BULL Magazine 2013 Issue 2 by BULL Magazine

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ASSANGE FOR SENATE FASHIONABLE FEMINISM RED GENDER LOVING YOURSELF

PUT DOWN & PICK UP:

HOW SLEAZE BECAME AN ART BULL 02_NB_final.indd 1

ISSUE 02, 2013

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1. 2. 3. 4.

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ISSUE 02 CONTENTS

PUT DOWN AND PICK UP

EDITORS Felix Donovan Eleanor Gordon-Smith Diana Pham John Rowley Lane Sainty Kate Wilcox usubullmag@gmail.com CONTRIBUTORS Bec Barrett, Geordie Crawford, Francis Kevin Floresca, Theresa Gaven, Paul Karp, Tim Ledger, Ashling Lee, Estha Lee, Hayley de la Motte, Grace O’Neill, Oliver Plunkett, Mariana Podesta-Diverio, Alice Potter, Shannen Potter, Chloe Saintalin, Michael Santikos PUBLICATIONS MANAGER Louisa Stylian DESIGN MANAGER Anjali Belani DESIGN Carl Ahearn Nina Bretnall WWW.USUONLINE.COM

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FACEBOOK.COM/USUBULLMAGAZINE

The views in this publication are not necessarily the views of USU. The information contained within this edition of BULL was correct at the time of printing. This publication is brought to you by the University of Sydney Union ISSUE 02, 2013

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ASSANGE FOR SENATE

FASHIONABLE FEMINISM

RED GENDER

PUT DOWN & PICK UP

LOVING YOURSELF

WRITE FOR US! Whether you’re a budding

student journalist or have a random idea that could be a great story, email us and you could get published here. usubullmag@gmail.com

What’s On Columns News Interview When I Grow Up Food & Booze Travel Campus Chatter Fashion Sport & Health Science & Tech Going Without Reviews Club Hub Shutter Up Stop. Puzzletime Bullshit

04 06 07 15 21 22 23 24 35 36 37 39 40 43 44 45 46

CONTENTS 15/03/13 2:43 PM

BULL USUONLINE.COM WHAT’S ON

WHAT’S ON

WK 6 (APRIL)

WK 5 (APRIL)

SEMESTER BREAK

WK 4 (MARCH)

MON

TUE

FOR THE FULL CALENDAR OF EVENTS – HEAD TO USUONLINE.COM AND CLICK THE CALENDAR. CLUBS AND SOCS – REMEMBER TO SUBMIT YOUR EVENTS ON THE WEBSITE!

WED

THU 28

FRI 29 GOOD FRIDAY

SEMESTER BREAK

SYDNEY UNI BAND COMP STARTS

USU BOARD NOMINATIONS CLOSE

INDIGENOUS FESTIVAL

INDIGENOUS FESTIVAL SCASS INDIGENOUS FESTIVAL SHOW OPENING NIGHT Verge Gallery

NEW GODS + THE TROUBLE WITH TEMPLETON + SURES + MAPLES

WK 7 (APRIL)

8pm, Manning Bar

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ANZAC DAY

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ISSUE 02 WHAT’S ON

EVERY WEEK MONDAY-FRIDAY MONDAYS

TOP PICKS STATE OF THE ART EXHIBITION – POLITICAL ECONOMY

WEDNESDAYS

SOLO SESSIONS

1-2pm, Manning Bar

SCHOOL TUTORING

3-6pm, International Student Lounge 6pm, International Student Lounge

3-6pm, International Student Lounge

$3.50 DRINKS

POOL COMPETITION

4pm, International Student Lounge

1pm, Eastern Ave

5-6pm, Manning Bar

GET UP! STAND UP! COMEDY

AUSTRALIAN DISCUSSION GROUP

1-2pm, Manning Bar

3pm, International Student Lounge

PROJECT 52 COMEDY

5-10pm, Hermann’s Bar

FRIDAYS DJS

4-7pm, Manning Bar

$3.50 DRINKS

TUESDAY TV

7.30-10.30pm, Hermann’s Bar

4-6pm, Hermann’s Bar

ROCK YA BALLS BINGO

THURSDAYS

7-11pm, Hermann’s Bar

HERMANN’S TRIVIA

1-2pm, Manning Bar

12-3pm, Manning Bar 5-6pm, Manning Bar

1-2pm, Hermann’s Bar

FREE

BEAT THE SYSTEM

MANNING TRIVIA

TUESDAYS

Verge Gallery is exhibiting a collection of works that get under the skin of economic inequality and policy. The exhibition features collaborative works from political economy students and Sydney College of the Arts students.

FORTNIGHTLY MARKETS

WEEKLY FUNCH (FUN @ LUNCH)

4-6pm, Hermann’s Bar

Thursday 28 March – Friday 12 April 6pm, Verge Gallery Curated by: Joy Paton and participants

SCHOOL TUTORING

11am-3pm, Eastern Avenue

MOVIE NIGHT

LIVE BANDS

THEATRESPORTS®

COURTYARD TIKI DJ

4-8pm, Manning Bar

twitter.com/manningbar facebook.com/manningbarsydney

28 MAR

7 APR

18 APR

DEMON HUNTER (USA)

+ I, THE BREATHER (USA)

SYDNEY ROCK N ROLL ALTERNATIVE MARKET FEAT. BROTHERS GRIM AND THE BLUE MURDERS

NEW GODS + THE TROUBLE WITH TEMPLETON + SURES + MAPLES

19 APR

3 MAY

10 MAY

SILVERSTEIN (CANADA)

+ SIENNA SKIES

DEATHSTARS (SWEDEN) + GRAVEYARD ROCKSTARS + THE MERCY KILLS UNIDA (USA) FEAT. JOHN GARCIA FROM KYUSS + TRUCKFIGHTERS + BEAST WARS + LOOKING GLASS

COMING UP

7 JUN & 8 JUN – EVIL INVADERS V FEAT. SADISTIC INTENT (USA) + ARCHGOAT (FINLAND) + CRUCIFORM + MIDNIGHT (USA) + PORTAL + NOCTURNAL GRAVES + CAULDRON BLACK RAM + GRAVE UPHEAVAL + SACRIPHYX + IGNIVOMOUS + BLACK JESUS + WITCHAMMER + VASSAFOR + EREBUS ENTHRONED + HORDES OF THE BLACK CROSS + KINGDOM OF DECAY + BLEAKWOOD + WHITEHORSE + INVERLOCH + SPIRE + STAND ALONE + CRONE (AUS)

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BULL USUONLINE.COM COLUMNS

COLUMNS

EDITORS’ NOTE FELIX, ELEANOR, DIANA, JOHN, LANE & KATE

Dearest Reader, BULL is our baby. By the end of this year we will be the Octo-Mum, replete with eight wonderful children. The previous issue – our first – burst forth from the vagina of the BULL offices, pink, bloodied and crying. Like most newborns, it was ugly, but brought us much joy. You are holding in your hands the second fruit of our collective loins. As with most parents, the second child brought us slightly less excitement than the first, but it would be going too far to say that the novelty has worn off. Our second child required the same amount of work, but at least we knew what to expect. Second children often form their identities in relation to their elder sibling. Like most second children, our offspring has a clear inferiority complex. Also like most second children, it’s taken a different route to success. Our deuxieme enfant terrible is smart and politically savvy, concerned with Julian Assange’s political ambitions and feminism. They are also keen to distinguish themself from their older sibling, aware of the qualities that often afflict the first – narcissism, sleazy pick-up antics and the possession of red hair (a recessive gene). As with all good parents, we insist that we don’t have a favourite child – we love them all equally – but this one is fairly good. Treat it kindly – we birthed it. Much love, Your BULL editors

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PRESIDENT’S DESK ASTHA RAJVANSHI.

I hope you enjoyed an action-packed O-Week and are now settling into the routine of lectures and tutes. During O-Week we celebrated the success of INCUBATE at the program’s inaugural Demo Day. The eight teams pitched their startups to investors and the university community with two teams raising over $1.1 million between them! Applications for the next intake will open later in the year so if you have an idea, make sure you apply. With USU Board Elections just around the corner, there’s plenty of opportunity to get involved in shaping the student experience. The annual election fosters new student leaders who govern the USU and ensure a vibrant student-run community. When I first decided to run for Board, my only interaction with the USU was reading BULL. But running in the elections exposed me to the breadth of what USU has to offer and it became a very real and exciting opportunity to make a difference to university life. Make no mistake, managing a $22 million organisation is a big responsibility and time commitment, but the skills and experience you gain are truly priceless. This year, we are providing election grants to help with the expense of running for Board and encourage a larger and more diverse group of candidates to step forward. If you’ve always thought about becoming a student leader, I strongly encourage you to get involved. Nominations open on Monday 18 March and an information session will be held on Wednesday 20 March. If you’re considering nominating yourself, awesome! Please feel free to email me at president@usu.usyd.edu.au for more information or check out www.usuonline.com.

STUDENT LEADER DIARY

ELYSE JOHNSON AND AMIE LIEBOWITZ ON THEIR ADVENTURES ORGANISING THE 2013 INDIGENOUS FESTIVAL . The theme for this year’s Indigenous Festival is ‘Connect & Reflect’. We want to encourage the university community to understand the meaning behind the festival’s events and hopefully this will lead to a greater awareness of Indigenous culture in Australia. The events have been planned with ongoing consultation with the Indigenous community and aim to make the complex elements of Indigenous culture more accessible to students on campus.You can look forward to art, Indigenous epistemology, performance, history, discussion of contemporary issues and the showcasing of traditional practices. Organising the 2013 Indigenous Festival has been one of the most educational, testing and worthwhile experiences we have both undertaken and we can’t wait to see everyone get involved in the three days of interactive and educational events that celebrate one of the world’s longest surviving culture.

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ISSUE 02 NEWS

1 The Jezabels performing at Manning Bar

2 Having fun at lunch

NEWS WIN $1000 AND THE KIRBY CUP FOR A 5 MINUTE SPEECH Now in its seventh year, the Michael Kirby Plain Speaking Competition offers students of all experience levels a chance to test their public speaking skills in an environment that is both constructive and competitive. If that’s not enough of a reason to compete, here’s another sweetener: big prizes for the winner and finalists. This year USU will again be awarding prizes for two divisions: an Open Division and an English as a Second Language (ESL) Division. At the grand final, the talented winner of each division will receive up to $1000 in prize money and the Kirby Cup. For more information or to register visit usuonline.com. Students can also complete the form in person at the Access Desk (Level 1, Manning). Registrations close Friday 19 April.

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SYDNEY UNI BAND COMP The competition that launched the careers of The Vines and The Jezabels, to name but two, is back again for another year. Heats begin on 9 April 2013 at Manning bar and all shows are free, so come and support your fellow students and you may catch the next big thing before they become famous.

CAMPUS CULTURE’S FUNCH The Campus Culture program has returned in 2013 bigger and better than ever. Every Wednesday from 12pm on Eastern Avenue there will be free food giveaways, entertainment or an area built for you to spend your lunch with a difference. This semester we have snow-cones and beach umbrellas, a cute ukulele serenade and free ice-cream to help you have fun at lunch.

STUDENT LEADERS WANTED Running for Board is a big step, so this year, to make the election process fairer and easier, USU is providing $500 election grants to assist candidates through the process. Being a student board director is a real job, with real opportunities to make a real, lasting change. It’s a challenging role, but one that comes with great rewards and the chance to shape Australia’s best student experience. Collectively, student board directors are responsible for governing the USU, developing and reviewing policies, improving programs and services, creating new spaces and managing the USU’s finances. Student board directors are currently enrolled students at the University of Sydney and are Access members who want to make a difference. They are elected, for a two-year term, into a board position by fellow students on the basis of their ideas for the future and their passion for student life.

This year’s election grants will be monitored by USU staff to ensure the spending abides by the USU’s Election Regulations. The spending limit will remain at $700 (as in previous years) and students wishing to spend an additional $200 can do so at their own expense. Nominations now open and close 15 April 2013. To find out more visit www.usuonline.com or email elections@usu.usyd.edu.au

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BULL USUONLINE.COM FEATURE

THE ONE. THE TEN.

AN ELECTION BULL 02_NB_final.indd 8

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ISSUE 02 FEATURE

“If we can only live once, then let it be a daring adventure that draws on all our powers.”

FELIX DONOVAN AND PAUL KARP ON A NEW POLITICAL FORCE.

n late 2006, Harry Harrison created a profile on the dating site OKCupid. In response to the question, ‘What am I doing with my life?’, he answered, ‘directing a consuming, dangerous human rights project.’ To ‘I spend a lot of my time thinking about’, he replied, ‘Changing the world through passion, inspiration and trickery.’ That same month, celebrating the launch of Wikileaks.org, a hacker and blogger known as Mendax wrote that “Every time we witness an injustice and do not act, we train our character to be passive in its presence… If we can only live once, then let it be a daring adventure that draws on all our powers.” Both names were pseudonyms. And through them, we see an ambitious idealist still in obscurity. We come to know a little about Julian Assange before he changed the world. Six years on, he has made the front cover of

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Time, become Le Monde’s Man of the Year and Sweden’s ‘creepy white-haired crackpot’. Now he intends to become an Australian senator. On 16 March 2012, WikiLeaks tweeted: “We have discovered that it is possible for Julian Assange to run for the Australian Senate while detained. Julian has decided to run.” He declared his candidacy in less than fortuitous circumstances. Ensconced in the Ecuadorian Embassy, a political refugee, facing allegations of sexual crimes in Sweden and possibly worse in the United States. He will likely remain there for the campaign and beyond. Assange is running as a candidate for the new Australian WikiLeaks Party in the state of Victoria. Phillip Dorling, Fairfax journalist and Assange’s contact in the Australian media, describes the WikiLeaks Party to BULL as an “outgrowth” of WikiLeaks’ advocacy effort. He says that just as the whistleblowing organisation has done, the political party will push for “openness of government; privacy of individuals”. At the centre of the party is a ten member National Council. Strategy and policy is formed by the council and candidates are selected by it. It includes Assange, his father John Shipton, lawyers and academics. All are activists, most are techno-geeks. Rarely, if ever, in Australian history has such a collection of individuals been brought together into a political party. Neither WikiLeaks nor Assange are incidental to the party. The degree of personal loyalty to Assange is great. Most of the Ten have spoken at various Free Assange rallies across Australia. They share in his injustice. Gary Lord, a blogger and one of the Ten, recounted to BULL with venom that the Australian government has abandoned Assange, leaving

him “trapped in an overseas embassy”. Indeed, Lord has called himself a WikiLeaks “groupie” writing on his blog that he shows “blind devotion to the WikiLeaks founder”. Assange told Professor John Keane of the University of Sydney that he wanted an “ideologically unified” party. In the Ten, he certainly got this. Just as nationalists see history as the inevitable march towards nationhood, the WikiLeaks Party Ten have their own capital-h History. It is the struggle of individuals against state, corporate and religious control, moving irrepressibly towards greater individual freedom. The blog that Assange maintained throughout 2006 begins with this quote from the German anarchist Gustav Landauer: “The State is a condition”. At a Free Assange rally last year, Daniel Mathews, a lecturer in Mathematics at Monash University and one of the Ten, observed the Historical significance of the nearby library staying open on a Sunday. “The very fact that the library is open today is not a given,” he said. Public spaces free from dogma, open despite the protestations of the church, were not handed to the apathetic; they were won by the brave. “That was a struggle. That was fought over. People went to jail for that,” said Matthews. WikiLeaks is the new frontier of this struggle. Assange, first as a hacker, then as a blogger, finally as the editor-in-chief of WikiLeaks, resisted what he saw as the Government’s attempt to monitor and control the Internet. Lord sees the same threat, and casts WikiLeaks as a weapon in this struggle, blogging that “WikiLeaks has ushered in a new form of peaceful revolution, where the truth can no longer be suppressed and denied at will.”

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BULL USUONLINE.COM FEATURE

The state is one declared enemy, increasing corporatism is another. Kellie Tranter is a lawyer, one of the Ten, and the likely WikiLeaks candidate for New South Wales. On her blog she castigates our “self-proclaimed statesmen” who are “servants of the monied but not of the people”. Many of the Ten have shown sympathy with the Occupy movement. Such suspicions about power and its use tend to lead to conspiracies. And so it is with the WikiLeaks Ten. Assange himself wrote a lengthy essay in 2006 on ‘Conspiracy as Governance’, noting the corrupting links between politics and corporations. Lord flashed his Truther colours on ABC’s The Drum in 2011, with an article titled, ‘We are allowed to ask questions’. Those questions included: “Why did those World Trade Centre buildings collapse like that, especially Building Seven which wasn't even hit by a plane? Why didn't Bush want to have an enquiry? Why were those Mossad agents celebrating on a NYC rooftop as the towers burned?” The preliminary perception of many voters is to see the WikiLeaks Party and Assange’s candidacy as a single-issue political crusade.

ASSANGE ON THE BALCONY OF THE ECUADORIAN EMBASSY. IMAGE BY KERIM OKTEN.

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Ross Pritchard, usually a Greens voter who occasionally votes independent, thinks Assange “sees himself as a journalist; freedom of the press is his issue”. She told BULL that she would be reticent to vote for him, considering it a “protest vote”. Assange and the WikiLeaks Party will have the appeal of anti-politics. Their message: that the system is corrupted, broken and disillusioning, that it doesn’t represent the people, that it is built upon fleeting expediency rather than lasting principle – will resonate with many. Especially so in an election that will go on for a little longer than usual, with parties a little more petty and truculent than usual, with leaders a little less palatable than usual. But it would be a mistake to file them away under ‘anti-politics’. They are suspicious of authority, even hostile towards it. They see governments as unaccountable, opaque institutions bent on private profit rather than public good. But Assange and the Ten are deeply committed to ideas of democratic process, holding power to account. As Kellie Tranter said on her blog, political activism is about “holding up the mirror to selfishness, hypocrisy, inhumanity and injustice”. Theirs is an anarchic disposition, a tendency to view power as illegitimate until it proves otherwise, rather than an anarchic prescription, a society absent any authority. Despite the high profile of Assange, the WikiLeaks Party faces “problems that no other political party has ever faced,” according to Gary Lord. He says these problems include “a hostile government” and, of course, the plight of its leader “trapped in an overseas embassy”. Were Assange elected, he may never be able to take his seat. The votes of Victorians would do nothing to make a midnight dash from the Ecuadorian Embassy in London any easier, where police are waiting to arrest and extradite him to Sweden to answer allegations of sexual offences. If Assange is elected and unable to return to Canberra, one of the Ten is likely to take his seat in the senate. But Assange is optimistic that a successful election could reverse his legal fortunes. He told Keane that the US Justice Department would drop its grand jury espionage investigation for fear of sparking a diplomatic row with Australia over one of its senators. Assange’s lawyer Julian Burnside QC, however, told BULL that Australia’s obligations to its citizens “do not materially change if the person is a parliamentarian”. Burnside comments that Australia has “conspicuously failed” to help its citizens in other countries where they faced danger from US authorities, citing the examples of David Hicks and Mamdouh Habib in addition to Julian Assange. Burnside’s observation indicates that the WikiLeaks Party and its allies plan to tap into a deep reservoir of support for Assange’s freedom, a sense of injustice at his persecution, and turn his predicament into a broader issue of protest. Sam McLane, National Director of GetUp! said his organisation “intends to make the current

treatment of WikiLeaks and Julian Assange a key issue in this election”. Circumstance, however, is not the chief vulnerability of the campaign. Having a wellpublicised arrest warrant out against him for suspicion of rape, sexual molestation and unlawful coercion is an extraordinary blow to Assange’s image. His responses to the charges have been varied. For a time he let them go unanswered, walking off a live CNN interview when the subject was raised. Assange and his defence team have since denied the allegations, and have pointed to discrepancies in the evidence used against him. Assange has piled layers of doubt on the allegations by claiming they are part of a conspiracy to have him tried by a grand jury in the US for espionage. More than that is the extent to which voters would feel a WikiLeaks Party is relevant to them. One of the Ten, Lord nominated “transparency and open government” as the only philosophy and policy of the party. It is undeniably the salient issue for the Ten, and the issue voters will identify them with. However, when voters go to the polls they may be looking for a more comprehensive platform than WikiLeaks can promise – one that can make a material impact on the lives of everyday Australians, not just those holed up in the Ecuadorian Embassy and sympathetic civil libertarians who feel disregard of his rights as violence against their own. Assange told Keane that the WikiLeaks Party will draw upon “maximum grass roots involvement”. The vision is of a movement that becomes a party, taking the idealism and energy of WikiLeaks to the halls of power. One of the Ten, Omar Todd, says that the main difference between the WikiLeaks Party and other parties will be “transparency and crowd sourcing for policies that the electorate actually cares about”. Keane wrote that Assange “could be described as the Tom Paine of the early twentyfirst century” and that his running for senate was “one of the rare political miracles that make life as a citizen worth living”. The question that must haunt Assange on quiet nights in diplomatic limbo is how far this enthusiasm will extend. Daniel Mathews, a Stanford PhD, founding member of WikiLeaks and one of the Ten, last year accounted for the lacklustre Australian Occupy movement. “Australian society is much less forthright on matters of principle” he observed on his blog. It is “a nation of warders. Any threat disturbing the peace of conformity and resignation raises the greatest annoyance and indignation, until the deviant elements are hauled off and taken away, out of sight, and all returns to the order and stability of the prison”. What hope, then, for the campaign of an international deviant and his deviant Ten?

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BULL USUONLINE.COM FEATURE

KATE WILCOX TELLS US WHY FEMINISM IS BACK IN FASHION.

“F

or typical reasons, I didn’t identify myself as a feminist until around the age of 20 when I began studying gender studies at university. Prior to that, I would have said something along the lines of, ‘I believe in equality. But you know, I wouldn’t call myself a feminist.’”

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ISSUE 02 FEATURE

“To me, a feminist was a manhating, rabid hairy beast who no one wanted to have sex with. I wanted people to have sex with me, and for men to find me attractive, and I was terrified that indicating my politics to them would put them off.” This is quite an admission from Clementine Ford, writer and social commentator, who was voted among the top twenty most influential Australian female voices of 2012, and described as “the goto feminist for a new generation.” But it seems the zeitgeist, like Ford’s personal feelings, has changed dramatically concerning feminism. Until very recently, older women were tearing out their hair at the lack of interest young women were showing in feminist causes. And many young women, like Ford, wouldn’t touch the moniker “feminist” with a ten-foot pole, much less wear it pinned to their lapels with pride. Last March, when Naomi Wolf and Germaine Greer – esteemed matriarchs of feminism – converged on the Opera House, both of them bemoaned the state of

contemporary feminism and how loath young people were to participate in it. Indeed, the conference title, ‘The F-Word’, reflected the low regard in which feminism has been held. But in the last year or so it seems that something has changed. Feminism is back in fashion. Feminist blogs are more numerous, more professional and more visited than ever. Feministing, the US-based feminist blog, had approximately one million unique views in January, an all-time high for the site. Closer to home, Fairfax’s Daily Life, which describes itself as a “proudly female biased website” and regularly features explicitly feminist articles about issues such as violence against women, workplace sexual harassment, female genital mutilation, and the pay gap, has become the go-to opinion site for Australian women. In the year since it began, it has become the ‘women’s website’ most clicked by Australians, with over 940, 000 unique browsers in January 2013. The surge of girl-power sentiment has led to movements such as ‘This is What a Feminist Looks Like’, which seeks to normalise feminism and address the stereotyped image that the word might conjure up; and events such as One Billion

BILL BAILEY

Rising, which took place on 14 February, and saw millions of women participate in a variety of activities across the world – from debates to protests to mass dance sessions – to protest violence against women. “After years in the wilderness, we’re finally at the point where women and young girls and men are talking about [feminism] again, frequently in positive ways,” said Ford. “To be a feminist is once again a cool thing.”

WHAT’S CHANGED?

There are a few things in particular that have prompted the change in feminism’s status. Global incidents of violence against women, most notably the recent gang rape and murder of a 23 year-old woman in Delhi, and reports of honour killings in India and the Middle East, have gained attention from Western media recently. Such reports, says Ford, as well as those closer to home like Jill Meagher’s rape and murder last year, have also led to increased discussion about how violence against women is ingrained in and abetted by a patriarchal culture, and how far our society has to go

before women feel safe. A feminist twang has also been heard in the public discussion about the way women are treated in the workplace. This, says writer Chloe Angyal, is partly the result of Australia having its first female Prime Minister. “People watching the reaction to Julia Gillard, go, ‘Oh I guess we still have a lot of sexism to deal with them in this country.’ Just like how in the US, the election of Barack Obama has revealed that racism is still alive in the US,” she says. In September last year, Australian feminist power, Anne Summers, delivered an address titled ‘Her Rights at Work’, which explored the gender-based discrimination that Gillard has suffered since taking office, such as Alan Jones’ comments that the women in power in Australia were “destroying the joint”. When presented with Summers’ research, many viewers and readers (her speech which has since been published online, has been read by over 100,000 people) were appalled by the gendered nature of the

“TO ME, A FEMINIST WAS A MAN-HATING, RABID HAIRY BEAST WHO NO ONE WANTED TO HAVE SEX WITH.” CLEMENTINE FORD

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BULL USUONLINE.COM FEATURE

"DESTROY THE JOINT" WOMEN'S NATIONAL SERVICE POSTER,1943

theory, what’s the wage gap in Australia? Interesting theory, how many female prime ministers have you had? One. Interesting theory, what proportion of congresspeople are women? Twenty per cent, and that’s an all time high.” “It’s – what is the word I’m looking for? – Bullshit. Yeah, it’s complete bullshit. Feminism has succeeded in a lot of ways, but anyone who contends that the work of feminism is done, simply isn’t paying attention. They’re either woefully misinformed or willfully ignorant, or they’re a shit-stirrer and you should walk away.” Despite the fact that feminism is not enjoying quite the renaissance in the States as it is in Australia, Angyal says she is “cautiously optimistic, but mostly optimistic.” Ford says the situation in Australia is even more hopeful. “I think we’re on an upswing,” she says. “The cynical side of me is waiting for the backlash in around ten years (it seems to run at this cycle). But for now, I’m riding high on the fact people are talking positively about feminism again. We can stop trying to convince people they should be feminists and get down to the business of changing things. Women are realising once again that all this equality we’ve been told we have is actually illusory. And we’re ready to fight again.”

MANY WOMEN FELT THE SMACKDOWN WAS DELIVERED NOT JUST TO TONY ABBOTT BUT TO A SOCIETY THAT HAS NOT YET FULLY ACCEPTED WOMEN INTO THE PROFESSIONAL AND PUBLIC SPHERE.

opposition the PM has faced. And the revelation of such sexism has fuelled the feminist fire. All this culminated with Gillard’s speech in the House of Representatives last October, in which she thundered that she would not be lectured to about misogyny by Tony Abbott – “not now, not ever.” Whatever you think about the political climate in which the speech was delivered, the speech resonated with women around the world, gaining international press attention and leading to “Gillard” trending on Twitter globally. Many women felt the smackdown was delivered not just to Tony Abbott but to a society that has not yet fully accepted women into the professional and public sphere.

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HAVEN’T WE GOT EQUALITY?

Chloe Angyal, 25, was born and raised in Sydney by parents who “did a really good job as raising me as a feminist” so much so that when she reached the age of 15 and started reading feminist books and talking to feminist people, she was surprised to learn that there was a word for what she believed in. “I had feminist contact lenses on,” she says. “I remember this intoxicating feeling of thinking, this is huge, this touches everything I see. Gender shapes everything we see, and if its not gender it’s other forms of power and inequity.” Angyal now lives in New York, where she works as a writer and editor at Feministing and she says

that while there has been quite a big shift in Australia in the last few years, the situation is not quite as feminist-friendly in the USA. “[There is a] concern that young women don’t want to call themselves feminists, that it’s uncool, it’s still the f-word,” she says. Angyal says she frequently encounters people who think the work of feminism is done and so it is no longer necessary, and she says such a response worries her. “I think the complacency, the attitude – it’s a fait accompli, we don’t need to work on it anymore – that worries me because I think women of my generation especially, we take for granted the stuff that our mothers and grandmothers fought for. And that’s good, we’re supposed to take that for granted, as Gloria Steinem said, you’re not supposed to walk around being grateful that you have the vote. But I think there’s a real danger when equality isn’t sewn into society tightly enough to be secure,” she says. The issues that get her feminist engines revving are restrictive media representations of men and women, reproductive rights, body image issues and sexual violence. Whereas Ford says she is concerned about what she calls “the three fundamentals” – women’s financial independence, reproductive autonomy and an end to violence against women. When asked how she would respond to a person who did think feminism redundant, Angyal laughs. “I would laugh at them and then I would say, ‘interesting

CHLOE ANGYAL

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ISSUE 02 INTERVIEW

INTERVIEW ANNA FUNDER LANE SAINTY CHATS TO ANNA FUNDER, THE AUSTRALIAN AUTHOR OF AWARD-WINNING BOOKS STASILAND AND ALL THAT I AM.

WHAT WERE YOU LIKE AS A UNIVERSITY STUDENT? I was doing an Arts/Law degree and I wasn’t as studious as I should have been. I was really exploring things on a much more personal level than an intellectual level. I mean, I did the work, but I was doing a lot more social things than academic things, and there were a lot of books I didn’t read and I should have.

STASILAND TELLS STORIES FROM THE GERMAN DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC, AND ALL THAT I AM IS SET DURING HITLER’S REGIME. WHY THE INTEREST IN GERMANY? I had a fantastic German teacher at school, and then I got an exchange scholarship to Berlin in the late ‘80s…but what really interests me is not the German-ness of either book. It’s much more about these extremes of belief and the extremes of the 20th Century and what that says about what it is to be human. Looking at either the socialist regime or the Nazi regime and the different kinds of responses that these regimes called forth in people – that is what is interesting. If I were doing Mandarin at school I would have gone to China and written essentially the same books… I could have found the same kinds of themes and stories that interested me. It’s just that Germany was what I knew. BOTH STASILAND AND ALL THAT I AM ARE HISTORICALLY BASED. WHY DID YOU DECIDE TO WRITE ONE AS FICTION AND ONE AS NON-FICTION? With Stasiland, there was a big problem in that the first thing you have to do in a novel is make a believable world where the reader trusts exactly what it is that’s going on. The real East Germany literally beggars belief. It beggars belief that the Stasi would climb into your flat when you weren’t there, steal a piece of your dirty underwear, bottle it and train a dog to track you by your bodily odour. All of the things they were doing – if you put them all in a novel, you’d be laying it on way too thick. I wanted to be

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able to put all of those incredible, excruciating, condemning and fantastic details into a book, so it had to be non-fiction. AND ALL THAT I AM ? All That I Am was a different task, because everybody in the book is dead and the one thing that you can’t do in non-fiction, legitimately, is to get inside someone else’s head. The task of [All That I Am] is to bring these people, in a sense, back to life, so that we can understand the kind of fear that they suffered from living in London. Only by understanding that fear can you understand the courage that it took to do what they did. So to represent that from the inside – to ask ‘What does that feel like?’ – is a task of fiction.

“I THINK THAT’S AN IMPORTANT THING TO KNOW: THAT ORDINARY PEOPLE, IN GROUPS, CAN DO VERY BAD THINGS.”

quantified, that is being listed and de-listed, that is being shortlisted and sold and counted in the quantities that it’s being sold in and counted in the weeks on the bestseller lists and all of this counting surrounds this book that you wrote from a different place. All of a sudden it’s a commodity that is being bet on and chartered and that’s a really strange thing. To win the Miles Franklin, paradoxically, relieves the fake anxiety that’s foisted on you by all this betting and counting. It’s a good feeling!

YOU SAID ONCE THAT THE STASI MEN WERE “NOT MORE MONSTROUS THAN ANYBODY ELSE I’VE KNOWN IN LAW OR GOVERNMENT IN PARTICULAR, BUT THEY WERE PEOPLE WHO WANTED A NICE LIFE AND A GOOD INCOME AND A SAFE LIFE…” COULD YOU EXPAND ON THAT? All of the things that were done were basically sanctioned by committee – the decision to ruin a life, or imprison someone, or take away their children, to dope them with drugs, to dope children with drugs – whatever the horrific thing being done, it was being done by quite ordinary committees. And I think it’s really much more shocking to think that the real villains in real life might wear a suit, they might wear a uniform, they will look like a middle-class, conforming, reasonably successful, well-adjusted person. They do not have horns, tails or pitchforks and I think that’s an important thing to know: that ordinary people, in groups, can do very bad things. FINALLY, WHAT WAS IT LIKE WINNING THE MILES FRANKLIN FOR ALL THAT I AM ? It meant a lot. Nobody writes for that reason [to win awards], but once you have a book out there it is something that is being

Image Credit: Marco del Grande

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Quit throwing your money away every semester.

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ISSUE 02 FEATURE

JOHN ROWLEY CATCHES GINGERVITIS.

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stimated to make up about two per cent of the worldâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s population, the red-headed contingent of our global society has endured a curious history. After centuries of less-thanfavourable stereotyping, female redheads are now seen as embodiments of allure and kook. Their male counterparts have been less lucky - but are things beginning to change?

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BULL USUONLINE.COM FEATURE

RED ALERT: A HISTORICAL ANTHOLOGY OF TIME’S MOST INFLUENTIAL REDHEADS* * Some of the listed individuals’ hair colour is subject to contention.

(1157-1199) RICHARD THE LIONHEART

(DATE UNKNOWN) LILITH

A demon, child murderer and general troublemaker. What’s not to love?

(69 BC-30 BC)

CLEOPATRA

This lover of Julius Caesar and Mark Antony made red hair fashionable in Egypt during her reign.

(DATE UNKNOWN) CAIN

Adam’s eldest son had a fiery temper to match his locks, compounding the stereotype that persists today.

When BULL previously broached the subject of ‘Gingerism’, we focused on the struggles of redheads as a whole, and their contemporary redemption through a new prescience in pop culture and politics. It seems clear now that this image rehabilitation has largely neglected the group’s male members. Gabby Harradine, a second-year UTS engineering student and full-time redhead, believes that “there’s definitely a difference between the way women and men with red hair are treated”. Today, the celebrity circuit’s leading ladies sport copper tresses with a commonality that belies their general statistical rarity. One would struggle to swing a (ginger) cat at an awards show without hitting a glamazon topped with red locks. The list is long: Nicole Kidman, Isla Fisher, Florence Welch, Nicola Roberts, Emma Stone, Alyson Hannigan, Debra Messing and Julia Roberts have been leading the charge for years. Now a slew of celebrities are dabbling in dye. Rihanna, Cheryl Cole, Christina Hendricks, Katy Perry and Scarlett Johannson have found varying levels of success after reverting from type. Even Ginger Spice, whose nickname renders her the only Spice Girl defined by a

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The celebrated military leader and King of England was among the first of many red-headed royals.

(1678-1741) ANTONIO VIVALDI

The Four Seasons composer was nicknamed ‘il Prete Rosso’ for his rouge tresses.

(1533-1603) ELIZABETH I

(UNKNOWN - 30 CE) JUDAS ISCARIOT

The betrayer of Jesus stood out from other Disciples with his russet hair.

physical trait, isn’t a natural redhead. Fiction has also taken a shine to red hair. Kirsten Dunst played resident damsel in distress Mary Jane Watson to a titian tee in the noughties’ Spiderman trilogy, while Uma Thurman brought the sexy as ‘Poison Ivy’ in 1997’s Batman and Robin. Animation has played an equally important role. Jessica Rabbit’s curves are rivalled only by her long orange tresses. Scooby Doo’s ‘Daphne’ was the series’ token eye candy, and ‘Ariel’ saw redheads represented among the canon of Disney princesses. According to Gabby Heraldine, “red hair can be a real visual symbol of independence and feistiness for audiences, casting agents and writers alike.” She sees the recent children’s film Brave as an example of how well-worn these connotations have become. Harradine believes that the “heroine with the flaming red hair and fiery temper is now an archetype of sorts in fiction.” Evidently, flame-haired girls aren’t exactly inconspicuous or hard-done by in Hollywood. The male equivalents of ‘Ariel’ and ‘Ms Rabbit’ suggest a contrasting attitude. It’s unlikely that ‘Sideshow Bob’ or ‘Ronald McDonald’ have inspired too many sexual awakenings.

With hair inherited from her father Henry VIII, Elizabeth epitomised the ferocity and fierceness associated with redheads, despite eventually going bald.

History tells of a similar polarity. A number of rule-flouting female redheads from centuries past are fondly remembered. Nobody’s asking for their lover to replicate the Kiss of Judas, however. Judas Iscariot, betrayer of Jesus, has repeatedly been depicted with a mop of striking red hair to set him apart from the other disciples. His antagonistic role is mirrored by that of another male biblical figure. Cain, slayer of his brother Abel, is commonly depicted with similar hair. It has even been theorised that his amber shock is the infamous ‘Mark of Cain’ – his Godgiven punishment for fratricide. Even for females, red hair didn’t always have the positive connotations it now enjoys. Various early religious texts assert that prior to Eve, Adam had another spouse. Lilith was a fierce redhead crafted from the same dust as her husband. She refused to act as Adam’s inferior and so left the Garden of Eden to become a demon and amour of Satan. Medieval Europe saw thousands of ginger-headed innocents burnt at the stake, as long-standing associations with witchcraft and vampirism came to the fore. Things began to change soon after this, though. Compared to her intemperate redheaded father Henry VIII, who is frequently

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ISSUE 02 FEATURE

(1830-1886) EMILY DICKINSON

(1911-1986) L. RON HUBBARD

This enigmatic poet and Board of Studies favourite earned a reputation of being mysterious and otherworldly, no doubt helped by her shock of hair.

The founder of Scientology was uncommon in more ways than one.

(1874-1965) WINSTON CHURCHILL

The last aristocratic Prime Minister of England was also the last genuinely popular redhead politician.

(1986 – PRESENT) LINDSAY LOHAN

We’re sure you’ve red all about her.

(1882-1941) JAMES JOYCE

Yet another tortured creative. Are you sensing a theme yet?

(1761-1829) NAPOLEON BONAPARTE

The celebrated French military man is believed to have had a copper mane.

vilified in historical fiction today, Elizabeth I remains a well-loved monarch. She conforms to a broader narrative of fierce female rulers with coral tresses, her predecessors including firstcentury CE tribal queen Boudica and Egyptian spell-binder Cleopatra. It would seem that for redheads of the fairer sex, connotations of power and seductiveness remain at play. Harradine can attest to this. “I see it as a gift that I have red hair,” she says. “A lot of the time I get [positive] male attention because of my hair, which can be a good thing or a bad thing.” For men, a different narrative is at work. Fiction and history have largely ensured that we inherit what Harradine describes as “a very different perception of male redheads – one that remains perplexing and attached to stigma”. Although a handful of high-profile gingerhaired guys are in the public eye – think Ed Sheeran, Prince Harry, Rupert Grint and Seth Green – they are exceptions to the rule. With few role models, younger redheaded males are at risk of insecurity and bullying. For example, in February of this year, a 13 year-old French student known to the press only

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(1853-1890) VINCENT VAN GOGH

Van Gogh’s famous self-portrait pulls no punches.

as Matteo committed suicide following severe bullying, believed to be linked to his red hair. Matteo’s parents have blamed the staff of this school for failing to intervene following their complaints about the jibes and taunts he endured. While obviously a rare case, Matteo’s story is paralleled in part by other male redheads’ tales of teasing. Even Prince Harry admitted in 2007 that he’d been bullied because of his red locks. The “ranga” taunted in Summer Heights High was, unsurprisingly, a boy. The spread of the term ‘ranga’ – derived from orang-utan – is a local phenomenon that mixes affectionate ribbing with serious bullying. According to proud redhead Elliot Brennan, “‘ranga’ is now part of Australian jargon and I don’t think that will change. For me this isn’t such a problem.” He does acknowledge, though, that he has experienced some unfriendly acknowledgement of his ginge tinge. Asked about his experiences with bullying, Brennan recalls “having a Maccas cup full of coke thrown from a car at Coogee beach while someone inside it shouted ‘Happy Australia Day, you ranga c*nt’”.

(1972-PRESENT) GERI HALLIWELL

Ginger Spice flew the flag for selfconfidence, coralhaired sexiness and girl power as a new millennium loomed.

It seems the response red hair elicits largely depends on the gender of its owner. However, males will continue to fight the red corner. Prince Harry and his carrot-topped army have helped promote a reputation of redheads as good-natured and self-deprecating. For Elliot Brennan, these figures have held some influence. “I know there’s a lot of love out there for them and that’s never bad. I know bullying of redheads used to be a lot worse. So maybe I’ve blindly benefitted,” he says. While their hair colour is often a negative sticking point for redheads, Brennan undertakes a more positive attitude towards his locks. “I love it [having red hair]. I wouldn’t have it any other way,” he says. It’s often thought by the public that redheads will gradually decline in their recurrence from here on in, until they go the way of dodos and triple j’s street cred in about fifty years’ time. However, experts dismiss this theory. The ginger hair gene is recessive and dormant, meaning that it can skip multiple generations before popping up unannounced so you’ll be seeing red for a while yet.

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ISSUE 02 WHEN I GROW UP

WHEN I GROW UP I Want to Be... A Prison Psychiatrist E

ach month BULL sits down with people whose careers took the road less travelled. This time we found a woman whose psychiatry degree took her somewhere she didn’t expect – into the heart of one of Australia’s most secure prisons. Here’s what she had to say about redemption, addiction, and paper clips. SO, HOW’D YOU GET YOUR JOB? I’d been a psychiatrist for a while when a friend saw an opening in the prison system. I’ve always been interested in a challenge and in the real-world applications of mental health. A lot of people have this perception that psychiatry is for these post-divorce mums who want antidepressants or for over-prescribed teenagers whose parents don’t know how to deal with their son taking ballet, and it really appealed to me to be able to have something feel straight away like it would make a difference. AND WAS IT ANYTHING LIKE YOU EXPECTED? No. Not even a bit. I think normal psychiatric practice exists on a spectrum, and prison psychiatry grabs both ends of the spectrum and yanks them. So when you do something right and you get to see an inmate really develop

and overcome some deep-seated problems, problems that are hard for anyone to deal with, like childhood abuse or addiction or something like anger management, it’s twice as rewarding. But then the bad stuff is twice as punishing, you see some really awful suicide attempts and some people who’ve been let down by the system their whole lives. WHAT’S THE BIGGEST DIFFERENCE BETWEEN PRISONPSYCHIATRY AND YOUR FORMER JOB? Oh god, there’s so many. One would definitely be the attitude of the people receiving care. Outside prison, in hospitals or in serious rehabilitation clinics, people have often found themselves facing care because of their families or because something unexpected has happened to bring their illness to a head. The point is there’s often an initial reluctance to interact with their psychiatrist in a helpful way. AND WHY’S THAT DIFFERENT TO PRISON? Oh it’s totally different in prisons. Often seeing the psychiatrist – even if it’s in hospital – is a relief, it’s a way to break the routine. That’s why you’ll see inmates regularly doing things like swallowing paper clips in the middle of the night to get out of their cell, or away from other inmates giving them a hard time. That’s a step up for them. That’s really unlike outside. ARE THERE ANY FUNDAMENTAL DIFFERENCES ABOUT THE PEOPLE, OR IS IT JUST IN THEIR ATTITUDE TOWARDS THERAPY? It’s kind of both. I mean I think people are broadly speaking the same, but you do notice a different distribution of stories inside. Addiction is concentrated much more highly, and there’s a disproportionately high indigenous population. I try not to think about that for too long at a time. It’s my job to help people once they arrive, not get mired in why they come to us to begin with. OBVIOUSLY YOU CAN’T DISCLOSE ANYTHING ABOUT SPECIFIC CASES, BUT ARE THERE ANY MAJOR DIFFERENCES ABOUT YOUR ACTUAL WORK, OR IS THERAPY THE SAME WHEREVER IT HAPPENS? Disorders don’t discriminate. Depression can happen to anyone, inside or out, and the strategies for coping are different person to person, but not different either side of the prison wall. There’s a slightly different distribution of disorders, what’s comparatively rare in the general population like schizophrenia is much more common in the prison population. It’s also quite a good professional challenge to have to work within the confines of prison life. The people I’m dealing with don’t have the same

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flexibility with their routines as you’d be able to assume ordinarily. So we have to approach things like exercise differently because of the time constraints. And it’s slower to say to recovering alcoholics “consider rebuilding your relationships” because structurally their family could be a day’s drive away. WHAT’S SOMETHING YOU LEARNED ON THE JOB? I have to factor in things like suspicion much more now. Sometimes faking disorders is a way to get time away from a cell or, in more serious cases, reduce a sentence by proving diminished culpability. AND WHAT’S THE MOST REWARDING? Because you get to see the greatest lows and biggest challenges for someone with a mental illness to be dealing with, you also get to see and be inspired by the depths of redemption. Every day we get to see a family forgive and heal or somebody find a way to manage a condition that might have been undermining them their whole lives.

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BULL USUONLINE.COM FOOD & BOOZE

FOOD & BOOZE Organic & Ethical Eats DIANA PHAM LEARNS HOW TO BE A SUSTAINABLE TIGHT-ASS.

oing organic can take a toll on your wallet, while words like ‘quinoa’, ‘acai berries’ and ‘goji juice’ are uncomfortably far from dietary vocab that doesn’t get more exotic than ‘mi goreng’. But what if you could conscientiously eat on the cheap and not go out of your way to do it?

Food cooperatives are an alternative to supermarkets that offer ethical produce at prices even students can afford. Prices are kept low through a variety of initiatives like buying foods in bulk directly from farmers at wholesale prices and relying on volunteers to keep it running. Check out these food co-ops around Sydney:

RAW VEGAN CHEESECAKE CRUST

• 1 cup almond/hazelnut meal • 1 cup pitted dates, soaked in hot water for 10-15 minutes • 1/4 cup coconut flakes. This can be replaced with 1/4 cup of linseed for nuttier flavour

FILLING

ALFALFA HOUSE

113 Enmore Rd, Enmore t: 9519 3374

One of the biggest and best co-ops in town, Alfalfa House has been around for more than 25 years. You don’t have to wait for box day to get fresh veggies and there’s a wide range available every day as well as a huge selection of grains, nuts, beans and anything else that can be dried. There’s also a range of boutique cheeses, oils, seeds, cacao nibs and other snack foods. The store also offers natural hygiene products like soaps, mint toothpaste, shampoo and conditioner. Alfalfa does weekly fruit and veggie boxes at $25 each for their members, picked up on Sundays. Shoppers are encouraged to bring their own containers and bags to help reduce waste. Membership fees are $20 per year. Both Alfalfa House members and food co-op members get 10 per cent off all their shopping. Open: Mon – Wed; 11am to 7pm, Thur; 11am to 8pm, Sat; 9am to 6pm, Sun; 11am to 6pm.

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THOUGHTFUL FOODS

Shop G05c, Roundhouse Lower Campus, University of New South Wales t: 9385 6097

Thoughtful Foods is one of the larger university food co-op shops around town.You can expect to see the usual suspects like canned food, gluten-free pastries and selfhygiene products. They also offer a vast amount of dried goods and imported organic seeds and spices from Egyptian coriander seeds to sweet paprika sourced from Spain. They also have one of the largest organic tea selections you can drink on the spot café-style. For 50 cents you can chill with a cup of tea in front of the store where they have a nice makeshift table made of milk crates. Fruit and veggie boxes are $20 and are collected on Thursdays. Membership fees are $15 per year. Members also get the option to buy a share of the co-op for $10, which is refundable if you decide to opt out. Open: Mon – Wed; 10am to 4.30pm, Thur; 9am to 7pm, Sat; 10am to 4.30pm.

THE UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY FOOD CO-OP

Level 4, Wentworth Building corner of City Rd and Butlin Avenue t: 9563 6059

Like the Broadway Food Coop, the USYD branch is small with around 60 members. It has a nifty little space in the Wentworth Building that stock basic dry ingredients from spices to grains and natural household cleaning products. However, for this semester, the food co-op has extended their stock with some delicious snacks like popcorn, fava and chick nuts, coconut and date roles, sesame bars and Inca berries. The USYD co-op crew also does fruit and veggie boxes from $12.50 to $50. Orders must be made before Tuesday afternoon to be picked up on Wednesday or Thursday. Lifetime membership is $10, which is pretty cheap considering other co-ops charge on a per year basis. Members also get 15 per cent off their shopping.

• 3 cups raw cashew, soaked for 2-3 hours • Juice of 2 lemons • 1 teaspoon of lemon zest • 3/4 cup of raw honey (or agave syrup if you’re a strict vegan) • 3/4 cup virgin coconut oil, melted • 1/4 cup of goji berries • 1/4-1/2 cup of water

METHOD

• Using a food processor, mix the crust ingredients until they form a dough • Press the dough onto the bottom of springform pan to form the cheesecake base • Blend all the filling ingredients, except the goji berries, in the food processor until creamy • Pour the 2/3 mixture onto the crust in the pan, and mix the remaining 1/3 with the goji berries and pour on top. Let it set in the fridge for an hour. Refrigerate until serving

Open: Mon – Fri; 10am to 5pm.

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ISSUE 02 TRAVEL

NEW YORK

The Big Apple LANE SAINTY ENJOYED BEING ONE SMALL PERSON IN A BIG, BIG CITY.

ew York was the best city I’ve ever been lost in. There’s something incredibly exhilarating about being an unimportant speck among millions of people going about their day-to-day routine. There’s nothing like the utter freedom that comes with the anonymity of wandering around a city that is not your own, in a country that is not your own. And New York has a buzz like no place I’ve ever visited before. There’s a number of staples in the essential New York experience, such as the Statue of Liberty, Times Square, the Empire State Building and Central Park. These are all well worth visiting, along with the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Museum of Modern Art. However, there’s also much to be gained by exploring NYC in as many different ways as you can.

HARLEM

Forget the bad press – you need to visit Harlem. It’s a fascinating suburb with a lot to offer regarding African American culture in New York. If you’re unsure where to start, a walking tour of the district is a great way to become acquainted with the various landmarks. Go to Sylvia’s Restaurant for some of the best southern soul food in NYC and sample the corn bread and candied yams. In Harlem lies the Abyssinian Baptist Church, the heart of gospel music in the area. It’s a huge church, on the corner of W 138th and 7th, and the Sunday services attract a line that stretches around the block. Their Wednesday night service is shorter, less packed and much more suitable for tourists. The gospel choir at this church is second to none, and can be appreciated by the religious and non-religious alike. It’s a wonderful insight into the Harlem community.

BROADWAY

For lovers of musical theatre, it’s hard to go past Broadway. Don’t just stop at the flashing billboards in Times Square – if you can, get in and actually see a show. Currently

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the hottest thing on Broadway is The Book of Mormon, an incredibly clever show that provokes thought about privilege and piety via great musical numbers and dance routines. It’s hard to pick badly on Broadway – whether it’s a tried and true classic like The Lion King or a smaller show like Disney’s Newsies show you won’t be disappointed. The downside is that seeing a show is expensive, particularly for students travelling on a budget. However, with perseverance and a bit of luck, it’s possible to get cheap tickets to even the most highly sought after shows. Ask at the box office about ticket lotteries, where you go in the draw to win a cheaper ticket on the day, or standing tickets, also sold on the day, where you stand at the back and watch the show.

it everywhere. It’s the easiest way to get around, especially considering that it avoids NYC traffic. Like New York itself, the subway attracts a ridiculously diverse cross-section of people, making it the perfect activity for those who like to ‘people watch’. Events like ‘No Pants on the Subway Day’ and a lively procession of buskers only add to the NYC subway experience. It might not take you right to the door of your destination like a cab will, but the extra walk through parts of the city is by no means a negative.

TREAT YO’SELF

Acknowledge that you probably won’t see it all. Do some research, figure out what you’re interested in, and tailor your visit to what you want to see. If you’re a Sinophile, head to New York’s huge Chinatown for some cheap and tasty fare (pro tip: Vanessa’s Dumplings on Eldridge Street do delicious dumplings that are four for one dollar). If you’re after good coffee and bagels with organic fillings, or you just miss King Street,

VANESSA’S DUMPLINGS ON ELDRIDGE STREET DO DELICIOUS DUMPLINGS THAT ARE FOUR FOR ONE DOLLAR.

head to Brooklyn’s Williamsburg for all the hipster culture you need. If you’re interested in the queer rights movement, make a pilgrimage to the original Stonewall Hotel and sit in the park across the road, soaking up the gay liberation history around you.

GET LOST

Set time aside for aimless wandering.You don’t have to be standing inside a museum or tourist attraction to have fun in New York. Hit the pavement and give yourself time to get distracted, go to places you didn’t know existed and soak in the big city vibe. Best of all, you can wander at any time of the day or night (keeping safety in mind, of course) and still find something going on. They don’t call it ‘the city that never sleeps’ for nothing.

THE SUBWAY

Like the London Underground, the NYC subway is an experience in itself. Catch it often, catch

TRAVEL 15/03/13 2:44 PM

BULL USUONLINE.COM.AU CAMPUS CHATTER

CAMPUS CHATTER TO THE BLONDE GIRL IN PSYC1001,

I’M NOT A STALKER, BUT... TO THE JACKHAMMER GUY FROM THE USU HARLEM SHAKE, You can pound my ground anytime. Needs Renovations TO THE SHY GUY AT THE SHADES STALL IN O-WEEK, I know your society is for queer and queer-friendly people – but please tell me you’re the former. 50 Shades of Gay

I found your Facebook profile and while I was going through your photos I accidentally ‘liked’ one from 2008. I really hope you don’t know my name. Actually A Stalker

TO THE GIRL WHO DROPPED HER WALLET OUTSIDE BOSCH, Your licence photo is super cute. Also, I have your wallet. Have coffee with me and you’ll get it back. Blackmailer TO EVERYBODY STUDYING IN THE LIBRARY IN WEEK ONE, Why are you here? Go and drink like a real uni student. Confused Postgrad

HEY YOU!

SOMEONE YOU WANT TO WOO AND/OR PASSIVELYAGGRESSIVELY COMPLAIN ABOUT? SEND US YOUR STALKER MESSAGES: USUBULLMAG@ GMAIL.COM

TO THE RANDOM PERSON I HUGGED ON EASTERN AVENUE, I actually mistook you for somebody else, but thanks for pretending to know me anyway. Grateful

TO THE AUTOMATIC DOORS AT TASTE, Why don’t you open for me? Was it something I said? Under-the-radar TO THE GIRL IN FISHER, You looked straight into my eyes, a playful smile on your lips.You were tall, blonde, frozen, and naked. Someone had put porn on the large screens again. Awkwardly mistaken TO GODOT, Still here! Estragon and Vladimir TO ANTONIA, I saw you while floating over the campus in a hot air balloon. From where I stood, you looked like an ant.You looked beautiful. When I landed, I ran to find you, and I was right.You were an ant. Anthony TO SYDNEY UNI SCABWATCH, I do like a mysterious stranger. Let’s meet up for coffee sometime and I’ll plan your revolution. Alex McKinnon

VOX POPS QUESTION WHAT’S YOUR FAVOURITE INTERNET TIME-WASTER?

SOPHIE RAY

JOSH HAN

MyLifeIsAverage.com. It makes me feel better about my life.

Mainly Facebook and the Sydney Morning Herald website. I like to convince myself that I’m being constructive!

BPESS I

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ARTS/MUSIC V

BRIDGET HABERECHT ARTS/SOCIAL WORK I

Looking up holidays that I’ll never be able to afford to go on.

15/03/13 2:44 PM

ISSUE 02 CAMPUS CHATTER

PLEASE, HAVE A COW GOT BEEF WITH SOMETHING? SPILL YOUR GUTS IN 300 WORDS OR LESS TO USUBULLMAG@ GMAIL.COM

MARIANA PODESTA-DIVERIO DOESN’T LIKE YOU, COOPER’S RED DRINKER.

If you’ve ever found yourself in the company of a Coopers Sparkling drinker, you’ve undoubtedly had to shield your nose from the horrors that emerge in the form of the most sinister form of beer belch: that of Coopers Sparkling. Few beers incite purposeful shaking to eliminate (or at least tone down) carbonation, but Coopers Sparkling longnecks warrant a good throttle to bring the beer’s bubbliness down to a palatable level. If its personality was as bubbly as its consistency purports, it would indeed make

for a good friendship. Alas, what it lacks in flavour is not made up for in amicability. My first clash with Sparkling came due to the unavailability of my preferred Coopers Pale Ale (green label), which is renowned for its smooth texture and cloudy, full-bodied flow (what a sexy beer Pale is). I found myself bewildered one sip into the bottleneck, with no other option but to re-seal it as best I could and start shaking. I maintain that a better-tasting brew would not have induced this moronic behaviour.You may have met apologists of Sparkling that raise the age-old “But, der, it has a higher alcohol content

BEC BARRETT FIGHTS FOR FEY

GRACE O’NEILL GIVES LENA DUNHAM THE NOD

At only 26, writer, director, and star Lena Dunham has immediately made a striking impact on the way women are portrayed in popular culture, creating and bringing to life an array of women who are not afraid to be emotionally and physically flawed. In a totally refreshing change to the Manolo Blahnik fantasy created by Sex and the City, Girls focuses on the very real problems faced by girls graduating amidst a financial recession, with each character struggling with financial insecurity and the paradox of searing career ambition and a blatant lack of available work. Even the relationships in the show demonstrate a completely new dating climate (which has been defined by many as the ‘post-dating era’) where traditional notions of love are abandoned, sex is a choice and “dating is for lesbians”. Perhaps most importantly however is the overly hyped decision made by Dunham to appear fully naked in her love scenes. In an era where beauty is signified by Victoria’s Secret shows, Dunham’s choice to parade her supposedly ‘imperfect’ body is an inspiration to women everywhere who need to see a relatable and normal woman undressed on television. Dunham demonstrates a real, lived understanding of the modern woman, creating a show that simply and hilariously defines a new era of women in a completely revolutionary way.

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than Pale Ale” argument. This response should be met with a reassessment of your conversation with this beer-illiterate fool. The red label does well to warn off potential customers that may be drawn to Pale Ale’s ugly cousin. In the natural world, red is seen as a threatening colour. It helps that this has been evoked by Coopers for their Sparkling Ale bottle labels. Perhaps it’s a subtle attempt to warn off naysayers of harsher brews who’d do best to opt for Pale Ale. It’s readily available, less salty, and will guarantee a more pleasant kind of dinner conversation untainted by the Sinister Sparkling Belch.

FEY

DUNHAM When Hannah Horvath burst into her parents’ hotel bedroom in an opium induced state and professed: “I think I am the voice of my generation, or maybe a voice of a generation” in the pilot of the hit HBO series Girls, she unknowingly spoke a resounding truth.

LOCKING HORNS DISPUTED: WHO BETTER UNDERSTANDS WOMEN?

Let’s get this out of the way to begin with: yes, Girls is ground breaking TV. Yes, Lena Dunham really ‘gets’ young folk. But when it comes to understanding women? Give me Tina Fey. Girls is undeniably significant for the insight it provides into the lives of 20-somethings but Tina Fey casts a light on women as a whole. Girls has women wondering whether they’re a ‘Hannah’, a ‘Jessa’, a ‘Shoshannah’ or, god forbid, a ‘Marnie’, but we all immediately knew we were a Liz Lemon. I don’t want to be naked on TV. I do want a sandwich. That’s the understanding Tina Fey brought to 30 Rock. Her ‘trying to have it all’ schtick spoke to the angst of modern women trying to balance their careers, families and mentorships with Alec Baldwin. 30 Rock’s women are diverse – from the no-nonsense Liz to the tyrannical Jenna to an inspired guest appearance by Condi Rice. And she’sbacked that up with genuine glass-ceiling-breaking in real life, when she became the first female head writer for SNL. Tina Fey understands how to fight. She answered the question ‘can women be funny?’ in the affirmative every week for seven years, with a kickass memoir to back it up. Her best friend is Amy Poehler. Don’t you wish your best friend was Amy Poehler? But don’t take my word for it – ask Dunham. When she took to the stage at the Golden Globes, she thanked Tina Fey for making TV that got her through middle school and supported her such that she felt comfortable to begin producing Girls. See – even Lena admits it – Tina just gets it.

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BULL USUONLINE.COM FEATURE

PICKING

UP AND

PUTTING

DOWN

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15/03/13 2:44 PM

ISSUE 02 FEATURE

ELEANOR GORDON-SMITH FINDS OUT HOW NEGGING CAN LEAD TO K-CLOSING.

‘‘I

’d sort of fight her, hold her down. Pick her up and throw her on the bed, straddle her, pin her hands above her head.You have to remind her that you’re dominant. That stuff only gets messed up when the girl’s already been raped.”

It’s a Wednesday afternoon and Kevin* is explaining how he’d overcome “last minute resistance” from a girl he’d taken home. Kevin is one of an emerging community of self-titled ‘Pick Up Artists’ (PUAs) who have developed an arsenal of strategies to help each other pick up women. Last minute resistance (LMR) is one in a series of military-grade jargon-terms adopted by the PUA community to describe the behaviour and nature of women in the crosshairs. Pick Up Artistry isn’t new. Guys like Kevin have been united by their desire to meet women since networks were a thing, and “how to pick up women” has been the most reliably bestselling theme of self-help books since the boom in therapy you could buy at Borders.

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What’s new about PUAs as a community is their unity. They coagulate around pseudonymous gurus like Mystery or Style and hone each other’s ‘game’ in online forums and real life bars. By and large, they agree on key strategies and on how to conceptualise the pick-up. They have standardised seduction. Kevin got on to Pick Up Artistry when he was in late high school and didn’t have a date to his formal. He started by reading Neil Strauss’s The Game: Penetrating the Secret Society of Pickup Artists, which has garnered a reputation as the bible for would-be pick up artists. It’s an allusion Strauss’s publishers have leaned into; later editions of The Game featured gilt-edged pages and embossed gold letters on the red-lined leather cover, a fairly self conscious allusion to the Thompson Bible. Strauss wrote The Game after leaving The NewYork Times. It chronicles his experiences infiltrating the seduction community, how he was taken under the wing of pick up guru ‘Mystery’ and what he learned. The book was a bestseller, Strauss was a

celebrity, and Kevin trusted him because he hit on Britney Spears and Jessica Alba. Strauss thinks of ‘gaming’ as a natural expression of a human desire to connect, and of his teachings as ways for people with selfesteem issues to meet interesting people. He resents that the community has been hijacked by – and perceived as – weird guys with sharp goatees and fuzzy morals. And it’s not just about sleeping with women. Strauss was happily settled by the time he was on Jimmy Kimmel’s show and has dispensed advice about how to slide into a relationship, or heal a rift with an ex. So, what does Strauss tell guys like Kevin to do? The answers are buried in endless sequels and spinoffs, the bowels of the Internet, and bootcamps and workshops with price tags in the thousands. There are a few standouts though. ‘Peacocking’ refers to the act of wearing something deliberately peculiar to attract attention and start conversations. If you know a guy who wears a fedora to uni and a cummerbund to clubs, he’s peacocking and he knows it. ‘Openers’ are a mathematically precise art that non-PUAs would know as “going up to somebody and saying something”. PUAs share lists of openers online and compare their success rate. Maurice*, a second-year who has dabbled in the PUA forums, shows me a post where a dozen contributors laud the suggestion of going up to a woman and thrusting your penis towards her while hissing “precious likes it… precious wants it”. Like Gollum. I don’t get it either.

MAURICE SHOWS ME A POST WHERE CONTRIBUTORS LAUD THE SUGGESTION OF GOING UP TO A WOMAN AND THRUSTING YOUR PENIS TOWARDS HER WHILE HISSING “PRECIOUS LIKES IT… PRECIOUS WANTS IT”.

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BULL USUONLINE.COM FEATURE

A lot of the material in PUA forums is geared towards ‘sealing’ – sleeping with the woman in question.

SECRET LANGUAGE OF SEDUCTION Pick Up Artists use slang and acronyms with a frequency that would alarm the military. Here’s your rough PUA dictionary:

THE HB RATING SYSTEM

“THE TARGET IS AN HB9” “Hot babe” or “honey bunny” depending on who you ask. The number is a simple 1-10 scale.

SARGING

‘Negging’ has had a peculiar amount of media reclaim with Tarantino-esque abandon. attention for what it is; it’s what primary school Every community, particularly an Internetcounsellors would call a put-down. Gurus are based sex-centric one, is likely to have loony keen to clarify; the neg is a finely balanced thing, molluscs clinging to its edges. A prominent pick it should only be used on women who are “a 9 up artist in the Bay Area, Jeff “Jeffy” Allen, was or a 10” and it’s a backhanded compliment not recently outed by Jezabel for referring to his car a bare-faced insult. as “a rape van”. But we judge communities by I ask Maurice to neg me. He says it won’t how they deal with the fringe. Are their faults be the same because he’s not actually trying to exacerbated or alleviated by participating in the game me, but clears his throat obligingly and community? Are misogynists eased into dealing stares briefly into middle distance as he gets with women or are their views inflamed in a into character. After emerging from his NIDA global echo chamber? revelry he turns to me and says “is that your One of the biggest issues is consent. A lot of natural hair colour?”. I tell him it is because it is. the material in PUA forums is geared towards “Oh,” he says, deflating like a sad balloon, ‘sealing’ – sleeping with the woman in question. “I was going to be all ‘you mean you dyed it That means overcoming anything she does to that colour?’” resist. Kevin’s “hold her down” strategy is meant He comes in for round two, looks at my to overcome Last Minute Resistance, which is thigh and exclaims “hey you stopped working what non-PUAs know as “she’s in my bed but out! I like it when women seem real”. I’m she’s saying no”. I think Kevin imagines it’s surprised by how much it stings even though I clear that he’s talking about a pantomime-fight, have never in my life wanted Maurice’s approval. a playful roughhousing with a giggling woman, It’s easy to see how feminist commentators but I wonder about how it would feel to have the have condemned the PUA community. It’s a weight of a man on top of you after having said peculiarly clinical approach to dealing with other “no” once, and his choice of phrasing about her humans and a lot of the subtleties of Strauss’s “already” having been raped unsettles me. methods are lost on the perhaps-unsurprising It’s worth noting that nobody in the PUA anonymous e-misogynists who refer to negs as a community, at least nobody willing to sign their way to “break down the bitch shield” and throw name, advocates having sex with a woman around the slurs feminists have been trying to despite her “no”. It’s about ways to erode her “no” and ultimately convert it to a “yes”. This comes from a belief that the woman’s original “no” is not a faithful expression of her feeling but a last-minute flash of guilt in response to societal conditioning that tells her to fear sleeping with a Bootcamp with Magic......... $2,393.00 man because of pregnancy, emotional rejection, Copy of The Game.........................$19.79 or societal stigma – or as Kevin puts it, “she Entry to the Ivy........................................... $20 doesn’t want to be a slut”. 4 drinks.............................................................$32 The law acknowledges that a woman has Taxi ride............................................................ $20 the right to change her mind as many times as Feather Boa................................................. $18 she likes, from yes to no and back again. But Glitter Watch.............................................. $50 the PUA’s understanding of LMR is one that TOTAL $2552.79 struggles to deal with the concept of a legitimate “no”. It says that “no” rarely means “no”, or as one poster put it: “the truth is even that little

HOW MUCH WILL IT COST YOU TO BE A PUA FOR A WEEK?

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Going into the real world to try to meet women.

GAME

Picking up with PUA informed strategy. Both noun and transitive verb; “how’s your game?” “I hate gaming drunk chicks” .

F-CLOSING

Having sex with the ‘target.’ The final form of closing after #-closing (getting a phone number) and k-closing (getting a kiss).

LAIR

A group of PUAs, either online or in real life.

prude teacher wished there were times when she said “no”, that a stronger man would have figured out a classy way to lower her social guards”. It’s one that believes a “no” can be whittled away with persistence. In a culture where date rapes are seldom reported and an overwhelming proportion of surveyed rapists felt “entitled” to sex, it’s easy to be apprehensive about anything that doesn’t treat a “no” as absolute. Brigid Dixon, VicePresident of the University of Sydney Union and former chair of UN Women Sydney, says considerations of consent need to focus on the experience of the person experiencing the advance, and “if the perspective of the person who is the target of the sexual advance is omitted, then we’re taking a step backwards and creating a dangerous precedent and unhealthy social interactions”. Notably, few of the PUA suggestions for dealing with LMR include “accept it, and sleep on the couch”. It’s a few days after Kevin tells me about how he’d hold down a woman who’d said “no” to him once, and it’s still playing on my mind, so I ring Maurice and mention it to him. He makes a grimace sound. “Yeah,” he says, “I’m not so sure about those guys these days. It feels like they’re more interested in studying women than they are in talking to any.” * Names changed to protect identity

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Intuitive Touch

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BULL USUONLINE.COM FEATURE

ASHLING LEE ADMIRES HER OWN REFLECTION.

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ISSUE 02 FEATURE

ne of my favourite movie moments is when Viola Davis in The Help says to little Mae Mobley, “You is kind, you is smart, you is important”. The scene is heart-warming, portraying a child starved of parental affection finally hearing kind, empowering words from her carer Davis. Children deserve to grow up with a sense of confidence and security, and it is the duty of parents and carers to enable this esteem to flourish.

However, there is a fine balance between too much praise, and not enough. The last few decades have given rise to the ‘self-esteem movement’ where parents lavish unearned praise on their kids who then grow up believing they are perfect. It has produced a profound sense of entitlement in many individuals, and led to a culture where everyone’s a winner. Take a look at Lance Armstrong. Cancer victim and seven times Tour de France champion, he wasn’t just a winner, but a true ‘survivor’, a hero. His guilty admission to using performance-enhancing drugs throughout his career confirmed the worst kept secret of the sporting world. Armstrong’s confession also revealed a stark egotism, arrogance and an indifference to others. As he told Oprah, “Yes, I was a bully. I was a bully in the sense that I tried to control the narrative and if I didn’t like what someone said I turned on them.” In an effort to understand his actions, many have associated Armstrong with a condition called Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD). In itself, narcissism is nothing new to most people. Often used with negative implications, it describes personalities with excessive selfcentredness, vanity and self-admiration. The name has its origins in Greek mythology from the proud hunter Narcissus, whose love of himself ultimately caused his death. Dr Genevieve Milnes is a clinical psychologist and the National Clinical Director of Psychology Australia. She says “NPD is characterised by a persistent pattern of grandiosity, need for admiration and lack of empathy that begins in early childhood.” According to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, patients are commonly diagnosed against a set of nine characteristics (see breakout box). Dr Milnes cautions that many individuals can exhibit narcissistic traits but don’t actually

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have the disorder. “A person would need to satisfy five out of the nine criteria to receive the label of NPD. Any person can have less than five of these quite serious characteristics without being labelled as having NPD.” In romantic relationships, NPD is a highly destructive force. In a book titled Divorcing A Narcissist: One Mom’s Battle, author Tina Swithin details her ten year relationship with now exhusband, whom she discovered suffered from NPD. Her account is compellingly personal, with what began as a fairy-tale relationship eventually leading to a divorce involving a four year custody battle for her daughters in the family court system. On the line from her home in San Luis Obispo, California, she tells me openly about the early days of her marriage: “It was like a storybook, he was so nice…flowers, dinners, the courtship was amazing.” She cautions young people to look into things that seem too good to be true. “I saw red flags and I ignored them. They were there pretty early on, and I kind of just wanted to believe the best in him, because that’s how I am with anyone.” She also stresses the importance of using “borrowed judgement” from a trusted support circle. “Ask other people, ask your friends, ask your family members what they thought. Part of the problem was that I saw these issues with him, but I didn’t tell anyone about them.” Outside of romance, narcissists leave a trail of destructive relationships behind them in other facets of life too, such as the workforce. “For years, [this] was his quarter. And anytime he had a disagreement with somebody, employees – he sued one of our employees – I always believed his version of the story because it was in my best interest to support him,” Swithin says. However, a common denominator soon became apparent as familial relationships suffered. “He ended up

stealing from his own family members, his own parents… his younger brother.” I’m not surprised as we suddenly find ourselves talking about Lance Armstrong, someone who, ironically, her ex-husband worshipped. “Now that I do know about this disorder and the general public has been educated about it through Lance Armstrong, it just shows what a narcissist is truly capable of. This wasn’t just a few people, he didn’t just fool his wife, he fooled millions of people around the world and kept going for many, many years.” Lying, reckless living at the expense of others, and a chilling desire to win at all costs begs the question: how does the narcissist come into being? According to Dr Milnes, “In my experience, it comes through indulgent parenting whereby parents give their children everything and don’t give consequences for bad behaviours. These children learn that they can get what they want by using people, in the first instance their parents.” Swithin thinks that in her case, it was genetic – her ex-husband took after his father. “He was constantly told that he was the best. Their family was the best. Any issues that the family had were hidden from the public and they really went over their way to uphold this image.” It seems that everything about the modern era is fuelling narcissism. The internet, social media, celebrity culture, and personality politics have all played a part in ensuring that the transformation in consciousness is not unwarranted. A simple Google search will produce numerous studies comparing Gen

“HE WAS CONSTANTLY TOLD THAT HE WAS THE BEST. THEIR FAMILY WAS THE BEST. ANY ISSUES THAT THE FAMILY HAD WERE HIDDEN FROM THE PUBLIC AND THEY REALLY WENT OVER THEIR WAY TO UPHOLD THIS IMAGE.”

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BULL USUONLINE.COM FEATURE

“Narcissists are usually totally self-engrossed or egocentric and cannot identify with others. One hundred per-cent egocentric behaviour works against the fabric of society.”

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Y’s narcissistic tendencies with preceding generations. One of the most famous is that of psychologist and author Jean Twenge from San Diego State University. In her study of survey data spanning over 47 years and answered by over nine million students, it was found that there were greater levels of individualism and self-focus in today’s young generation, or ‘millennials’. The data was nationally representative in that it compared over three generations worth of young people at the same age. So where does one draw the line between healthy self-interest and narcissism? “Narcissists are usually totally self-engrossed or egocentric and cannot identify with others. One hundred per cent egocentric behaviour works against the fabric of society,” says Dr Milnes. They are also able to recognise and label their behaviours. “In my experience, what a narcissist does works for a narcissist and therefore they are very unwilling to change. They would prefer to hang out with compliant people rather than change their behaviours.” This stubbornness has resulted in the increasing medicalisation of NPD, which according to Dr Milnes, “at least gives the patient and everyone else around them a break.” Treatment usually endeavours to challenge the patient’s behaviours, being confrontational in identifying the characteristics and working on opposites such as humility and honesty, one by one. Despite this, it is a disorder which has seen low success treatment rates. “I have had rare successes with NPD. Those who come through are usually humble enough to want to change their behaviours.” For those who may potentially be dealing with someone with NPD, she advises going to a GP as a first point of contact, who can then refer patients onto a psychologist to work on behaviours and attitudes. “Partners may [also] need help to stop being victims.”

Indeed, the ability to recognise the disorder early has the potential to minimise its negative effects. “If I would’ve had even an inkling about this disorder, I could’ve saved myself years of heartache,” Swithin recalls. Today, she is both renewed and empowered, the custody-battle and divorce process having inspired a desire to bring about change in the family court system, where judges have little to no education about the disorder and are often fooled by the charm of narcissists. “Children are suffering because of that,” she says. Although Dr Milnes believes “narcissism appears to be on the rise as the population expands,” NPD itself is relatively new to the public. Swithin herself is learning every day about the power in which education about the disorder can bring. “I’ve talked to women who have been married for 20 years, they read my blog and say, ‘Oh my gosh, this is my husband’… it helps them tremendously through the divorce process.” Being educated early too, is crucial. All too aware of the consequences of unchecked NPD, Swithin teaches her daughters the importance of thinking outside of themselves. “Just this morning I asked them, tell me two things that you could do today that are kind.”

THE 9 CHARACTERISTICS OF NARCISSISTIC PERSONALITY DISORDER 1. Grandiose sense of self-importance 2. Sense of entitlement 3. Admires self and requires other to admire them 4. Preoccupation with fantasies of success, power and beauty 5. Takes advantage of others for personal ends 6. Believes that they are special and unique 7. Lacks empathy 8. Envious of others or believes other are envious of them 9. Shows arrogant behaviours or attitudes

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ISSUE 02 FASHION

Fresher Fashion KATE WILCOX IS FRESHER THAN THIS.

e all remember the kneequaking nerves of starting university and the questions that plagued us in the first weeks of first year: Will I make friends? Why is Bosch so far away from everything? And what do Arts students actually do? On top of this is the fear of committing the worst possible crime, Not Fitting In. Which means that for some first years fashion becomes a big concern, taking up far too much time and brain space. Ironically this concern with picking the right clothes to fit in can lead to first years marking themselves out as new to uni with a too-studied, trying-too-hard look. Here is BULL’s advice to freshers: high heels are not necessary, wearing thongs is fine, and follow Chanel’s supremely useful advice: “Before leaving the house, a lady should stop, look in the mirror, and remove one piece of jewellery.” Or for some first years, remove the hat, the fake glasses, the belt, the crocheted vest, the suspenders or the headband. You don’t need them all. These are three first-years that got it right.

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JESS XIAO ARTS I

ACCOUNTING I

HARRY ZHENG

ZAINA AHMEND

Dress: Myer. Hat: Dangerfield. Glasses: Ray bans. Shoes: Markets in France. What do you imagine will be your fashion style for uni? Effortless. I don’t plan my outfits, it’s a spur of the moment thing. Favourite shop? ASOS for midi dresses. Style icon? I love the 50s era housewife look, I’m keen to bring that to campus. What do you think of fashion on campus so far? There’s a wide array of fashion. Each to their own, I think, it doesn’t really matter as long as you’re comfortable.

Shirt: Some shop near my hometown in the province of Anhui in China. Jeans: Same shop. Shoes: Nike. Jade pendant: It’s really important to me. I wear it almost all the time. It gives you good luck. Where did you get it from? My mum gave it to me. Is there a difference between Chinese and Australian style? Yes! Australian style is more easy, simple and casual.

Shirt: Courtesy of Women’s College, I have to wear it all week with a few exceptions, like they let us take it off for a formal dinner. Shirt decorations: Paint got thrown on us, but we can’t take our shirts off, so it’s still there, and we have nicknames on our shirts that seniors came up with. Mine is ‘Peanut’, I’m not really sure why. Shorts: Market in the Phillippines. What do you think your average uni outfit will be? I brought a bunch of clothes over [when she moved to Sydney a few weeks ago] but it’s too hot to wear any of them, so I think I’ll mostly be wearing T-shirts and shorts.

SCIENCE/ARTS I

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BULL USUONLINE.COM SPORT

You ain’t seen nothing yet GEORDIE CRAWFORD.

SPORT & HEALTH START TAKING TECH BREAKS

1 MIN CHECK

1 MIN CHECK 15 MIN

1 MIN CHECK 20 MIN

Technology Addict THERESA GAVEN. Remember when we were told mobile phones and the Internet would ruin our health for good? That we would turn into perverted, socially inept, tumour-ridden freaks with failing eyesight and arthritic thumbs? Well, things aren’t that bad yet, but one health problem the doomsayers foretold has actually come to fruition – we’re addicted to our phones, and through them, addicted to the Internet. This may not be a revelation but has led to what world renowned technology addiction expert Dr Larry Rosen calls iDisorders. Rosen is a Professor of Psychology at California State University and is recognised as an international expert in the Psychology of Technology. “We have been studying this topic for a few years now and what we are seeing is that technology use does and can contribute to the development of symptoms of many psychological disorders,” he says.

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Video footage of a 12-year-old Aboriginal boy running the last leg of a 4x100 relay has gone viral. The clip shows James Gallaugher nearly 30 metres behind the leader when handed the baton. He finishes in first place. Gallaugher has a personal best time of 11.45 seconds. Rewind to the 1896 Athens Olympics, and American Thomas Burke claimed 100 metre gold in 12 seconds. Usain Bolt’s 2009 world record is 9.58 seconds. We have evolved only 2.42 seconds in 113 years. Of course, a second is an eternity in the world of sprinting. This stands contrary to the popular belief that sprinting relies on power alone. Admittedly, it is often hard to tell the difference between an elite sprinter and a WWE wrestler. But the 100 metres is just as much about finesse as fencing or darts. To run the perfect race, a sprinter must have the fast twitch muscle fibre of a professional pickpocket. At the London Olympics, Bolt had a reaction time of 0.165 seconds. The slowest of the field was 0.179 seconds. To paraphrase an old sports cliché, every millisecond counts. We cannot know what the limits of pace will be; what the 100 metre sprint in 50 years is clocked at is a mystery to us. Bolt may be an anomaly, combining height with power in an inimitable way. Speed is decided by stride length times stride pace. At 6ft 5in, Bolt’s stride is 1ft longer than his competitors. And it doesn’t take him any longer to make it. Eclipsing him and his record may take decades. That is, unless James Gaullagher has anything to say about it.

1 MIN CHECK 25 MIN

1 MIN CHECK 30 MIN

When the Bible of psychiatric disorders, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, is updated in May, it will contain for the first time ever Internet-Use Disorder as a mental condition. Rosen says that Internet and mobile phone addiction is just like any other addiction in terms of what is going on in the brain. People who are addicted get a hit of dopamine when they check a message, see that their status has been liked on Facebook, or check in to their inbox. And addicts can get “anxiety reactions” if they are not allowed to do this for any length of time. He advocates taking “tech breaks”, which slowly retrain your brain so it is no longer addicted to your phone or to the Internet. Rosen advises that when students sit down to study they check in with their virtual world for one minute, then turn off the phone and set an alarm to check it again in 15 minutes. “After a short time you can increase the focus time to 20 minutes and then 25 and 30, which usually is the maximum most people can do,” says Rosen.

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ISSUE 02 SCIENCE & TECH

SCIENCE & TECH

Ctrl

Alt

Del

Eating Disorder 2.0 ESTHA LEE STOMACHS SOME HASH-TAGS THAT DON’T MAKE HER HIGH.

ike ICQ and Friday jokes on forwarded email, proanorexic sites and forums were part of the fabric of the 1990s Internet. ‘Pro-ana’ and ‘pro-mia’ (pro-bulimia) fans promoted eating disorders as ‘lifestyle choices’ instead of illnesses, giving crash dieting tips and sharing images of twigthighed models.

Public pressure meant the worst of the pro-ana sites were leashed by hosting sites long ago, but now the images that used to accompany them have infested social media sites, along with thousands of new ones, often selfies. ‘Thinspiration’ (short for thin inspiration) is back – and social media sites are struggling to deal with the phenomenon. Photo-sharing sites like Tumblr and Pinterest have tried to manage hashtags like #thinspo, #ana, #mia and #suicide, often attached to accounts showing soft-filtered photos of girls (and the occasional guy) with jutting collarbones, concave stomachs and praying mantis like legs. Instragram has now followed suit, with new guidelines stating that topics or pictures that actively “promote or glorify self-harm” are banned. The service aims to enforce the ban by making the relevant hashtags unsearchable. However, the new guidelines seem to be an ineffective solution to the problem: #ana content is still searchable through webstagram, and users avoid detection through spelling changes like #thynspo or #thinspoo or variations of words like #proanatips #anorexicdiet #anorexicleg is still searchable by its 80 million users. National Communication Manager, Sarah Spence of The Butterfly Foundation, says they’re

overwhelmed by the impact of social media on eating disorders. “We find hashtags like ‘thinspiration’ on Instagram, Tumblr and other social networking sites to be quite destructive. The real danger in these sites is that it develops a community of people who are like-minded and encourage each other in their destructive behaviour,” she says. Kris* is a second year Arts student at the University of Sydney who has been battling an eating disorder for the past five years admits that she used to search #thinspo to motivate her to lose more weight. She says that online pro ana communities help perpetuate eating disorder related illnesses by completely setting unrealistic standards of body types. “What makes thinspo so dangerous is that it’s addictive,” she says. “Those with eating disorders look at sicker and sicker models as they get sicker themselves – you’re always going to aspire to thinner models,” says Kris. Sarah Spence says that although it’s an issue difficult to defeat due to the precarious nature of the Internet, social media should be used in a positive way to counter the thinspo movement. That’s the line taken by Tumblr, who superficially appear to be restricting thinspo subjects, but offer little more than a content policy instead of outright bans. Like a chiding aunt, Tumblr only issues a public service warning to those who search pro-ana affiliated terms, but other than that takes laissez-faire approach where it expects its users to monitor and self-regulate content. “It’s really hard to monitor anything on social media,” says Spence. “As one will shut down, another will open up. It’s important that people are aware of the issue and try to use social media in a way that’s uplifting as opposed to encouraging destructive behaviour.” BULL encourages making healthy lifestyle choices. If you’re struggling with an eating disorder or body image issues, we recommend visiting CAPS – Level 5, Jane Foss Russell Building.

#THINSPO

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BREADED CATS Putting cats in bread is an Internet phenomenon that’s created a ripple of brain explosions among cat lovers. ‘Breaded cats’ originated on popular social news site Reddit in 2011 then went viral after blogs like Tastefully Offensive and Bits and Pieces started sharing it. Since then, Gawker has declared the photo fad as “an official meme according to Internet Law”. Like anything else that’s viral, the real origin of breaded cats is contested. Some say it’s a pun for ‘inbred’, while others say it’s homage to the ‘putting food on rabbits’ memes that took off in Japan (there’s a Wikipedia page dedicated to Oolong the Rabbit, who was trained to balance a waffle or pancake on his head). Breaded cats aren’t just posted photos from pet sadists – there’s also an iOS game entitled bread kittens. Players fight feral cats brainwashed by contaminated food, while saving uninfected cats by placing different types of bread on their head.

HOW TO BREAD A CAT: 1 Find a cat, that’s ideally not belonging to your neighbour 2 Cut a hole that’s approximately the size of your cat’s head (make sure it’s large enough to fit around the ears or else it’ll fall off) 3 Duck tape your cat’s paws to shield yourself from getting your face scratched off 4 Proceed to bread your cat 5 Take a picture and post it online for cat enthusiast to mewl over

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ISSUE 02 MY WEEK WITHOUT

MY WEEK WITHOUT

Lying

SHANNEN POTTER GRITS HER TEETH AND DOESN’T LIE THROUGH THEM.

he stupidest lie I ever told was to my parents when I was six. My younger sister, feeling particularly vicious, had bitten me very hard and my screams had brought my angry parents running. When they questioned about the bite marks on my hand, I, in a moment of sisterly compassion, said I didn’t know who had done it, but that it certainly wasn’t my sister, that’s for sure. I’ve become a better liar since then, though I like to think I don’t lie about anything really important. However, even those little white lies were banned when I went a week without lying. As the week went on, I started to long for the carefree days when “the traffic was bad” every time I left the house too late because I couldn’t tear myself away from Tumblr. Eventually, I did manage to embrace the truth, but it was a long, long road getting there.

DENIAL

As I began my week without lying, I discovered how deeply we are in denial about our lying habits. We often lie to ourselves about how truthful we are. I’m a fairly honest person, but I noticed that even as I was telling my friend a story, I would augment some of the details to make it funnier, snappier and generally more entertaining. I have to say, I am a lot wittier when I’ve had two days to think up my jokes. I tried to rationalise that this wasn’t really lying; I hadn’t changed the basic facts, had I? Even in my wilful denial, I couldn’t justify that.

BULL 02_NB_final.indd 39

BARGAINING

I searched for minute reasons to explain why I wasn’t actually lying, or to plead the case that I needed to lie just this once, please. I think the word ‘untruth’ entered my vocabulary for a couple of days and word choice became a dangerous game that only I was playing. I knew that if I was careful enough, I could technically not lie, while still avoiding uncomfortable truths.

ANGER

By now I had a pretty bad case of, why me (because you agreed to write this article, idiot). Someone on the executive from a society I’m a part of had to go to a boring conference, so of course everyone had an excuse as to why they couldn’t go. I resigned myself to the fact that I would be the one going, since I couldn’t lie to get out of it. I “why me”-ed some more and listened to angry girl rock for a while.

DEPRESSION

Soon, I no longer resented the people in the world lying freely with abandon. They had bad traffic, doctors’ appointments and improved anecdotes to comfort them. I had only the cold, hard truth. If Jack Nicholson had burst into my room shouting, “You can’t handle the truth!” I would have agreed.

ACCEPTANCE

After battling through the anger and depression stages, I made a decision to embrace the rest of my week without lying. If I was going to tell the truth, I was going to do it with class. First step: avoiding the conference. I told the others that I didn’t really want to go. No excuses, no justifications. I felt hardcore and dangerous, which mainly shows I need more excitement in my life. I braced myself for the onslaught, bravely awaiting my next Facebook notification. And I was pleasantly surprised. Someone else volunteered to go, and people actually thanked me for everything else I’d done. This wasn’t a freak occurrence either; people generally accepted “I don’t want to” and “sorry, I slept in” with good grace. Soon I was telling the truth all over the shop. Over the week I realised that most of the lies I wanted to tell were to make myself, or someone else, feel better. My week without lying was a week without caring so much what other people think. And in my book, that’s always a good thing – until the next time I don’t feel like admitting I was late because it took me way too long to find a clean pair of socks.

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BULL USUONLINE.COM REVIEWS

REVIEWS ALBUM GIRL TALK KATE NASH

FILM I GIVE IT A YEAR DAN MAZER

ALBUM MARCH FIRES BIRDS OF TOKYO

GAME SIMCITY 4 ELECTRONIC ARTS

Kate Nash’s debut album Made of Bricks received comparisons to the breezy, anecdotal early work of Lily Allen. Nash’s third album is more likely to elicit association with Courtney Love. Sexism is an important theme throughout Girl Talk and is often accompanied by punk-esque, heavy production. Nash retains her melodic sensibility, but doesn’t always put it to full use. Too often her natural singing voice, subtle and emotive, is sacrificed in favour of passionate shrieking and shouting. ‘Oh’, for instance, builds a melancholy soundscape over three minutes, which is then quickly torn down with a short burst of aggressive screeching. This lack of polish is part of Nash’s attraction. She doesn’t play by the rules, with mixed results.

There’s a poignancy to English rom-coms that makes them one of the country’s most reliable exports. Currently vying for a place on the list of heart-stirring greats is I Give It AYear. The film has a head start: its producers worked on Love Actually and Bridget Jones’ Diary. Such predecessors create pressure, but I Give It AYear is bolstered by its high-calibre cast. Australians Rose Byrne and Simon Baker are joined by Ana Faris, Minnie Driver and Stephen Merchant to form a rich ensemble. At times the film is too selfconscious, but this is counteracted by an eclectic soundtrack and a hilariously awkward charades scene. While undergrads probably aren’t the film’s target demographic, I Give It AYear could function as a cautionary tale for commitment-lovers.

The most recent album by Perth outfit Birds of Tokyo is a departure from the band’s established heavy, riff-based sound. Unfortunately, the band’s exploration of subtler musicianship on March Fires largely fails to connect with the listener. Instrumental songs ‘Motionless’ and ‘Blume’ prove to be one of the album’s biggest flaws in a track-list already light on firepower. However, not all is lost. Standout track ‘Lanterns’ showcases a delicate application of instruments, and thrusts singer Ian Kenny’s powerful vocal performance into the spotlight with great success. Haunting vocals and lush instrumental layering make ‘Sirin’ another highlight. As an entity, March Fires can be considered pleasant and inoffensive, but the result of the band’s venture into softer songcrafting is ultimately more bland than bold.

Almost a decade after its last computer-based incarnation, and 24 years since its debut release, SimCity is back. New features abound: improved game mechanics, shiny graphics and multiplayer functions will please die-hard fans. For budding urban planners, the ability to create curved roads will increase the game’s verisimilitude. As always, playing God is great fun – your choices have real consequences for your city – dwellers, and affect the other mayors in your city’s region. However, the release of SimCity has been plagued by bugs and glitches that have disallowed the realisation of the game’s full potential. Also, given that a popular SimCity app already exists, there is no real necessity for this game – especially at $80-$99.

JOHN ROWLEY

*****

ALICE POTTER

*****

SHOULDA BEEN THERE

SOUNDWAVE 2013 EMILY SWANSON KNOWS HOW TO MOSH.

It was humidity, tatts and flares ahoy as we welcomed the Sydney leg of this year’s Soundwave. The annual festival wouldn’t be worthy of its name had the 70,000-odd punters not braved some weather extremes. The rain early in the day during up-and-comers The Wonder Years left things muddy and all too familiar for Brits Deaf Havana, who were an early highlight, particularly for a few dedicated souls stripping off and having a frolic in the mud during their set. Bras were tossed at the by-all-counts adorable All Time Low, who came up

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HAYLEY DE LA MOTTE

OLIVER PLUNKETT

*****

trumps with a teen-friendly guilty pleasure setlist, and after a quick dash to the main stage, we witnessed stoner hordes paging ‘Dr. Greenthumb’ and getting insane in the brain with Cypress Hill. Despite having to dodge rogue flares, the crowd relished the chance to chuck a mosh to metalcore lads Bring Me The Horizon, while back at the main stage Blink-182 – sans Travis Barker – schooled the masses in sing-alongs, pop-punk and all-round good times, the Sydney crowd having been denied their dick jokes and nostalgia tunes since 2004.

Following suit, The Offspring delivered a blistering greatest-hits collection all while ANZ Stadium played host to a two hour plus set from metal overlords Metallica. Drummers pulled out, Garbage bailed, Twitter feuds were plentiful and Paramore scored an accidental headline spot. All in all this liquorice allsorts mix of punk, rock and metal was enough to satiate this reviewer. Bring on Soundwave 2014.

EMILY SWANSON

15/03/13 2:45 PM

ISSUE 02 REVIEWS

TV SERIES

Downton Abbey Season 3 LERT A R LE Julian Fellowes

I SPO

CLASSIC COUNTDOWN Best Girlband Feuds

MICHAEL SANTIKOS WILL BE A SUGABABE, ONE DAY.

SUPREMES

Membership to the Supremes during the 60s and 70s worked like a revolving door. The group usually had three members at a time, with ten women partaking in total. The 2006 film Dreamgirls was based on the dramas of the Supremes, and saw Beyoncé play the lead member (a nod to Diana Ross). Such foreign territory must have been a challenge!

PUSSYCAT DOLLS

The third season of Downton Abbey, set at the beginning of the 1920s, is much like the decade itself - colourful, shallow, and characterised by fastpaced change. Just when you thought Downton couldn’t become more of a period soapie, it does. New faces breathe life into the Abbey. Despite appearing in just two episodes, the standout character of the season is Cora’s American mother Martha Levinson, played by Shirley MacLaine. Levinson’s snubbing of tradition and witty remarks repeatedly leave Maggie Smith’s Dowager with the glare of a disgruntled pigeon. Fresh faces also appear in the servants’ quarters, including the handsome Jimmy Kent, who toys with the girls and boys alike. We begin to see substantial action ‘downstairs’ (pun intended), with a raft of romantic storylines playing out. One might think that series creator Julian Fellowes gave the daughters of the household an ultimatum: get married or die. One clearly couldn’t decide, enduring both. Sybil’s death comes as a shock, leaving husband Branson to transform from socialist to widower. Perhaps in reaction to fans and critics writing her off as the ‘other sister’, Edith becomes one of the driving characters of this season, being left at the altar by her sugar daddy and then becoming a suffragette. The season’s final episode (a Christmas special) proves to be the peak of its drama, set north at the Duneagle Castle in Scotland. Unlike the previous Christmas Special – which tied up loose ends with a happy close for all – this finale puts My Kitchen Rules to shame with its contrived theatrics. First-born and favourite Mary gives birth to the future heir of Downton, and in the episode’s final seconds we see the departure of a key character. Downton lost its magic the moment Matthew and Mary’s courtship ended in marriage, and it’s safe to say that after numerous jumpings of the shark during the third season, a large portion of the fan base won’t be returning for round four. Downton has lost its sharp, witty dialogue and the depth of the characters that made it successful. With the cast changing at a pace that would put Mary’s outfit swaps to shame, the third season makes you wonder how much longer the writers can stretch things out.

CHLOE SAINTALIN

It had been clear since ‘Don’t Cha’ that the Dolls were heavily reliant upon one member. While the group’s others provided synchronised dance moves, oiled flesh and impressive flexibility, Nicole was the star of the show. She demanded that PCD’s ‘Jai Ho’ was renamed ‘Jai Ho (feat. Nicole Scherzinger)’ and then left the group in tatters to forge a mixed solo career.

SPICE GIRLS

When Ginger left the group in 1998, it signalled the beginning of the end for this Nineties juggernaut. A dodgy attempt at hip hop was quickly followed by a split. Today, the dynamics of the group have shifted. Following their Closing Ceremony appearance and the opening of a Spice musical, it has been rumoured that the Spice Girls may release new material soon - without Posh.

SUGABABES

When Keisha, the only remaining founder of the Sugababes, was ousted in 2009, the b(r)and found itself in a precarious position. With its fourth lineup experiencing diminishing commercial returns, the Sugababes have since faced further challenges from the resurgence of its original incarnation, now imaginatively entitled Mutya Keisha Siobhan.

ALL SAINTS

Having scored hits with ‘Pure Shores’ and ‘Never Ever’, All Saints expected to be treated with a certain respect. This didn’t extend, it seems, to their relationships with one another. Growing bitterness came to a dramatic climax when two members of the band both wanted to wear a particular jacket. Who killed All Saints? It was Shaznay, at the Christmas party, with the jacket.

*****

BULL 02_NB_final.indd 41

15/03/13 2:45 PM

BULL USUONLINE.COM CAUGHT ON CAMPUS

9,000 CHUPA CHUPS CONSUMED

O-WEEK TAKES OVER SYDNEY UNI

HI MUM

BAND COMP WINNER SIRENO LOOKING THROUGH THE RABBIT HOLE

DOWN THE RABBIT HOLE: O-WEEK 2013.

rom 27 February to 1 March, Sydney Uni was transformed into a Wonderland for O-Week 2013. Those who ventured Down the Rabbit Hole were rewarded with free food, entertainment, and endless opportunities to sign up to clubs and societies. If you weren’t there, here’s a taste of what you missed.

CAUGHT ON CAMPUS IMAGES TAKEN BY JENNIFER YIU, JAMIE KENNEDY, YOUNGTAE KIM

V-TEAM REPRESENT!

STOP PHOTOGRAPHING ME! SURCAS HEATS THINGS UP

HEARTS AND DIAMONDS

FREE FAIRY FLOSS

O-WEEK'S HOST WITH THE MOST THE SUMO WRESTLING GOT OUT OF HAND

BULL 02_NB_final.indd 42

15/03/13 2:45 PM

ISSUE 02 CLUB HUB

CLUB HUB In Need

TIM LEDGER HAS A LOOK AT WHAT DOING GOOD MEANS ON CAMPUS.

A FEW GOOD CLUBS AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY

An organisation that stands up to governments who violate their citizens’ rights. It is well respected for its advocacy and awareness work, particularly on drawing attention to the plight of political prisoners. On campus, Amnesty International Society seeks to continue the organisation’s fine work in a social setting. Membership $5; info@usydamnesty.com

FRED HOLLOWS SOCIETY

The Fred Hollows Foundation aims to continue the work of Fred Hollows, an Australian ophthalmologist who restored the eyesight of thousands around the world. Over one million people can see today because of initiatives Fred Hollows began. The Fred Hollows Society supports the Foundation through raising funds on campus Contact: usydfredhollows@gmail.com

rving Kristol, the American neo-conservative, did not think much of international organisations. He said that he preferred the Organisation of American States (OAS) to the United Nations because at the OAS, America only had to pay for three translators. The perception of many is that these organisations are where idealists come to die. There is a chasm between what they purport to do – protect world peace, act as a democratic forum – and what they actually do. The same could be said for ambitious charities: the distance between their goals and their impact is significant. How do humanitarian clubs and societies on campus, with a fraction of the resources and prestige, confront this challenge? Why do people join these clubs and what meaning do they extract from the club’s activities? Elisabeth Wale, Campaign Coordinator of the Amnesty International Society, says that the campus society is an ‘extension’ of the state organisation. A night in for AmnestySoc involves movies (more likely Hotel Rwanda than Django Unchained, I imagine), drinks, and letter writing. Wale has also organised panel discussions and joint events with other humanitarian societies. President of the UN Society, Vidushee Deora, is hard-headed about campus humanitarian groups. She says that although the UN has a name for highminded idealism, UNSoc knows that there

BULL 02_NB_final.indd 43

is ‘no point’ writing idealistic resolutions. The countries of the world aren’t going to listen. Instead, UNSoc focuses on education, developing skills in public speaking and diplomacy, and sending students around the country to participate in model UN conferences. According to Wale, the purpose of AmnestySoc is to continue the campaigns of Amnesty International but in a social setting, with more emphasis on building ‘awareness’ – the catch-cry of the university do-gooder. “Students are more passionate and have more time to volunteer. Amnesty on campus aims to channel that passion,” she says. AmnestySoc and UNSoc represent two very distinct models of humanitarian clubs on campus. AmnestySoc stays steadfast to the pursuit of doing public good, raising awareness, fighting fights. There is a certain nobility, majesty, tragedy to it. UNSoc is more pragmatic in its aims: seeking to discuss rather than campaign, simulate an imperfect world in debate and model UN conferences rather than battle its imperfections. It is clear which society Kristol would sign up for.

OXFAM SYDNEY UNIVERSITY

Oxfam is a charity with broadly defined goals: reducing poverty, averting environmental disaster, and helping people caught in war. Oxfam on campus supports the global organisation by educating students and organising petitions and volunteer actions. Contact: oxfamsu@gmail.com

UNITED NATIONS SOCIETY

The United Nations is the premier forum for global political cooperation.The UN Society on campus hosts drinks and discussions throughout the year, with the aim of educating students, refining their skills in debating and networking with like-minded students. A number of students will also have the opportunity to travel around the country and participate in model UN conferences. Contact: uns@usydunsociety.org

ANIMAL WELFARE SOCIETY

The Animal Welfare Society aims to increase awareness of the mistreatment of animals, with the hope of changing animal welfare locally and internationally. They host discussions and guest speaker events, as well as fundraisers. Contact: dc3750@gmail.com The University of Sydney Union (USU) runs the Clubs & Societies Program at the University of Sydney. With over 200 registered clubs and societies, there’s sure to be a group that interests you. Visit usuonline.com for more information.

15/03/13 2:45 PM

BULL USUONLINE.COM WHAT’S ON SHUTTER UP

SHUTTER UP THE OTHER SANDSTONE An empty bench outside the Madsen Building waits for semester to start. PHOTOGRAPHER: FRANCIS KEVIN FLORESCA [NIKON D3100, 18.0-200.00MM F/3.5-6.3]

SNAP! BULL 02_NB_final.indd 44

Send us your unique, arty or just plain cool (as in, not another quad shot) campus snap to usubullmag@gmail.com. We’ll publish our faves each edition in full page glory. High-res, 300dpi jpegs only – portrait orientation. 15/03/13 2:45 PM

ISSUE 02 STOP. PUZZLETIME

STOP. PUZZLETIME CROSSWORD (IN 3D) ACROSS (LEFT TO RIGHT)

01. Fund Bush (5) 04. Putting in a box, decapitated, when death is approaching (5) 07. What you do with a number you like? (5) 10. Vessel for Army Captain, or Territorial Army (5) 13. Mouth of a singer? (5) 14. Wilde is a grouch (5) 15. Rate agency employee with head office (5) 18. Move to Addams’ butler (5) 19. Prepare chief (5)

AWAY (FRONT TO BACK)

01 Listened to Australian rappers on the radio (5) 02. Examining absent man when death is approaching (5) 03. Hidden sleigh takes the reindeer (excluding Rudolph) (5) 10. Increase extreme doubt in trouble (3,2) 11. Remains within care license (5) 12. Two babysitters forget us (1,4) 15. Beginnings of trade unions linking Israel & Palestine blossom (5) 16. Gratitude in Paris for organised crime (5) 17. Said to be more woody brown? (5)

DOWN (TOP TO BOTTOM)

01. One who beats The Artist is revealed (5) 02. Wheat and mud thrown around old city (5) 03. Muse of poetry makes typogaphical mistake? (5) 04. Paula is endlessly boring with muscle (5) 05. No lead on murderer? That makes me sick (5) 06. Goth gutted about hip-hop chart (5) 07. Let go of ring in sink (5) 08. Designer has central figure 100 & 101 (5) 09. After two, an hour in start of golf course (5) Issue One Solutions.

Sheet1

B E G I NN E R S OU T DO A E O A N H F S ENA T E S THE S EUS I I R T H B I Y CHUT E E X E R C I S ED S S D R U T N C ANNON QU I T E A N M A I U C Y NOON E V I V I AN D V E E S I A E Y E O P E N E R I NN E R R L E U S M D T SC I ENC E I DO L I S E O S C T D G R N O T M E E T Y MO L O G Y

This year, BULL brings you cryptic crosswords from a Sydney University student (Arts IV) known affectionately and pseudonymously as 'Ghoti'. Ghoti says hello, and that ‘BULL Magazine’ is an anagram of ‘I'm unglazable’. Any questions, comments, or complaints can be sent to ghoti.cryptic@gmail.com

Page 1

WIN A 6 WEEK LATIN DANCE COURSE! N! WI

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There’s Salsa, Bachata, Zouk, Kizomba and more! For your chance to win, simply send your name and details to usubullmag@gmail.com by 15 April 2013. The winner will be notified by email. Good Luck! For more details check out: www.tsdance.com.au

15/03/13 2:45 PM

BULL USUONLINE.COM BULLSHIT

BULLSHIT

“[WE HAVE A PLAN TO] STOP FOREIGN WORKERS BEING PUT AT THE FRONT OF THE QUEUE WITH AUSTRALIAN WORKERS AT THE BACK”

A COLLECTION OF INANITIES AND INSANITIES, BECAUSE FAMOUS PEOPLE ARE DUMB TOO.

-PM Julia Gillard

@HATHAWAYNIPPLES

“Here’s hoping that someday in the not too distant future my wardrobe misfortunes will only be found in stories and never more in real life.”

HEIDI KLUM

“Some people are more experimental in bed and others are more boring. If you are wild and crazy, bring it on so the other person is well aware that you have little devil horns that come out every once in a while. It’s good to make an effort to dress up sometimes, to do things outside the norm.”

ASK AUNTIE IRENE

SPOT OF BOTHER OR NEED SOME ADVICE? EMAIL AUNTY IRENE AT USUBULLMAG@GMAIL.COM

BULL 02_NB_final.indd 46

CHARLIE SHEEN

“When Jimmy Hendrix ate a red cabbage salad was it known as a Purple Graze? The heat now undoing my bitchen-ness…”

LADY GAGA ON A SAFARI:

TONY ABBOTT

“I tell you what we’ll never “In this photo I’m about 10 feet do? We won’t run around from 13 lions, 2 cubs. I spent 30 the place demonising minutes with them and took a nap!” foreigners the way the prime minister sought to SENATOR ERIC ABETZ do over the last 24 hours.” “If I might say, I wouldn’t put the two (paedophiles and asylum ANDREW BOLT seekers) in the same category, “Even Gillard’s necessarily.” xenophobia is fake.”

Dear Aunty Irene, I deliberately skip the pill sometimes, but I know it’s causing my boyfriend a great deal of grief. I think I’m addicted to the thrill of not having control over my reproductive system and that I could wake up tomorrow knocked up. It’s crazy, but it’s like the same feeling I get when I leave Facebook open on a public library computer, and the prospect of not knowing what’s going to happen makes me exhilarated. I’ve been with my boyfriend for three months, and the sex has been great. But ever since he’s caught on, I get the feeling that he’s deliberately trying not to ejaculate. In fact, I think he’s been faking it lately. Usually, I would need a box of tissues to clean myself up after our late night rendezvous, but now I barely need a single ply of paper. My reckless behaviour is affecting my sex life and I don’t know what to do. Please help? -Alice

My dear periwinkle, it seems like you found yourself on a sticky wicket. Missing the pill is a common occurrence amongst forgetful minds. However, you deliberately miss the pill because you love the thrill of playing Russian Roulette with your ovaries despite the distress it’s causing your gentleman-caller. Well, since a shared joy is a double joy, I advise that you two settle for a middle ground. I know a little method that your Uncle Bill and I used to do when I was too ‘tired’ to fit in my diaphragm (that’s what we used back in the old days). When your uncle would reach the point of catharsis, he would pull out of me and dispose his goodwill all over my tummy. Back in those days, it was called ‘getting off at Redfern’, but I think the kids these days call it the ‘withdrawal*’ method. Anyways, my point is darling, that you still get the thrill while he can

play peek-a-boo and not be such a nervous wreck about it. One last advice my dear, I suggest that you don’t leave The Facebook lying open around the library, you should promptly return it to the front desk so someone else can borrow it. My greatest affections, Aunty Irene

Dear Aunty Irene, I think Lena Dunham stole my idea for a TV show. She must’ve had access to my Wordpress account because GIRLS is exactly like my idea of a show based on my white middle-class crisis. I’ve been doing it pretty tough, especially with my blog failing to gain the recognition it deserved (à la Walkley Awards); it didn’t even get a mention in The NewYork Times.What. A. Fucking. Joke. It’s just so unfair that a fat fuck like Lena Dunham is famous when it should be me. All she’s ever done is motorboated too many cakes and lesbians.This stress is

affecting my Chakra levels, what should I do? -Alecia I’m sorry for your loss. I know the feeling all too well pet. I pitched the Australian Broadcasting Commission the idea for a show about Agony Aunts in 1976, and never heard back. Then I turned on the television set last night and what did I see? The exact same thing – only calling itself ‘Q&A’ with people reading their problems off little cards (again, my idea). Times have changed of course. Back then most of the problems posed to me were about smelly discharge and stubborn stains, now they all seem to be about refugees (Uncle Bill thinks those topics aren’t so different). The only thing you can do my pet, is let the grieving take its course. My sincerity, Aunty Irene. BULL advises safe sex at all times. Use a condom. *

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WE ARE MAKING A DIFFERENCE Now serving 100% organic and Rainforest Alliance Certified coffee.

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More for Uni Students Cheaper textbooks Tech gear, backpacks, stationery + more Buy online pick up in store option ALWAYS free delivery

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