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Aborigines Incensed Over Didgeridoo "Dare" in Book for Girls

CitizenSugar — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 09:00:56 -0700

The Australian answer to the hit book, The Daring Book for Girls is striking the wrong note with Aborigines. The book teaches girls how to play the didgeridoo — despite the fact that Aboriginal culture views the instrument as strictly boys only and not to be played by girls.

The publisher says it wasn't aware of the taboo and has apologized for the faux pas saying there was a "divergence of opinion" on the matter. The hollowed out instrument with the quintessentially Crocodile Dundee-esque sound (just try to imagine that tone without thinking of the movie) is viewed by Aborigines as a male ceremonial instrument. Not only are women forbidden from playing it, but doing so could cause grave consequences, even infertility.

The Daring Book has a less controversial profile than it may seem — its mission: "Whether you’re a girly-girl, an athlete, a brainiac, or a little bit of everything, The Daring Book for Girls gets you ready for anything — from pitching a tent and building a campfire; to running a lemonade stand and learning about female heroines in history; and even to tying a hitch knot and organizing your own spy team. The Daring Book for Girls is the can-do, how-to manual for enthusiastic, unfettered adventure, cheering girls on to be curious and brave—and above all, to have fun."

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Aussie Mayor Asks Ugly Women to Move to His All-Male Town

LibertySugar — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 11:00:36 -0700

One Australian mayor thinks he came up with the perfect way to fix his town's glaring gender imbalance: invite all the country's ugly women to move in. John Moloney, the mayor of Mount Isa, has invited the "beauty-disadvantaged" to relocate to the outback mining town because it's the perfect place "for ugly ducklings to flourish into beautiful swans."

You would think the mayor's comments would offend women, but he also managed to upset his biggest constituency — men. Apparently implying that the men are desperate for some ugly women didn't go over too well. The town's city councilor criticized Mayor Moloney for "returning us to the Dark Ages and making the guys that live in this town seem like sex-hungry starved men that will pounce upon the first girl that they see walking down the street."

While unlucky-in-love women might want to tap a town full of eligible bachelors, implying that they come because they're ugly probably won't motivate a whole lot of ladies to make the move.

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India and Australia Solve Food and Planet Woes With Dinner

CitizenSugar — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 14:30:22 -0700

Fire up the barbie, two countries are putting some creative meat alternatives on the menu: one to combat hunger, one to save the planet.

Given meat's effect on the climate, Australia is looking at how they can help and still have a chop every once in a while. Livestock grazing accounts for 11 percent of the country's emissions. The plan to remove seven million cattle and 36 million sheep by 2020 will lower greenhouse gases by three percent a year. What is on the menu instead? Replacing cows and sheep with kangaroo will give Aussies the same amount of meat for a much smaller eco-footprint.

Though kangaroo-kabobs seems odd, India's plan to combat hunger could be less palatable. To see what it is,

Party Like a Pilgrim! Pictures From Catholic World Youth Day

LibertySugar — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 10:30:09 -0700

If you were wondering what the Pope was doing driving around Sydney in the Pope mobile, his Holiness is in town for World Youth Day. The world's largest youth event, organized by the Catholic Church, has brought almost 125,000 international visitors to Sydney, more than the 2000 Olympics!

Every two or three years the Pope invites young pilgrims to celebrate their faith's international counterparts. Pope John Paul II started the event in 1984. This year the celebration being held in Sydney, Australia, from July 15 to July 20, includes an opening mass, catechesis (teaching) sessions, and a pilgrim dance party. One Vietnamese pilgrim said: It's like a big family, the Church gets to see how people from all over the world live their faith and it is interesting to see and it is inspiring to me."

From the look of these pictures, this "promotional event" seems like it gets young people excited about the Church. But, some Australians see the event as "propaganda" and are protesting the event, which received some public funding. A MySpace survey of Australian youth found that 77 percent of respondents felt the Catholic Church was "out of touch" with youth. Does this event help it get in touch?

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Seventy People Arrested in Australian Child Pornography Ring

CitizenSugar — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 10:00:10 -0700

The largest child pornography investigation in history has resulted in the arrest of over 70 people in Australia. The arrests were the culmination of a six-month investigation that spanned 170 countries. If that number doesn't blow your mind, consider this: the people arrested ranged in age from 19 to 81, and were from all walks of life, including a teacher, a youth worker, and a police officer.

The investigation was dubbed Operation Centurion, and collected information from a website containing downloadable pornographic images of children ranging from 18 year-olds to — get this — infants, being physically and sexually abused. No one is entirely certain where these images originated or the identities of the children in the photos.

During a 76-hour period of monitoring the site, it logged over 12 million hits, with 2,800 hits originating from Australia. The Australian Federal Police Commissioner said of this sting: “The AFP will not tolerate any form of child abuse in Australia or anywhere in the world and will continue to work with local and overseas counterparts to arrest those behind child exploitation.”

Though the arrests are a victory, the police sadly don't know if the children in the photos are still being abused.

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Front Page: Australia Leaves Iraq, GM to Close Plants, South Dakota and Montana Primaries

CitizenSugar — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 07:01:08 -0700

Australia Leaves Iraq: Australia has ended its combat operations in Iraq. One of the first countries to commit troops to the war in Iraq five years ago, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd made a campaign promise to bring the troops home — and they're set to return in a couple of days. Pegging his decision on the actions of the previous government, Rudd said, "of most concern to this government was the manner in which the decision to go to war was made: the abuse of intelligence information, a failure to disclose to the Australian people the qualified nature of that intelligence." Australia's 500 troops have helped to train 33,000 Iraqi soldiers. No Australian soldiers were killed in Iraq.

GM to Close Plants: Car maker GM, in response to a growing shift to smaller vehicles with better gas mileage, said yesterday that it would end production at four factories in the United States, Canada, and Mexico that produce trucks and sport utility vehicles. In perhaps the biggest news of all — the Hummer brand might be discontinued. The CEO says the market shift to smaller vehicles is permanent, "we at GM don’t think this is a spike or a temporary shift.". The company plans to build a new small car in Ohio in 2010. The cuts will affect about 2,500 workers at each of the four plants.
South Dakota and Montana Primaries: Voters head to the polls today in the last two primaries of the six month season. Obama will hold a rally tonight in St. Paul, MN — the site of the Republican National Convention — and Clinton plans what's being called by some, a "farewell speech" in New York. Obama is floating the idea of a “unity meeting” with Clinton to come together and regroup after the long and brutal primary battle with his rival. Check back tonight to see the results (and any major announcements) as they break.

Dude. What's the Deal With The Political Frat House Mentality?

CitizenSugar — Thu, 01 May 2008 09:00:36 -0700

Yay, I love that women get to be in politics, it's sooo awesome and we have it way, way better than a lot of ladies — but what the heck is going on with all of the dude behavior?

In Australia, Opposition leader Troy Buswell admitted to sniffing the chair of a female Liberal Party staffer. Um, ew. He turned suddenly sensitive however when he had to own up to the act, broke down in tears at a press conference and had to compose himself before telling the media that his shenanigan was inappropriate. Surely just a one-off joke gone wrong? Eh, he'd apparently also snapped the bra of a colleague inspiring a whole new slew of laws banning MPs from sexually harassing parliamentary staff. That's one way to inspire quick change in government I suppose.

Even the most prominent lady in politics at the moment, Ms. Hillary Clinton isn't safe from dude-ness. Right on the heels of the "pansy" situation, a local labor leader introducing Clinton and perhaps trying to pay her a compliment (?!) said the nation needed a leader "that has testicular fortitude." That's right. Testicular. Fortitude. Right or wrong, do people even say that? I say keep your fortitude in your pants, sir.

Have we become so comfortable with women in leadership roles, that the polite censoring has gone out the window, like gals are just "one of the guys," or do gaffes like this show something else? Are we really not as close to integrating women into power positions as we'd like to think? To check out Hillary's reaction to the labor leader's ballsiness,

Smart Women More Likely to Tie the Knot

CitizenSugar — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 00:00:54 -0700

Think it seems like the whole world is full of smart-and-savvy women skipping the altar to stay single? Not so according to recent research. Following a brief slowing trend among degree-qualified women reluctant to settle down, the tide has turned.

Though educated girls in their twenties do have a series of entertaining and short-lived relationships, by the time their 30s roll around they're marching down the aisle in record numbers. According to the study, the numbers of women with degrees who are married by the time they are 30 to 35 is higher than those without. By about 30, 61 percent of the women with a degree were married, compared with only 53 percent of women with no higher education qualifications.

One of the researchers said,

"There's something new going on, particularly among women. It's long been assumed that more educated women are less traditional and more financially independent and are therefore less likely to need to or want to marry. And indeed, this assumption has been borne out in the data for a long time. But now. . . we can see that in fact the pattern has reversed so that women with post-school qualifications, especially those with degrees, are now in fact more likely to be married than their counterparts with less education."

Does this surprise you? Do you know tons of smart women getting hitched?

For all of our network wedding coverage, be sure to check out I Do Sugar!

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My Country's Better Than Your Country! Who's More Stable?

LibertySugar — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 09:00:04 -0700

I always thought the United States was associated with wealth and stability. Well, apparently not according to the latest rankings of country stability and prosperity. The US is ranked 22nd, with a still respectable score of 93 out of 100, coming in behind Ireland, Portugal, Denmark, Australia, and France, to name a few.

Iraq just escaped the bottom ten, thanks to the high number of foreign troops and high level of oil revenue. But Afghanistan came in as the world's third most unstable country, thanks to its government's inability to control large regions of the country, and the fact that opium accounts for 50 percent of the economy.

Jane's Country Risk, the group that conducted the one year investigation, said that the proliferation of small arms (aka guns) owned by Americans, and dangerous drug trafficking on the Mexican border led to the US's drop in the rankings.

And who's number one? To find out

In Love, in Australia — Valentine's Day in Pictures

LibertySugar — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 15:30:48 -0800

In honor of my current Australian house guest, I got together some Australian looooove pictures so we can see the holiday from an international perspective. In Australia, Valentine's Day is a Summer holiday, which makes for some great shots! Check out how the Aussies celebrate love!

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Australia's Aboriginal People in Canberra For Their Apology

CitizenSugar — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 16:00:18 -0800

As we reported at the end of last month, Australia's new prime minister, Kevin Rudd, is set to apologize to Australia's Aboriginal population for past mistreatments.

The Aborigines are arriving in Canberra now for the Feb. 13 convening of Parliament. The pictures of their arrival are as striking as the event is historic.

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