Mandawuy Yunupingu

The Tribal Voice album was released at about the same time I started working in Aboriginal Education at Mt Isa in 1992.

I often heard this music played in the schools along and around the beef road through Dajarra, Urandangie, Boulia, and Bedourie.

It takes me back to a vibrant and exciting era.

This is dedicated to Mandawuy Yunupingu and his life and work.

Now two rivers run their course
Separated for so long
I'm dreaming of a brighter day
When the waters will be one

Some Questions About Autism

This is an American graph - the trend here is similar.

Back when Adam played second row for Valleys (1971 to be precise) and I started teaching in special schools, to encounter a child with Autism was a rare event.

From memory, in the school where I worked at the time, with an enrolment of about 70, there was one. He was also profoundly deaf, so some of the non-communicative behaviours he exhibited may have been as much a function of his hearing loss, as of Autism.

Contrast that with the situation these days. When I retired as a special school principal in 2005, over a third of my school population was classified as being on the spectrum*.

It's over diagnosis, I hear you say.

Perhaps - there is a process available (called Verification in Queensland) which identifies these kids, gets them diagnosed, and acquires additional resources to support them in their schools. Indeed, a large part of the work I do is guiding schools through these processes. Sometimes I feel more like an auditor than a teacher.

Other states have similar protocols.

Having said that seeking to support these children inevitably results in more of them being identified, but there's much more than over diagnosis happening, if it's happening at all.

There are simply more of these kids around. Anyone who has been at the chalk face as long as I have (over forty years) will tell you that. It's also backed up in the research. The incidence rate keeps rising.

So what's going on?

Is it diet? Has the advent of supermarkets and the necessity to apply preservatives to food which is going to sit on the shelf for a while having a cumulative effect?

Is it lifestyle? Is the exposure of the developing brain to screens rather than parental care an issue? Is the fact that many children these days spend less time in those vital years between age one and four communicating with their parents because of work commitments having an influence?

Are we so worried about childhood security that we don't allow our kids to bounce off the physical environment in the fashion that I did when I was growing up in the bush? Does this "cotton woolling" of the developing body (and the developing brain) prevent the normal development of the nervous system? We're only just beginning to appreciate the importance of the role that sensory integration has in both social and intellectual development.

And yet, there are so many kids who have had early childhoods that feature all these normal developmental exposures who are profoundly affected. How do you explain the phenomenon of children reared in identical family situations to their siblings presenting with Autism, when these siblings do not?

Does pollution, especially from vehicle exhausts, have anything to do with it?

I could go on - there are so many questions.

The point is, something has changed, the incidence rate is increasing at an alarming rate, and we need to spend some serious research money on this problem before the costs of not doing so come back to bite us.

"Us" being schools and parents all over the country.

*Spectrum - diagnosing Autism is subjective - the DSM - V describes a range or band of individuals who can be diagnosed.

Swing Girls

Whether you're a fan of big band swing or not, this is an engaging clip.

It's full of life and energy, and you'd have to be moribund not to get caught up in the sheer joy of performance. It's from a Japanese movie called Swing Girls, with a fiendishly convoluted plot.

Forget the movie, just enjoy the band.

 H/T Dave.

Francis on the Market

 The worldwide financial and economic crisis seems to highlight their distortions and above all the gravely deficient human perspective, which reduces man to one of his needs alone, namely, consumption. Worse yet, human beings themselves are nowadays considered as consumer goods which can be used and thrown away. We have started a throw-away culture. This tendency is seen on the level of individuals and whole societies; and it is being promoted! In circumstances like these, solidarity, which is the treasure of the poor, is often considered counterproductive, opposed to the logic of finance and the economy. While the income of a minority is increasing exponentially, that of the majority is crumbling. 

This imbalance results from ideologies which uphold the absolute autonomy of markets and financial speculation, and thus deny the right of control to States, which are themselves charged with providing for the common good. A new, invisible and at times virtual, tyranny is established, one which unilaterally and irremediably imposes its own laws and rules. Moreover, indebtedness and credit distance countries from their real economy and citizens from their real buying power. Added to this, as if it were needed, is widespread corruption and selfish fiscal evasion which have taken on worldwide dimensions. The will to power and of possession has become limitless. 

This is a quote from a recent speech made to diplomats accredited to the Holy See by Pope Francis.

He is obviously no admirer of the mantra that the market rules, and is our salvation.

He calls this belief a cult, and he's not far from the mark.

I probably would have used slightly more colourful language. For mine, the market can be described as behaving like a reptile, rather than resembling a cult.

That is, I guess, a distinction between what it is, and what it does.

Ask Google - they have used the market successfully to avoid paying their fair share of tax for years.

The Doors

This is as good an excuse as any to post this vid.

Make sure you have your headphones turned up high.

Fixer Fixed

One of the hallmarks of a corrupt government is its capacity to privatise and sell (or simply allocate) public property and services to cronies.

There is a proud history of these shenanigans in Queensland.

The current administration is moving, quite rapidly, in the same direction. The selling-off of nursing homes is a prime example.

Unfortunately, when this happens, the individuals supported by these services become collateral damage.

This has been turned into a fine art in Pennsylvania, in the USA, by an ex-judge, who put simply, sold juvenile offenders to privately run prisons.

Sounds a bit far-fetched? Well no, he’s been convicted on 12 counts, and put away for 30 years.

I wonder if the prison is privately run. It would be a delicious piece of irony if it was. The market rules, after all.

Couldn’t happen here?

I wouldn’t bet on it – something pretty similar happened not so long ago and the Newman government is doing its level best to neuter the CMC..

Equality Vs Justice

I never cease to be amazed at the lack of understanding of this basic Australian principle.

H/T Sharon.