Mega Rant

All right. I’ve had a bunch of rants building up inside me, and if I don’t let them loose on the unsuspecting world, it could get messy. Bits of rant everywhere.

So, here’s a quick run-through of things that have stuck in my craw in varying degrees recently.

1. Won't somebody think of the children?!?!?

Recently, here in the Wonderful Land of Oz, a lesbian couple tried to sue their doctor after their IVF treatment resulted in twins, not the one child like God intended that lesbians should have when using science to conceive. Of course, they ‘love’ their children equally, they just think the doctor should pay $398,000 for raising them – it’s such an inconvenience, you know?

Unfortunately, they lost. I mean, if they can’t successfully sue their IVF doctor, who are the rest of us gonna sue? Who’s going to pay for raising our children?

It’s just got to be like totally someone else’s fault.

Oh yeah, and this just in from the future: ‘Kids overjoyed to discover lesbian parents ‘cherished’ them whilst suing IVF doctor’.

Because we all know that, one day, they will find out.

Whilst on the topic of unworthy parents, here’s a little snippet from Lawrence Money (the guy I kinda bagged a few posts ago about his views on the Jesus T-shirt kid): Apply here for kids

This one talks to me on many levels:

“You want to breed? Then fill out a form, have a psychological screening, show you at least have the basic wherewithal to finance their upbringing, education. Are you mentally and emotionally fit for one of the most demanding tasks on this overpopulated planet? What's your family background like? Have you the slightest hope of giving your offspring the basic essentials of love, time, physical and spiritual nourishment. Or are you just going to let them run around like two-legged strays, accidental bonking by-products who bring in a bit of handy government moolah.”

But he’s right, no politician would or could ever go down this path.

Meddling kids…

2. Lockout, Schmockout

The Victorian Government recently implemented one of their dumb ideas and, due to an increase in violence in Melbourne, tried to enforce a bar lockout in the CBD – basically a policy that you can’t get into a venue after 2am, even if you were in there before. Apart from the flawed policy being successfully challenged by some venues, meaning it doesn’t apply to everyone (so drunken yobs only get locked out of some venues), it looks like the Government also knew it was flawed policy: Brumby warned of lockout risk. Plus, anecdotal evidence suggests it’s likely to lead to more violence, thanks to heaps of drunken yobs getting locked out of places at the same time, and then wandering the streets looking for cabbies to bash. Nice one.

3. Water, water everywhere, and not a drop to pay for

A wag of my finger to the Canadian city of London, Ontario, which has halted sales of bottled water at all of its municipal facilities and instead plans to replace them with water fountains: Canadian city bans sales of bottled water. A representative of Coca-Cola, a real victim of this policy since it sells bottled water under the label Dasani, stated: "It's hard to bring your kitchen sink with you" While I have no idea what this means, he went on to say "To us, it's a matter of choice and a matter of personal preference."

That’s right, if you want to pay a stupid amount of money for something that’s free, and which produces 150 times more greenhouse gases to distribute than tap water, you shouldn’t have that choice taken away from you in municipal facilities, whether or not you have brought your kitchen sink with you.

4. Let he who has not judged get down to some serious judging

Just read an article by a travel writer, giving advice on the ‘types’ of people you might run into whilst indulging in a bit of group travel: On tour, hell is other people

She sounds like such fun, I’m just itching to book some kind of group tour just in case she’s going, too (she seems to do them a lot, so my chances are good)!! Her ability to categorise people and put them down with witty rejoinders like “To counter this time-sensitive soul, simply ask if he is in a hurry” (guffaw) will add so much to my experience! With luck, she might even categorise ME! Plus, I want to hang with her and play Twister.

Nah but seriously you’re all right.

5. Un-rant

And just so I don’t look like a total knob, here are some people I recently discovered I like:

• Leslie Cannold, with a very reasoned article about men and their propensity to get all uppity about abortion
• Joe Biden, potential vice presidential running mate with my man Barack. Biden’s almost a Jedi name, I can go with that…
• Julia Nunes, whom I just discovered on the YouTube. Her ukulele cover of Weezer’s Keep Fishin’ is the biz-ness…*

* I mainly put this on my ranty blog because then I don’t have to remember these links. Yeah, blogs have got it goin’ on for forgetful MoFos like my good self.