s vital that you understand the basics of how it works and talk to your partner about their specific experience.
Dysphoria is not static, and levels of dysphoria will fluctuate naturally and in response to triggers. The things that trigger dysphoria may be being misgendered, having certain parts of their body touched, or seeing themselves naked.
Having sex is a vulnerable act. Be kind to your trans partner by being aware that they could feel dysphoric during sex and respecting their boundaries, even if they may seem odd to you.
FOR TRANS PEOPLE
Your trans body is sexy!
I spent so long feeling unsexy. I didn’t want to be sexy as a woman, and I could never be sexy in the way a cis man is. But what makes someone sexy isn’t how well they look like the ideal of a man or a woman. If your partner wants to have sex with you, they find you sexy. Be proud and secure in that.
Unpack your feelings during sex
Investigate why something makes you feel weird or bad during sex. This way, you can learn what your boundaries are. Ask yourself: What precisely is making me uncomfortable? Is it dysphoria, do I not like it, or is it just new? Is this pleasurable for me?
Be specific
Your cis partner may not know what questions to ask or won’t want to ask in case they make you uncomfortable. Before sex, try telling your partner your boundaries, what you like, and what language you are comfortable with using.
Trust yourself & your partner
Don’t keep going along with sex just because you don’t want to offend your partner. Sometimes you get a random wave of dysphoria – you’re always better off stopping rather than pushing through. Doing so strengthens your own self-awareness and the trust you place in your partner.
Be mindful of your partner’s experience
When I didn’t like the way my partner was touching me, I used to just pull away. Feeling dysphoric, I would be too ashamed to say much to her. I didn’t realise that this was making her uncomfortable.
It’s painful to feel like you have triggered someone’s dysphoria during sex – like you’ve failed as a partner. Be mindful of this experience. Explain what you’re feeling, and clarify what you want to do next. If you need a specific touch to stop, a simple;
“Could you not ——, I’m feeling a bit dysphoric” does the trick.
It’s also okay to be urgent and brief. Try;
“Can we take a break” or “we need to stop”
Once you’ve calmed down, explain what happened to your partner and do something together that makes you feel closer – watch a movie or cuddle. Aftercare is important after sex, but it’s even more important after ‘failed’ sex.
This may seem like a lot to remember. But all of these things will develop over time. It may take a little more consideration than ‘traditional’ sex; but I promise, it’s worth it.
Originally published in Woroni Vol. 72 Issue 5 ‘Cum As You Are’
Think your name would look good in print? Woroni is always open for submissions. Email write@woroni.com.au with a pitch or draft. You can find more info on submitting here.
ALINGA
Runway cleared for takeoff, a clear morning is heralding this service.
Onboard, we will fly though this small universe using highly sophisticated light rail technology. Red backed sentinels will oversee their metal dominion, protective of the finest blue spiral-patterned seating that $675 million of government money can buy.
I give you: The Fare-Evader’s Guide to the Northern Canberra Galaxy.
ELOURA
The air of this tundra blows in icy, colliding with an increasingly humid airlock interior.
Representatives of the Eloura jurisdiction appear in the form of a young couple, deep in terse conversation. They are directly followed by another, shrink-wrapped in black spandex, his neon green socks pulled flush to shivering knees.
IPIMA
Dried grass sprints alongside as we glide into the next dock.
I see the husks of residential halls hovering to the right, old Fenner Hall gone feral, dystopian.
Orange neuron skeletons litter the avenue with roadkill.
They lie supine on their side, with white helmets disjointed. Cranial and skull-like, they reflect the sunlight like bleached plastic bone.
MACARTHUR
ABC Canberra stands unadorned on the crossroads, traffic swarming before it. Onlooker to many, messenger to some. Inside the station, the radio corps that have been enlisted in service will broadcast to those few willing to listen.
The young couple vacate the shuttle, braving the frost in tandem.
Hotels with hundreds of tiny matchbox rooms have shot up from the earth.
DICKSON
The environs of this planet open up, streets suddenly wide.
A few creatures mill around the forest floor, with glass trees towering above. Cranes swing their metal branches in the breeze.
SWINDEN
Here, the glass trees are swiftly cut down to squat brick dwellings. Wire cages encircle asphalt courts, fencing in the inhabitants. They are clothed in matching uniforms, their bodies in a perpetual game. The ground is struck with force, as they run over, around, weaving between one another, up and back again, always focused, rhythmic.
PHILLIP
The world has its back turned. The graffitied rears of houses are sheepish, afraid to meet my eye. Any unique terrain is obscured by scrubland, only occasionally peeking out from behind stiff-lipped pines.
I spot a figure zooming across the scenery. A motorised skateboard, weilding a tiny dog on leash. The four-legged beast is frantic, barely keeping pace with the four-wheeled beast that drags it.
EPIC
An empty expanse, either abandoned, or biding time in wait for harvest. The frozen plateau is packed hard by hooves and tyre tracks. Off-season has silenced the baying of all creatures, their convoys shuffled on. Freedom fighting has long since begrudgingly packed up, migrated, with no trace but memory remaining.
White combat boots and moon-soled sneakers rush up to the doors, eager to be sheltered from the harsh elements outside.
SANFORD
Passing by the light rail stables, the rest of the fleet are standing by. Pilots idle, hands twitching for another stint at the reins.
To the left, a fish bowl is full of runners. They race no one and get nowhere. In ceaseless worship, they toil, Sisyphean, for the Club Lime cause.
Carpet Choices and War Memorial stand side by side, their warehouses occupied, allegedly. There is a lack of life, despite the warning signs.
WELL STATION
The Green Shed flashes by. Mecca for share house dwellers – an epicentre of cheap furnishings, wobbly tables and mismatched dining chairs.
We pause at a platform. It is landmarked by a turnoff, suburbs with the names of fathers of friends I only vaguely remember. Mitchell, Franklin, Harrison – I sat at their family dining table eons ago, universes away.
The loudspeaker warns us that the doors are closing. The doors never opened to begin with.
NULLARBOR
A billboard floats above highrises, boasting “Times Square.”
Maybe if I strained my neck, I could just about spot our Lady Liberty – Telstra Tower.
And as the journey surged forward into cosmopolitan Canberra, I couldn’t help but wonder… If New York City is the Big Apple, what does that make Canberra? Rotten to the core?
MAPLETON
The car creaks around the corner, protesting its own weight. The mechanical belly of this beast is suddenly bloated with passengers. A suburban sprawl seeps through the surroundings.
Brown brick McMansions, piles all the colour of syrup, drip from streets and cul-de-sacs.
MANNING CLARK
Apartments huddle together for warmth in lonely paddocks. White sedans roam the fields.
Eight little dollhouses sit forlorn in a blasted heath, webbed like toes and joined at the unfortunate hip.
GUNGAHLIN
The end of the line, furthest distance allowed by my public transport safety tether.
Another terminal, mirror image of Alinga, played in reverse – passengers drain out instead of pour in.
A new crowd is exchanged for old as I remain sat on my blue patterned perch, observing a faraway planet.
It is alien to me, although I too am an alien to this land. A blow-in from a distant station, unknown to the crowd now chattering around me. Judging, anonymous, from behind a paper mask and clicking laptop keys. My reflection on the dusty carriage window scowls at an uncaring audience.
The car goes quiet for a moment before jerking backwards, flying again into the concrete beyond.
Originally published in Woroni Vol. 72 Issue 4 ‘Alien’
Think your name would look good in print? Woroni is always open for submissions. Email write@woroni.com.au with a pitch or draft. You can find more info on submitting here.
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Letters to the Editor
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Comments Off on My Rocketship Has a Nice Personality Though
Penises, I feel, are inherently funny. It’s not a maturity thing. It’s the incongruity of something that sticks out of the human body when so much goes in (food, water etc.). However, men with penises: less funny. As you’ve probably realised, I’m conflicted about phallic spaceships. On one hand, they look funny. On the other hand, they’re owned and run by men projecting a masculine ego onto space and its colonisation.
There are a number of reasons why we should go to space. Humans are explorers, and it is the next frontier. What we find will broaden our conceptual horizons, challenging how we see ourselves in the wider cosmos. The problems we face will likely require new solutions that can be translated back to solving some of Earth’s problems. But this doesn’t seem to be our focus anymore. It appears we only have two motivations: money and masculinity. The former is well-documented, the latter less so.
Western environmental philosophy rests on two tenets: the idea of Mother Nature, and the idea of humans’ (read: mans’) physical domination of Mother Nature. The former is used in mainstream conservationist arguments. The latter is how we actually engage with the natural world: a territory to be beaten back and then harvested.
The feminisation of nature is not necessarily a good thing. Just look at the way so much anti-abortion rhetoric frames a woman’s purpose as birthing men and raising them. Likewise calling nature a “mother” assumes that it exists to care for humanity. Nature does not exist for us. It simply is, just as women simply are. Neither should be tied to anyone else by obligations of care or servitude.
But, by destroying nature, we have incurred a debt. Think of it like randomly attacking a stranger, you then owe them some form of atonement. Unfortunately, nature cannot tell us what could make up for centuries of exploitation and pollution. But it is not unreasonable to think we could start by stopping, and then by repairing and restoring it.
The space race rejects this. It thinks the solution to our biophysical limitations is not to live within them, but to try and supersede them. It thinks we can solve the scarcity problem by doing exactly what we’ve done to Earth, only on other planets. However, the scarcity problem is an inherent facet of capitalism. Take just one instance: food. A decade ago, it was clear starvation was a distribution issue. In 2009, the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation found that we produced enough food to feed ten billion people. But we won’t sell it cheap enough for those earning less than two USD a day, and instead we use it to feed livestock and create biofuel. Every year, one third of the food made for human consumption is wasted. We do not have a scarcity of food; we have a cruel and inhumane distribution of food.
Can we honestly say that letting corporations mine metals out of meteors will make us all richer? What, in the history of industrial capitalism, points to this? Sure, consumer markets may benefit, Western countries may benefit, big corporations may benefit, but the vast majority of people will be excluded from these markets. Or, even better, they’ll have foreign companies dump under-priced products on them, preventing any long-term economic development.
When men like Musk, Bezos or Biden insist that we must go to space, they discard the teat of ‘Mother Earth’ for that of Mars. In doing so, they write large how patriarchal societies see women. This pervades even the representation of space.
Space, in popular culture, is both empty and a frontier. Comparisons with the Wild West are abundant. This narrative prioritises a masculine ideal of ‘conquering’ and ‘overcoming’ nature. When so much of space is incredibly dangerous, aspects of this narrative are valid: challenges will have to be overcome. But what will solving these problems prove? The danger is that people will take them as evidence of individualism; they will be absorbed into the wider neoliberal idea of the individual beating back the natural world and asserting their authority. And, underneath, the idea of a man subduing a female nature to his will. This dismisses the inconvenient truth that the space race has always been an intensely collective endeavour. As Marianna Mazzucato documents in Mission Economy, the space race of the 1960s was a marvel of coordinated, cooperative effort. The narrative was not about worshiping Kennedy as it is today with Musk or Bezos.
The other side of this frontier myth is the idea that humanity solves its problems through individuals, and in particular men. The idea of Musk’s colony on Mars is built on the idea that sickeningly wealthy businessmen should hold society’s future in their hands. The dichotomy is clear. A bunch of white, rich men go off to Mars to fight against its inhospitable climate, while the rest of us, and in particular those from developing nations, must work together, selflessly, to survive. We will have to fight the inhospitable climate that they created.
And this idea won’t solve our problems. Just as pushing frontiers on Earth has spurred temporary economic growth, expanding into the Solar System will bring a period of renewed growth. But the issues that go hand in hand, like wealth inequality, plutocracy, police repression etc. will continue because fundamentally, nothing has changed. In many ways, allowing corporate colonialism will make things worse. In the last few years, it’s become apparent that the largest companies in the world: Apple, Meta, Alphabet, Amazon etc. are autocracies. Their CEOs run their own fiefdom, not only within the organisation, but across countries where they now expect to shape policy and public debate – because they’re rich enough.
If white, wealthy men dictate the future of the space race, why would we assume life in the future will be different from life now?
My immediate solution is government involvement and regulation. If men want to go to space in the name of humanity, then let humanity decide how they do so: let space be the jurisdiction of the United Nations. It will be far from perfect, but it will be a great deal better than our current trajectory. My long-term solution is, of course, less-phallic spaceships. Or one with a navigational system that can actually find the clitoris.
Originally published in Woroni Vol. 72 Issue 4 ‘Alien’
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Letters to the Editor
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An inundation of sourdough, celebrities singing Imagine, and Thursday nights ending with a seven-person booking at PJ O’Reilly’s. Two years ago, my friend and colleague Marlow Meares wrote the Post-Covid Economy for Woroni, a thought experiment on how the 2020 COVID recession would affect the Australian economy. Two years on, I see how well his prediction matches reality. Some things came true, some didn’t, and some are still to be determined.
Firstly, the title of Marlow’s piece had an unexpected mistake. In August 2020, we had an idea of there being two clearly defined periods: the pandemic and post-pandemic periods. The vaccine would arrive, and COVID-19 would become a near-eradicated disease, like Polio. Variants of the virus, named after the Greek alphabet, blurred this distinction. With the COVID-19 disaster payments ending on 30 September 2021 and the end of widespread lockdowns, Australia’s current economy is structurally running the same. Yet, any small business owner or first responder would tell you otherwise. 2.25 percent of all workers are absent from work because of illness – substantially higher than the 1.5 percent five-year average. This means business and services, essential services, are expected to produce business-as-usual results with a depleted workforce. Go figure.
Work absentees reflect a broader picture of how unprecedented Australia’s low unemployment rate truly is. Far from the 10 percent unemployment Marlow predicted would occur due to Australia’s “worst recession since the Great Depression,” COVID-19-era unemployment peaked at 6.46 percent in 2020. As of June 2022, the unemployment rate is a mere 3.5 percent, the lowest since 1974. Yet the flip side of low unemployment is low wages. In 2020 Marlow implored that the wage stagnation Australia experienced pre-COVID-19 needed to be addressed. Now, the minimum wage maintaining level with the rising cost of living is a political issue rather than a given. The government spending which alleviated the recession during the peak of COVID-19 – like the gigantic Jobseeker and Jobkeeper payments – has pushed inflation to new heights. As for the other causes of inflation – even Marlow could not have predicted a war in Ukraine.
Marlow hoped for an economy that served equality and the climate – and here is when the Australian economy finds itself on the precipice. He argued that Australia would have to accept regular budget debts to do this. As national debt threatens to zoom past the trillion dollar figure (as Marlow predicted), accepting government debt has become less of a choice and more of an inevitability. While we will not know for sure until the October federal budget, the Labor government promised, in the most recent election, more money for aged care and childcare. The previous Coalition government introduced an increase in parental leave of up to 20 weeks for both parents. This ought to decrease the effects of maternal leave on the gender pay gap (although this would only be a start).
It also looks like Australia will have an emission reduction target rate of at least 43 percent by 2030, enshrined in law. In other words, the choices the federal government makes in October will determine how much they are willing to spend on an inclusive and sustainable economy. We will have to wait.
This murky ‘post’-COVID-19 Australian economy is filled with uncertainties and differing potentials. What is to come of the ‘care economy’ when aged care and hospitals are understaffed and in crisis remains to be seen. It may be too early to say whether Marlow’s hopes for the post-COVID-19 economy will come true. If COVID-19 taught Australia one lesson, it is that when all else fails, prosperity can be found in a fresh slice of sourdough bread.
Think your name would look good in print? Woroni is always open for submissions. Email write@woroni.com.au with a pitch or draft. You can find more info on submitting here.
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Comments Off on The Humble Hubble Telescope – Our Eyes in the Sky
Have you ever wondered how humanity came to be? After all, it’s in our nature to be curious and the universe is another mystery we long to uncover. Our interest in space can be dated back thousands of years before the Common Era, where eastern cultures observed and recorded the movements of the sun, the moon and the stars. Through these observations, sundials, star charts and calendars were created to track hours, days, months and years. In particular, it was useful for agricultural purposes in identifying harvest seasons and for sailors to navigate across the seas. As technology advanced, humanity explored the moon, launched satellites and sent rovers off to other planets in our galaxy.
Humanity has speculated on the origins of the universe since the beginning and has found comfort in religion and supernatural beliefs. Our curiosity has caused us to ask the big questions – Where did we come from? Are there other intelligent lifeforms in the universe? Is there really a God? Through the Hubble Telescope, we are starting to formulate answers to some of these questions.
The Hubble Telescope, named after astronomer Edwin Hubble, is the size of a large school bus and orbits at an altitude of 569km above Earth’s atmosphere, completing a full circuit every 97 minutes. The Hubble Space Telescope provides information on the electromagnetic spectrum of space and captures high-resolution images, allowing us to observe distant stars, galaxies and planets. It was built by the United States of America, National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) with the purpose of extending our knowledge of the universe.
The benefit of having a telescope in space is that it avoids all the interference from our environment, light pollution, rain clouds and turbulence. The Hubble’s position high above the atmosphere means it can capture unobstructed images that are clearer and help us see deeper into our universe than our ground-based telescopes have previously been able to achieve.
The Hubble is a Cassegrain reflector telescope. Light enters the device through the opening at one end of the telescope’s tube shape. The light hits the primary mirror before reflecting to a secondary mirror, which then reflects the light to a focal point at the centre of the primary mirror. The mirrors used are similar to the ones you would find at home, although they contain a different composition to be able to reflect ultraviolet, infrared and visible light. If the alignment of either mirror is slightly off, it would cause the focal point to be away from the sensor, making the images appear out of focus. The light detected at the focal point is distributed through a network of small mirrors to several scientific instruments to record data for scientists to analyse. There is no actual camera aboard the Hubble. The telescope produces an image by recording the type of light and the location it was received, to then build a virtual image of what the subject appears to look like.
Through the images from the Hubble, we have seen stars forming, planets colliding, solar eclipses on other planets, galaxies far, far away, super massive black holes, auroras on Jupiter, craters on Mars, stars dying and so much more. There isn’t much knowledge of our universe that hasn’t been confirmed or determined by the Hubble telescope. It is the first major optical telescope to be placed in space and has continually re-shaped our view and knowledge of life beyond Earth.
Every single time we receive data, we are bound to discover something new. NASA infamously focused on a space of ‘nothingness’ for a whole month, which was very controversial knowing how valuable and important Hubble’s time was. The information slowly came through and it was discovered that this ‘nothingness’ was actually not nothing but rather the presence of over one and a half thousand galaxies, captured in a stunning image. Just when you think there is nothing more to see and learn, space is constantly surprising us.
The Hubble has enabled scientists to estimate that our universe is 13.8 billion years old and provides evidence to support the Big Bang Theory. This theory is founded on the idea that before the explosive expansion of the universe, nothing existed, not even time itself. Using this concept, Stephen Hawking, an English theoretical physicist, provided reasoning to argue that God didn’t exist as a creator of the universe, if there wasn’t a time for them to exist in to create this universe. Rather, if a supernatural being was to exist, it would simply be as an observer of our world that abided by the natural laws.
Dr John Grunsfeld said, “the Hubble is not just a satellite. It’s a symbol of humanity’s quest for knowledge.” The Hubble’s launch in 1990, marked the start of a new scientific era that continues to feed our curiosity for space. Our view of the universe is about to be advanced even further with the development of a new space telescope, the James Webb Space Telescope. This telescope is promised to go even deeper into our universe than before, examining everything from solar systems to very old and distant galaxies from the time of the Big Bang. The telescope was launched into space in December 2021 and is currently undergoing checks with the first images set to be released in July 2022. For now, the Hubble continues aiding us in our exploration of infinity and beyond.
Originally published in Woroni Vol. 72 Issue 4 ‘Alien’
Think your name would look good in print? Woroni is always open for submissions. Email write@woroni.com.au with a pitch or draft. You can find more info on submitting here.
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Letters to the Editor
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Mathematics has the most demanding standards of truth of any field of study. For a fact to be considered mathematically true, it must follow from previously-known facts using precise rules of inference. In turn, those facts are justified by inference from previous facts, and so-on.
But this process has to terminate at some point, or nothing could ever be justified. You need some facts which don’t need to be justified by something else. They’re called axioms — they are the sources of truth.
Because axioms are assumed true without justification, choosing axioms to believe in is more subjective than maths usually is.
Today, most mathematicians agree to work under the Zermelo-Fraenkel axioms. These axioms assert that there is only one kind of thing in existence: a set, i.e. a collection of things. Just as our understanding of people could be reduced to the movements of atoms, many beautiful structures in mathematics – numbers, space, geometric objects — can be reduced to sets.
The Zermelo-Fraenkel axioms include reasonable assumptions like “Two sets are the same set if they contain the same elements,” and “If you have two sets, then you can create a new set containing everything from both those sets.” Not especially controversial.
But there was one axiom whose proposed inclusion in ZF caused a stir: The Axiom of Choice, also known simply as Choice. (You know a mathematical statement is famous when it has a mononym like Prince.)
Choice can be written so innocuously as to believe its controversy:
Given a collection of nonempty sets, it is possible to pick one element from each set.
You could also call it the Axiom of Decision: if you have a bunch of decisions to make, you can always make every decision. Still sounds totally obvious and noncontroversial.
But, viewed from the right angle, the obvious can be troubling.
Choice asserts, without reservation, that you can always make any collection of decisions, no matter how many decisions that may involve. This is a little troubling: how do we make infinitely many decisions?
Actually, algorithms do that all the time. If you want to program an autonomous vehicle – say a rover – to travel for an indefinite length of time, it must be prepared to make infinitely many decisions. Every millisecond – or however short a length of time it takes to adjust the vehicle’s course – it has to decide on a direction to move in. But you don’t actually have to make infinitely many choices. You could program the vehicle to move in a straight line, or turn 90 degrees every 300 metres, or list 1° to the right every two minutes. Making decisions infinitely is not so difficult if you can write an algorithm or procedure that makes the decisions for you.
The trouble with Choice is that it asserts, even if you can’t write down an algorithm, that there is always a way to make infinitely many decisions. Choice is nonconstructive — it guarantees the existence of a decision process, but doesn’t tell you how to describe it.
And, by invoking Choice, one can argue for the existence of strange and unintuitive things that can’t be explicitly described. Choice implies that you can cut a set of points out of a finite line so that the set can’t be assigned a meaningful length. Even more amazingly, we have the Banach-Tarski paradox: a solid three-dimensional ball can be split into five parts, which can be moved around by rigid motions, and reassembled into two balls of the same size as the original.
The existence of indescribable objects (let alone indescribable objects that violated beliefs about measurement) was objectionable to some mathematicians when Choice was first introduced by Ernst Zermelo in 1904. It was a key reason for some mathematicians to reject Choice.
But there were also mathematicians prepared to support it, because of its astounding usefulness. Any areas of maths with incredibly useful applications, would be impoverished without Choice. Also, just as Choice has many strange consequences, rejecting Choice does too. For example, rejecting Choice implies that there exists a set that can be split into more parts than it contains objects.
So Choice sat in the middle of a crossfire. Who was right? How could we determine whether Choice is true or not?
In 1938, Kurt Gödel showed that Choice is consistent with the Zermelo-Fraenkel axioms. That means the ZF axioms, broadly accepted by mathematicians as a foundation of truth, couldn’t prove Choice wrong. That means Choice had to be true, right?
Not exactly. In 1963, Paul Cohen proved that ZF axioms couldn’t prove Choice true, either.
Choice is in the strange position of being totally independent from the ZF axioms. There are “mathematical universes” where the ZF is true and Choice is true, and there are also universes where ZF is true and Choice is false. Accepting Choice is equally valid as rejecting it. How, then, did mathematicians decide what to do?
Eventually, Choice became widely accepted. Except for mathematicians who study axioms themselves, most other mathematicians accept Choice as an axiom. Choice plus ZF is called ZFC – it’s the foundation for most mathematics done today.
Should that worry us? Choice has consequences that are physically absurd: a ball can be broken apart and reassembled into two balls. Should we be concerned that modern maths has no bearing on reality, because it relies on Choice?
No, not really.
Choice brings about some strange, unintuitive things, but they can’t be explicitly described, and can’t really have any impact on the real world. Choice is certainly not at odds with the success that mathematical models have enjoyed at describing our world.
Originally published in Woroni Vol. 72 Issue 2 ‘To Be Confirmed’
Comments Off on An Insider’s Scoop and Guide to the C(r)apital
Canberra can best be described in two words: endearingly mediocre. Like us, our mates have lived in Canberra for their whole lives. When we asked them what the best thing about Canberra was, their immediate response was “the airport.” A second response was “its close proximity to the coast and the snow if you are looking for a place to flee via car.” It sounds harsh, but part of Canberra’s charm is the collective agreement that it is a little bit subpar. It is well known that people who live here are drawn to trusty APS jobs, the good Universities and the welcoming environment to raise kids. The unremarkable activities and places to eat in Canberra are typically further down the list.
It took us some time to come to terms with the fact that Canberra can be summed up as the ‘dorky but loveable cousin.’ When we were kids, we tried to convince ourselves that Canberra was the place to be, since it had lots of buildings of national importance. But school trips to ‘treasures’ such as the Canberra Railway Museum and the National Archives did not actually impress us. In our early teens, we tried to assure ourselves that Canberra was the place to be because of all the ‘cool’ events it hosted. Unfortunately, getting a questionable spray on tattoo at Floriade and paying $15 for a tornado potato at GTM was not enough to get us over the line. In our late teens, we despaired. Intent on moving away as we succumbed to the belief that Canberra could never live up to the glitz and glam of Sydney. Or Melbourne. Or Adelaide. Or even Wagga.
However, moving into our early 20s, with a combined age of 43 years old, we have started to appreciate the charms of Canberra. Forget exorbitant Ubers and club entry fees, in the nation’s capital you can experience the whole three nightclubs it has to offer in a single night!
Perhaps this new appreciation is a hangover from our collective ‘mid-life crisis,’ but we now see Canberra for what she really is: fun without being stressful, calm without being bland and smart without being a know-it-all. Most importantly, she doesn’t try to be anyone else. She embraces her flaws and like any good Australian, appropriately takes the piss out of them. In the spirit of this, we have compiled a list of 15 very Canberra things to do, ranging from ironically shit to actually fun. Your adventure into the ‘Crapital’ awaits.
Food Delights
Goodberries Frozen Custard – specifically, the Belconnen one, because Erindale doesn’t have flavour of the week (criminal). Similar to Kingsley’s Chicken (another Canberra institution) – your stomach might hurt afterwards, but that’s all part of the experience.
Griffith Vietnamese – it’s definitely worth driving over the bridge for, even just to chat with Mr Tan.
The Cheese Aisle at the Ainslie IGA – the unsung hero of a Canberra picnic.
The hot chips from Hudson’s Café in Dickson – best enjoyed after a dip at Dickson pool.
An Egg and Bacon roll from Intra in Campbell – the classy spin on an Aussie classic is very Canberra and very good.
Iconic One-off Activities
Catch a big bash game or a game of AFLW (YTG) at Manuka Oval.
Watch a movie at Sunset Cinema at the Botanic Gardens – even if you have hay fever, it’s worth it for the ambience.
The flying fox swing at John Knight Park – a bit of nostalgic fun in the heart of Belcrompton.
Armada Outdoor Bar – we haven’t even been there yet but the vibes by the lake are on.
Play a La-De-Da game of tennis in the rose gardens at Old Parliament House.
Things To Do When You Need Something To Do
The driving range at Narrabundah – ever frustrated about an assignment mark? Take your anger out on some golf balls here. Bonus points if you hit the buggy collecting them.
Cross over the border and visit a winery, try Contentious Character or Lark Hill. Mt Majura Vineyard is good too if you’re looking for something closer to home.
Mt Ainslie Lookout – whether you want to trek for an hour on foot, or test the horsepower in your 2009 Ford Fiesta, the view from the top is stunning.
Have lunch at the Cotter – utilise the free BBQs and bring your swimmers for a post-lunch dip!
Attend a Monday trivia night at Edgar’s Inn in Ainslie and have a Mama Dough pizza while you’re there.
If you manage to complete this list, congratulations. We hope that if you are new here, these activities will fast-track you beyond the ‘I hate Canberra’ stage and make you proud to call yourself a ‘Ken Behren.’