• There is a distinction between saying “it is inadvisable to do X (because it may lead to or increase the risk of Y)” and saying “you are not entitled to do X, and if Y happens to you then you’ve got what you deserve.” Reasonable people have no problem with the first type of statement: it’s not victim blaming and you have to be deliberately obtuse or stupid to claim otherwise. To assert that a person has, ex ante, alternative courses of action open to them that can reduce or increase their chance of being attacked isn’t to reduce the culpability of the perpetrator for attacking them, and it doesn’t thereby imply that the victim is themselves liable for being attacked. Besides showing intellectual dishonesty and/or infirmity, the “don’t blame the victim” campaigners show an unpleasant willingness to use the tragic misfortune of other people as an opportunity to push political barrows and grind axes. - MicheleS
  • Tracey: “So it’s her fault because she was drunk.” That’s your interpretation. Two footballers had evil intentions and a 16 year old girl was drunk. Serena Williams stated she did not blame the girl and most of her comment was concern about how it had happened, quote “your parents should teach you…”. Her parents probably did teach her but like many teenagers she ignored their wise advice and took a risk. What a marvellous reminder to young people that bad things can happen. - MicheleS
  • I think many women's rape stories get twisted by others no matter what they do. Not being believed would be the worst. - katie
  • Last week, when the criminal record of Meagher's killer was made public, everyone seemed amazed person like him could be out of prison. While I was disgusted he was free, I wasn't surprised and it's because of attitudes like the ones Tracey describes. As a society we place blame on the victims of sexual assault, and therefore mitigate the responsibility of the attacker. There is some underlying idea that men are unable (or unwilling) to control themselves, which is rather insulting to the vast majority of men who do act decently. As I was buying my morning coffee today I was scanning the front of the paper and read the story of Milne's arrest for rape. The barista noticed and I said it was interesting the arrest had happened so long after the crime. The barista asked what did the girl expect, going back to some guy's hotel room. You hear stuff like this whenever these topics come up. Having no desire to start a fight with a virtual stranger I just replied that I had had people I didn't really know sleep at my house in the past and not once did I find it necessary to rape them. I will be buying my coffee elsewhere in the future. - kage
  • Thank you Germaine for the article. I do not need to be persuaded to vote for the PM and not just because she is a woman, but because she is a leader, a leader under extremely difficult and distressing circumstances; a leader with vision; sometimes having to compromise and take a smaller step forward than envisaged, however, any step forward in policy and reform is a step in the right direction. I try to use my voice against shock jocks on stations I despise, just to get up their noses, and get totally put down and ridiculed when objecting to their tactics, BUT Germaine YOU have a voice and a voice to be listened to. Please use YOUR VOICE as well as your writing skills to spread this message. - Vickie
  • Sometimes I just want to give up and call everyone who does not get how wrong such assaults are pigs. - ro.watson
  • Given that i wish to see the continuation of carbon pricing and allied green policies, the roll out of the (real) NBN, the funding of the NDIS and the Gonski education reforms, i have no hesitation in voting Labor on September 14th. I will be extremely happy to see PM Gillard retain her position. - sally b
  • Show me your policies Tony Abbott. I judge Gillard on her strengths already, not as some putative enduring barricade against the shock jocks here or there, Germaine. - ro.watson
  • This is so much like my own story. I have so much trouble getting people to understand, even 6 years after separation that he will always be the father of my kids, that he is deserving of respect, even if he has not been the best husband, that I cannot live with him, I do not feel romantic any more but I want him to be the best person he can be because my kids love him and he is their hero, no matter what I say. And I worry so much about the kids and I hope they don't grow up without the skills for a beautiful relationship. So I hope all goes well. I look forward to seeing how you manage. - Bron
  • But to vote for someone just because they are a woman is as flawed as voting for someone just because they are a man. The key point in Germaine's article for me was that we need to start focusing on policies and not personalities. - Pea
 
16
Categories:  Must see, Wellbeing

LOOKING FOR LOVE… IN ALL THE WRONG UNDERPANTS

By Gretel Killeen
September 27, 2012

Have you ever felt invisible to the society you live in?

I think I’m starting to.

Sure, there are people of my age and gender represented in the media but, unlike them, I’m ready to race to life’s finish line, not cruise the wine regions in a convertible with my beige-clad husband, our matching grey hairdo’s unflappable in the breeze as we smile at the comfort of our incontinence pads.

Have you ever wondered if you’ve done something wrong that has caused you to be a misfit in this stereotype? Do you ever wonder if you’ve passed your relevancy use by date?

 

For some women this question can arise when the kids have left the nest and ‘mum’ notices her husband has more hair in his ears than on his head and emits more grunts on the toilet than exchanged words with her.

For other women this dawning can arise the first time a waiter inadvertently calls you mister, the day you determine you haven’t enough Super to buy a budgie, or the evening you get in a taxi and the vacant sign stays up. You can be a good friend, great mum, recycle, work hard, volunteer or miraculously revive road kill …and yet still feel like you’re the loser in the game of life.

Is it too late to try and work life out when you’re already half way through it?

Do you ever wish you could start life all over again with the wisdom you’ve gleaned since birth? Sometimes I do. But then I realise I know very little. Even worse is the realisation that none of my peers know anything either.

Despite our age, we’re all bloody idiots.

The older we get the more we adhere to our narrow minded thoughts, determined to fight to the death for beliefs we only hold because we’re too lazy to change them.

Should the end of the world come, the population would instinctively look to the grown-ups for guidance and leadership. It’s frightening when you realise they’d be looking at us. Fact is when the Y2K was hovering years ago, I prepared for the end of the world by buying one big can of lentils.

 Page 1 of 2 next >>
support us

16 Responses to this article

  1. Lisa September 27, 2012 Reply
     
     

    There’s a lot of BS out there with everyone pretending they know what they’re doing and where they’re going. Few people are really focused at an early age – the rest of us stumble around cobbling together a living with our fingers permanently crossed behind our backs.

    Grown ups don’t have all the answers. At 45, I too am wondering where the hell the last 25 years went and wondering if it is too late to chase the job of my dreams. It’s taken that long to figure out what I really want. So I’m hearing you sister.

    I do think people generally talk up their successes and are much quieter about their setbacks. Thanks Gretel for asking the questions many of us are asking ourselves.

    You forgot to mention the increase in involuntary farting that seems to occur as we get older – or is that just me? Oh the glamour of being middle-aged. Bring it on!

     
  2. Ro. Watson September 27, 2012 Reply
     
     

    Gastro? My neighbour,92,suggests sipping a mixture of port and brandy…As for knickers~Bonds cottontails withe the high waist and loose fitting legs. Mmmm.I heard a phrase a while back now on the radio~”relevance deficit disorder”…

     
    • Lydia September 27, 2012 Reply
       
       

      Your neighbour is right! Port and brandy is an old remedy my husband told me about – I’ve used it numerous times and it always works.

      Seriously, I don’t pretend to know what life’s ‘about’ at 45, but I’m always open to new ideas on almost everything – in fact, I think age teaches you to be suspicious of those who are ideologically fixed and/or have a one-eyed view of how life ‘is’ or ‘should be’. It seems to me that younger people suffer from the ideologically fixed disease more than older ones. As you get older, you realise that life is more complicated than many ideologies suppose. Maybe that does make one ‘irrelevant’ – unless you’re out there shouting and stamping your feet in a tiresome display of your ideological fixedness, you’re ignored in this society. So, no, Gretel, I don’t think it’s fair to say that older people are all fixed on ideas because they’re too lazy to change. We have HEAPS of experience to draw upon, and to pass on. I do wonder what life’s about though, when I have watched my mother deteriorate over the past couple of years from a lively and intelligent person to a woman who sits crying in a wheelchair in a nursing home (along with lots of other people of a similar age). It’s staggeringly awful, and makes you really examine what the meaning of life is. Heck, I don’t know!

       
  3. Ro. Watson September 27, 2012 Reply
     
     

    So sorry Lydia that you and your mum are suffering~ I have a vague recollection of a buddhist phrase about not suffering over suffering….incidentally my neighbour used to be a runner. She had a friend who was a swimmer in his youth~ who died recently…at the age of 96. They had known each other since they were kids. Previously she had nursed her husband through Alzheimers, for at least a decade. .Anyway she came over to tell me that her friend had died…her friend “that would do anything for her”. As we were chatting she was trying to remember that word for something that comes around once a year~”birthday” I said…Yip…

     
  4. amd September 27, 2012 Reply
     
     

    I accept change all the time. Have embraced change all of my 44 years. Suppose I always will. We are all built differently, generalising is pointless.

     
  5. MazT September 27, 2012 Reply
     
     

    Thanks for asking the question Gretel. I was 46 when all of a sudden, no one wanted anything I had to offer. Confusing, devastating, bewildering after a lifetime of being in demand, contributing (positively I hope) to my world. 60 now, still the same, and I still know how much even more I can contribute. So, 14 years of “What? Why?” and “Is it worth sticking around?” For me, finally: “Yes.” Am smiling now and OK. Why? Well, I have a question: What if the reason we’re all here is … just to be here? What if our raison d’etre is to have the experience of living, of life, of this place (planet/part of planet) in this time? That’s all. What and how we do it is the fun, the froth, the bubble. Just a thought …

     
  6. Colin September 27, 2012 Reply
     
     

    Great words, Gretel. Witty and insightful. I wonder if the sense to life is only really the sense we each make of it, as much as we can. I’m pretty sure some people go through life without a thought about the ins and outs – not sure if I envy their blissful ignorance or if I’m grateful for being a thinker and a ponderer. I can certainly relate to the idea of searching for a purpose – an intimately personal one, if not a broader community one. Maybe some of the ‘fun’ is in the searching and discovery. I have mixed feelings on the subject, but I *think* some things have got easier as I’ve got older (39). Other life issues will, I’m certain, remain tragically impossible to comprehend and deal with. Thank you for your article.

     
  7. Aeron Winters September 27, 2012 Reply
     
     

    I can offer one small kernel of wisdom. For me, the meaning of life is to give life meaning….in other words, make it meaningful. Beyond that, at 48 I am still trying to work out what I want to be when I grow up. No one told me there was a deadline on that one.

     
  8. Ro. Watson September 27, 2012 Reply
     
     

    Onya Aeron.

     
  9. Ro. Watson September 27, 2012 Reply
     
     

    Sorry Gretel~ but I lost you on underpants title~ older ladies say knickers..or horse rider’s trousers(jocks) or BIG BROTHER…
    Anyway in previous message sent to the collective~ it should have been Bonds’….loose use of pacific terms but I had an escaping apostrophe and as I am in perth I feel the differences in time upon me…I should not try so hard,for so long…really

     
  10. Ros September 27, 2012 Reply
     
     

    Oh Gretel don’t be so navel grazing…… there’s life out there and I’m 62

     
  11. Carolyn September 27, 2012 Reply
     
     

    Love your comment Ros…… and I’m 61, so thank you!

     
  12. Rhoda September 27, 2012 Reply
     
     

    We live and we die. How we live our life is up to us. I think it was the Dalai Lama who said that we humans face the task of making a happy life for ourselves.

    The world is a very beautiful place. Don’t miss out on it.

     
  13. Judith Rubbish September 27, 2012 Reply
     
     

    I don’t have any answers at 48. Just can’t believe I am 48. Can’t ascertain why time just literally goes. Shopping the other day, my 12 year old texted me and asked me to buy Clearasil. I walked passed the baby aisle and into the health and beauty aisle. Felt like crying.

     
  14. susan September 28, 2012 Reply
     
     

    my philosophy is to live a life I love. To fill it with people and experiences that bring me joy and it’s working out just fine.

     
  15. Louisa September 28, 2012 Reply
     
     

    Great piece. Look forward to further installments.

     

Have Your Say

Get e-mail notifications for new comments

 

You may also like

Left Right

porno porno sex

FEATURED CONTRIBUTORS

Hoopla Poll

How often are you using a body lotion / moisturiser?

Comments

  • MicheleS: There is a distinction between saying “it is inadvisable to do X (because it may lead to or increase the risk of Y)”...

    Reply|Read all

  • MicheleS: Tracey: “So it’s her fault because she was drunk.” That’s your interpretation. Two footballers had evil intentio...

    Reply|Read all

  • katie: I think many women's rape stories get twisted by others no matter what they do. Not being believed would be the worst.

    Reply|Read all

  • kage: Last week, when the criminal record of Meagher's killer was made public, everyone seemed amazed person like him could be...

    Reply|Read all

Freebies

Copyright © 2012 The Hoopla

All Rights Reserved

Site by Feel.
loading time: 0.98 sec