Tertiary education is risk it’s imagination it’s not a guarantee of a meal ticket. The Abbott approach to education guarantees debt but no job. The Liberal Arts are a risk driven by passion and need to be encouraged the drive us forward with their imagination. Those taking up the Liberal Arts often never go on to be financially successful however currently they still have a facility in which to pursue their passion. Turning universities into a product market place will ensure only one thing debt. It wont ensure the availability of the courses or the students because of the increased financial burden.
In a world where who you know more than what you know still predicates professional success. Christopher Pyne is telling pork pies when he claims he is opening a doorway to meritocracy. Sure times have changed but not as much as you think. Reducing tertiary education to system based courses will kill the encouragement of imagination and the investment in youth that drives us foward.
“I think hard times are coming when we will be wanting the voices of writers who can see alternatives to how we live now and can see through our fear-stricken society and its obsessive technologies to other ways of being, and even imagine some real grounds for hope,” said Ursula K. Le Guin as she accepted the Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters at the 65th annual National Book Awards ceremony.
The fantasy and science fiction author “stole the show” Wednesday as she warned the literary crowd against the dangers of capitalism, which has turned writers into producers of market commodities rather than creators of art.
“We will need writers,” Le Guin continued, “who can remember freedom. Poets, visionaries—the realists of a larger reality.”
When her short speech was loudly applauded, the bespectacled writer thanked her audience, calling them “brave,” ostensibly for cheering her on in her scathing criticism of the publishing world despite the fact that the literary business constitutes the livelihood of many of those present at the ceremony.
And while the entire speech is well worth watching, the most poignant lines Le Guin spoke are the following: “We live in capitalism. Its power seems inescapable. So did the divine right of kings. Any human power can be resisted and changed by human beings. Resistance and change often begin in art, and very often in our art—the art of words.”
During the hard times we are facing and throughout those that the author herself foresees, let us never forget Le Guin for her passion, her art, her words and, perhaps most importantly, her truths.
Federal MP Christopher Pyne has launched an online petition to save jobs at the ABC in Adelaide.
Mr Pyne told 891 ABC Adelaide he had launched the petition this morning urging the board’s chairman, James Spigelman, not to close its television production house in the South Australian city.
The petition comes amid speculation 150 jobs will be lost in Adelaide as a result of the Government cutting the broadcaster’s funding by $50 million a year.
Mr Pyne said the ABC had been provided with an efficiency review that outlined ways to reduce spending at the broadcaster without impacting on production and programming.
“It is a deliberate act of political vandalism because they know, they have the report in front of them in black and white showing how to reduce costs without affecting production and programming,” Mr Pyne said.
“They [job cuts] could all be in the back office area, for example, in administration, in costs incurred particularly at Ultimo.
“I think [ABC managing director] Mark Scott and the board need to get out of Ultimo and go around Australia and find the place where the ABC is most popular.
“It’s in regional Australia, where it is the lifeline to a lot of country towns and regional areas.”
Mr Pyne’s petition has had a mixed response on social media, and it was posed to Mr Pyne the Government had broken an election promise not to make cuts to the ABC.
However, Mr Pyne said at the time Mr Abbott made the promise, he was not aware how “dire” the country’s economy was.
“At that time I don’t think he was necessarily as aware as we are now about the dire situation we face … we have to reduce the budget debt and deficit and that’s what we’re doing,” Mr Pyne said.
However, the federal MP for Port Adelaide, Mark Butler, said that defence was not good enough and suggested the Government should have put conditions on the cuts to the ABC.
“There has been an agenda for some time from other parts of the ABC as I understand it, to rationalise to Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane,” he said.
“Maybe Christopher didn’t know about that when he voted in the cabinet to cut the ABC’s budget to the degree that it is, but this petition is just an extraordinary front on his part.
“Did they put any conditions on those cuts on the ABC management? It’s all well and good for Christopher Pyne to launch this Pontius Pilate petition after the fact.
“There were very significant efficiencies being made by the ABC during our term in Government, but instead of returning that money to the budget or spending the money on something else, we supported the ABC’s decision to create ABC24 and an ABC online platform with those efficiencies.”
What happened in NSW battalions is not so relevant in South Australia. We have our own local military history and you get that with a local production.
Bill Denny, RSL Anzac Day committee chairman
Bill Denny, chairman of the RSL Anzac Day committee, told 891 ABC Adelaide the loss of local television production would result in the loss of local content.
“I just think one of the things we are really going to lose in the state is the capacity to produce the Anzac Day package,” Mr Denny said.
“In recent years the ABC has done a marvellous job of preparing an Anzac Day package. [It’s] very important to veterans because as Christopher would know our service history is generally localised.
“What happened in NSW battalions is not so relevant in South Australia. We have our own local military history and you get that with a local production.”
Mr Denny said next year’s Anzac Day coverage had been guaranteed, but he believed but from then on locals will be shown Sydney’s march “and then a flash for five to 10 minutes to each of the other states”.
“That’s just downright insulting and it diminishes the whole spirit of Anzac and our recollections of it,” Mr Denny said.
Mr Pyne said it was up to the board to save local content.
“Ultimo needs to be told this isn’t allowed to happen,” Mr Pyne said.
“We have to try and save the Adelaide production and programming and I am going to do what I can to do it.”
olddogthoughts 