Bindi Irwin, daughter of the late Crocodile hunter Steve Irwin, may be the youngest person to ever address the National Press Club in Washington DC. According to ABC Online she follows in the footsteps of Winston Churchill, Indira Gandhi and Nelson Mandela.
But the new face of nature conservation got it wrong when she suggested koalas could go extinct in “my lifetime”:
“It is very sad that in my lifetime, a lot of wildlife could disappear,” she said, wearing her trademark khaki and pigtails. “We could lose tigers and gorillas and even my favourite koalas.” “We need to help my daddy’s work and make this world a perfect place for animals.”
In fact there is no evidence to suggest that the Australian koala is threatened with extinction, and some evidence to suggest some populations, including on Kangaroo Island, may benefit from culling.
How could Bindi get it so wrong?
Perhaps the economics of conservation favours ignorance and failure?
Indeed the Australian Koala Foundation has generated and maintained its support base on the false belief that the Australian koala is a species in decline and furthermore the organisation has not supported measures, in particular control burning, that may significantly benefit koala populations.
Jennifer Marohasy BSc PhD is a critical thinker with expertise in the scientific method.
‘How could Bindi get it so wrong?’
…
Jennifer: Lets make a bold statement; there are more scientific papers on the Koala topic than actual populations. Also numbers that could make up the entire national picture are as scarce as the trees they live on. Mega data please.
Well my theory is that koalas are under threat as they’re being abducted by aliens.
That’s as much evidence has been presented here so far so I think it’s a valid hypothesis.
So increasingly for an evidence based blog we see little serious evidence tendered.
And the politics of land clearing would make it mandatory to beat the drum of overstated threats to wildlife.
(Clear runway for predictable swarm of industry attack helicopters).
Wiki says:
The Koala was hunted almost to extinction in the early 20th century, largely for its fur. In recent years, some colonies have been hard hit by disease, especially chlamydia. The Koala requires large areas of healthy, connected forest and will travel long distances along tree corridors in search of new territory and mates. The ever-increasing human population of the coastal parts of the continent continues to cut these corridors by agricultural and residential development, forestry and road-building, marooning Koala colonies in decreasing areas of bush. The Australian Koala Foundation has mapped 40,000 km² of land for Koala habitat and claims it has strong evidence to suggest wild Koala populations are in serious decline throughout the species natural range. Although the species covers a massive area, only ‘pieces’ of Koala habitat remain. These pieces need to be managed, protected and restored in a coordinated way. Presently, many are being lost to weeds, cleared for agriculture, or carved up by developers. Other threats come from logging, poor management, attacks from feral and domestic animals, disease and roads.
In contrast to the situation on much of the mainland, where populations are declining, the Koalas of many island and isolated populations have reached what some have described as “plague” proportions. On Kangaroo Island in South Australia, Koalas introduced some 90 years ago have thrived in the absence of predators and competition. Combined with an inability to migrate to new areas, this has caused the Koala populations to become unsustainable and threaten the Island’s unique ecology. In particular, species of Manna Gum, native to the island, are being stripped by Koalas at a rate faster than they can regenerate, endangering local birds and invertebrates that rely on them, and causing the extinction of at least one isolated population of manna. Koala numbers are estimated at over 30,000, with ecologists suggesting that the Island can sustain 10,000 at most. Although culling has been suggested as a means to reduce Koala numbers, with the South Australian Government seriously considering such in 1996, this has met with fierce opposition both domestically and internationally, and the species remains protected. The popularity of the Koala has made the possibility of a cull politically improbable, with any negative perception likely to impact tourism and a government’s electability. In place of a cull, sterilisation and translocation programmes have had only limited success in reducing numbers thus far, and remain expensive. There is evidence that Koalas relocated to the mainland have difficulty establishing themselves in the different circumstances. A mooted alternative to the complex sterilisation method, wherein the animal must first be captured, are hormonal implants that can be injected via darts.
The Koala inhabits four Australian states. Under state legislation, the species is listed as Vulnerable in the South East Queensland Bioregion, Vulnerable in New South Wales and Rare in South Australia. The species’ national status is under review. The IUCN lists the species as Near Threatened.
Maybe Wiki is wrong?
So how about some serious analysis and recognition of the diversity of regional situations for a change?
There is a population of koalas just outside Adelaide in the hills. The South Eastern Freeway even has wire netting on the concrete median barrier, so they can cross over. It’s quite common to see them on the freeway. I have also seen several around Mt Gambier and in western Victoria towards Portland.
Jennifer, I think your comment that a species in decline attracts funding, and so there is no incentive to report that they are actually doing ok, is spot on. That’s one reason I am sceptical of the campaign to prove climate change is man made. A lot of careers down the gurgler if it is shown that humans have negligible effect on the climate.
It would probably be more correct to say the IUCN classifies the koala as Lower Risk / near threatened (which seems very loosely defined)
http://www.iucnredlist.org/search/details.php/16892/summ
The IUCN definition of koala habitat seems wrong. Would Wilson’s Promontory classify as subtropical? I would have thought it is temperate.
Bindi Irwin says we “could” lose them. Could, not will. You had better be bloody sure that in her lifetime, which could be some 90+ years, that she is not right before shooting down a comment by an 8 year old in flames, and that anthropogenic threats, disease, and so on do not send then down the path the tigers and gorillas are most certainly going.
First it is a children’s movie (Happy Feet) that you single out for ‘misleading’ information, now it is an actual child. Don’t you have anything more worthwhile than this to post on?
Paul: More significantly, a lot more careers down the gurgler if it is shown that humans are causing climate change, eh?
I’d suggest that enviroskepticism is a more profitable gig than enviroalarmism, or even the serious scientific study of the problem. Anyone have any real data on the economics of careers in denialism vs alarmism?
I guess all this rain shows just how wrong all those global warming alarmists really are!
Libby,
are you suggesting that when an 8 year old tells the national press club in the US something it should just be repeated … not questioned?
the little girl/Bindi should perhaps be at home (or on holidays) playing with her dolls and/or trucks and/or pets. but someone/some industry is using Bindi to progress their cause/make money for their cause/business/industry? pretty sad really and worth posting on at this blog because its all about politics and the environment …at the national press club in Washington DC. they are really putting her out there and she is unwittingly spreading misinformation in my opinion.
What misinformation? Still no numbers. You had better write a letter to the IUCN which is more significant as a policy issue.
So Slim – how does rain prove global warming “alarmists” wrong exactly and who are they anyway? Where has any serious AGW proponent had said it would never rain again. And so if the rain peters out or it turns dry again this will make the AGW crowd right will it – jeez – get a grip – what simplistic tosh. (suggest move any replies to drought thread).
No evidence tendered in the so-called evidence based blog. (as usual)
We recently had some overseas visitors who took a drive down the Great Ocean Rd and spotted lots of koalas
How much more proof do you need?
Jennifer: Bindi is probably exceptional even in the US, given their media style campaigns. IMHO we can’t take anything away from her, here or there.
Luke: My tongue was firmly in cheek. I guess I was just anticipating Bolt’s column next week! 🙂
‘but someone/some industry is using Bindi to progress their cause/make money for their cause/business/industry?’
Just a slight whiff of hypocrisy there!
Rhetoric is easy. Let’s see some evidence for a change…
Luke,
Always best to check the links provided in the original post…
you will find some numbers on koalas in the link provided in the last paragraph of the post:
“The political and
fund-raising success of the group has
been aided by its claiming that there are
fewer than 100,000 koalas remaining,
with numbers on the decline.
Yet by simply counting up a few
of the known koala populations, it is
evident that there would be well over
100,000 koalas in Australia—59,000 in
the mulga-lands of southwest Queensland,
25,000 in southeast Queensland,
8,200 in North Coast NSW,
and 27,000 on Kangaroo Island South
Australia. This quick count does not include
Victorian koala populations, with
a Monash University researcher suggesting
in 1998 that the Victorian koala
population could total one million.”
Libby, Any number of species could perish in a 90 year time frame,so “could” is always a possibility. But lets look at probability then. Koala numbers in the 1920s were estimated to have fallen to as low as 500 in Vic and extinct in SA. There are now some 15000 between both states. Population growth on Kangaroo Island also suggests a robust ability to procreate.
Comparing Koala to Tigers, with a total estimated population of between 5-7000, is not a correct representation of Koala endangerment.
As a foreigner I see Bindi’s statement on koalas just as a generalisation on ” what could happen” to our wildlife.
Methink this mentioning of koalas had to with the fact that she is an Aussie and wanted to point out an animal that was familiar to everyone.
Just a message in general, and not an expert opinion on some particular species.
I did – you should know better than that – pity no references hey?
“It is evident” ??
100,000 remaining koalas – did they? When?
A Victorian researcher suggesting? (Ms A Smith, Moonee Ponds?)
I’m sticking to my aliens abduction hypothesis at the moment.
Twenty years ago some of you could easily have said Tasmanian devils wont go extinct too.
What is the evidence “someone/some industry is using Bindi to progress their cause/make money for their cause/business/industry?” and why on earth should “the little girl/Bindi should perhaps be at home (or on holidays) playing with her dolls and/or trucks and/or pets”?
Australia Zoo has a large veterinary clinic attached to it which does a lot of work with injured native fauna. The cause Bindi might be being “used for” is this very hospital, because Bindi herself has seen so many koalas brought in from dog attack, road injuries, fires, habitat destruction, disease, etc, etc. Why does there have to be some dark, sinister side lurking that has possibly corrupted this child who is as naturally passionate about wildlife as her father and plainly doesn’t want to sit at home and do what grown ups think she should be doing? Why would anyone crush a child’s spirit like that, just because she used the koala as a species that COULD go extinct in her lifetime?
If you want to claim “they are really putting her out there and she is unwittingly spreading misinformation in my opinion” you are directly critical of her mother’s parenting skills for a start. Are you now saying that an 8-year old who should be at home playing with toys should know about misinformation and how certain groups can twist her words around to suit their own agenda, which is not that koalas COULD go extinct, but that they WONT?
Thank you Ann for some common sense. If Bindi Irwin gets kids sitting up and INTERESTED in wildlife, not to mention possibly giving a fig about it rather than their x-box, then perhaps you can weigh up for yourselves if it is really so bad that she mentioned at the National Press Club of the US that koalas COULD go extinct.
Libby, I suspect Bindi is doing “what grown ups [close to her] think she should be doing”. I question their judgement.
Jennifer,
There are persons who have had a hot spot for animals/ wildlife for whole their life , since they were little kids…and not being influenced by any organisations or whatever.
Maybe Bindi is just a natural… and has a streak of his father’s entertainment streak in her…
Not wanting in any way to compare myself to Bindi, but when I was in her age, me too was really interested already in all kind of animals.
Once in school we had a task… our job was to interview some person whose work we were interested in… I was in Bindi’s age and I interviewed the super-intendent for Swedens Zoological Museum.
Yeah, so some kids really find issues with animals/wildlife more interesting than playing with dolls or trains, video games, you name it….
Ann/Libby
I never intended to suggest that Bindi is not genuinely interested in animals and wildlife.
My concern is that she has been turned into a celebrity. … that she is perhaps being denied a childhood?
She is regularly on the front page of every second women’s magazine in Australia, and often on TV here.
Some celebrities complain that there is no freedom … that it is a bit like living in a zoo?
… and I didn’t think Libby approved of Zoos?
Anyway, Bindi is just another media performer….
Koala Not a Threatened Species, Says Top Science Body
AAP
Jul 14, 2006
CANBERRA – Australia’s great icon the koala is not in danger of extinction and is not a threatened species, a scientific committee has concluded.
Advice from the federal government’s Threatened Species Scientific Committee (TSSC) to Environment Minister Ian Campbell says koalas number in the hundreds of thousands and are not threatened on a national scale.
Senator Campbell said he had accepted the committee’s advice that the koala did not need to be listed as threatened under federal environment laws.
“This is reassuring news for Australia’s koala population and good news for those many Australians who have a deep fondness for this native Australian icon,” he said.
Senator Campbell said this was the third time a federal government scientific committee had considered scientific evidence for the koala, and the third time the evidence had shown it was not nationally threatened.
“The news is also supported by the World Conservation Union’s Red List of Threatened Species which, at its recent update, continues to include the koala in its lower risk category,” he said.
The koala was nominated for listing under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (EPBC Act) and was assessed by an independent panel of experts based on the best scientific information available.
The nomination was also subject to a two-month public comment period.
“Given a recent scientific report regarding the status of a retrovirus associated with the koala, however, I have asked the TSSC to review the conservation status of the koala in two years time,” Senator Campbell said.
“While the committee’s advice to me that the koala is not at threat nationally is reassuring, it did find that some local koala populations, subject to severe localised threats, have undergone large declines in numbers in recent years.”
Jennifer,
You are taking the same tact as so many, who seem to think that they know what is best for this child. She has obviously never had a childhood like many have, and has been exposed to celebrity, animals and being on show all her life. This is not something new to her. Why is this not healthy? Because it’s different? I wonder when people don’t think it’s healthy if it’s because they are jealous they did not get to live out their childhood dreams in real life. Don’t you think it would be far more detrimental for this little girl to suddenly be denied this and expected to play with dolls/trucks/pets?
As I mentioned before, you are also questioning her mother’s parenting skills. Why should Terri be any less a loving, supportive, knowledgable mother than you are?
What of all the little boys who tried out for Billy Elliot auditions recently, or the kids who are on TV commercials, in circuses/theatrical events, competing in high-profile sports, acting in movies, in beauty pagents, competing in science and other competitions around the world? I think it is pretty fair to say that some kids are way more advanced than their age would suggest, and that Bindi Irwin is one of these kids.
Recently it was announced just how far behind the rest of the world Australia is with regards to kids participating in science and maths. Maybe kids nowadays need good role models, and ones that aren’t adults. Go get ’em kids because it’s your furture us all-knowing adults are stuffing up.
I have faith in Terri Irwin’s and Bob Irwin’s judgement regarding Bindi. They have everything to lose if it is to the detriment to their daughter/grand daughter. I just wish others would leave them alone and stop thinking they know better. There is no handbook to good parenting.
Jennifer,
Your comment I have just responded to has changed before my very eyes. You originally questioned about it being healthy for an 8 year old. Not fair play, but it’s your game.
Regarding celebrity being like a zoo with no freedom, that judgement would be up to the individual. There are many celebrities who have kids and they themselves are celebrities. They are born into it and would know no different. This doesn’t make it right or wrong. It is simply a different life style than most of us have.
I have worked in captive animal facilities all my working life. I don’t approve of many aspects of zoos because I have seen how they operate from the inside and question their ethics and conservation spin. However, my little “zoo” which I work in and do talks for kids is about to be no more because the powers that be think interpretives such as computer screens are far more effective for teaching about wildlife than live animals are. Personally, I pray for more Bindis.
Libby,
I appreciate your comments, thanks.
You might be right, Terri and Bob might be making the best decisions for Bindi’s future by turning her into a celebrity, helping securing a future for Australia Zoo, and telling the world about how wonderful animals and wildlife is.
I’m not sure.
And I hope the press doesn’t turn on her one day down the track.
But I am sure that to suggest koalas are threatened with extinction is not “maths or science”, it is misrepresentation.
Indeed Steve Irwin promoted an approach to conservation that could be argued is counter productive as per my pieces on Steve Irwin for OLO here: http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=4880 and The Land here: http://www.jennifermarohasy.com/articles108.html suggest.
And “they” certainly don’t want us to “leave them alone” (as per your comment above), “they” appear to be actively seeking public attention particularly for Bindi.
” And I hope the press doesn’t turn on her one day down the track. ”
Aah Jennifer, you know media love the stars , but they even love more to knock them down from the piedestal.
I just wish they would get the precocious brat off my TV screen. I’m sick of her.
I could not stand her father, either.
Libby,
“Twenty years ago some of you could easily have said Tasmanian devils wont go extinct too”
What makes you think they will go extinct? Yes face tumour disease has reduced the population by 30-50% which is a tradgedy, but there are diease free areas which are likely to be fenced off to minimise disease transmission and the tumour/cancer is being studied closely.
Watch less TV Hasbeen, it’s making you stupid.
After all Paul W’s pretence of considering the science on GW, PB’s, etc he finally states his actual predecided position: “a species in decline attracts funding.. I am sceptical of the campaign to prove climate change is man made. A lot of careers down the gurgler if it is shown that humans have negligible effect on the climate.”
‘sceptical of the campaign to prove climate change’. His mind is made up, issue decided and so-called evidence dismissed accordingly. AGW is an agenda-driven campaign with a predecided outcome so that scientific consensus must be corrupt. No more pretence that reasoned exchanges are possible with Paul either.
The ‘common sceptics’ (your garden variety, unlike the ‘genuine sceptics’) are showing their true colours this month – among them, selfish, racist, supremist, evidence-free, short-termist, closed-minded, materialist and creationist. And careerist. Jennifer makes a career from being a common sceptic.
Jennifer has made wild accusations without evidence again, and she’s again editing posts after the fact to better suit her purposes. Anything to avoid having to reason or think. Going by the evidence presented, the alien koala abduction theory is equally plausible.
Jennifer’s claim “there is no evidence to suggest that the Australian koala is threatened with extinction” remains unsubstantiated by Jennifer. Intellectually sloppy or doesn’t know how to do secondary research?
Terri has said that after Steve’s death she asked Bindi what she wanted to do and Bindi wanted to continue her father’s work. She was already a minor celebrity. Should she have been told ‘no stay at home and play with toys’ like a normal anonymous child? Then she could grow up with frustrated desires like the adults who knock her.
Terri commented: “I think grief is a road every individual travels in their own way”
They were already used to being in the public eye.
“It’s like that fishing trip every weekend or going surfing with your dad – whatever that was special in your family”. “For some people it’s hard for them to do it again.”For some people they really need to do it again.”
Pinxi, I’m just guessing that the sun is well and truly over the yardarm where you are?
How did she get it so wrong?
Because she is the daughter of a boofhead who died a bimbos death while molesting wildlife for infotainment purposes. And she is now being exploited to keep the tourists numbers up at a tacky theme park just up the road from the ettamogah pub.
And all for the memory of a hypocrite who formed a charity to campaign against the sustainable use (farming) of native animals as a means of restraint of trade and maintaining the exclusivity of his own @#%&*$ zoo.
What next, the blow up Bindi sex doll for rock spiders?
You may not believe this, but the only living koalas in the U.S. are having to be kept alive in zoos. It’s true. Same thing with Canada. I’m sure that she meant extinction in those countries, as seeing how she was addressing a room of stupid, left-wing U.S. journalists who wanted something sensational. It’s Bush’s fault, too. Bindi in the footsteps of Winston Churchill…?! Proves my point about media intelligence.
If someone said that disease carrying fleas and mosquitoes might be eliminated, there would be some nuts having a rock concert to save them.
Ian every comment by you has some sort of sex reference in it. Do you have some sort of problem? You have precious little to contribute, although Jennifer is on your side, and to make matters worse you turn our stomachs with your sexual fetishes and exploits and try and talk like a homie. Crikey.
Mott you are a grub. How long do we have to put up with your vile comments. We’ve already had the “Ian’s Guide to Europe” stuff.
You’re beneath contempt on this issue. Get some help. Don’t delete it Jen – leave it as a memorial of how bad it gets.
We now have
(1) assault government staff
(2) arson recommended
(3) destroy your remnant vegetation
(4) dynamite bilby colonies
(5) bullocky’s daughter
and now the absolute bottom.
At some stage people become liabilities to causes.
Revolting.
I complained about Ian’s coments at an earlier thread but was told by him to ‘cut the mock outrage’. I am glad others find his coments unsettling.
Is this fellow a bit more subtle than Motty:
http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=5410
Get off it Jennifer. You’ve censored Motty before and even banned him for a while. You’re so happy to take whatever support you can get for your evidence-weak stories that you’ll defend Ian’s violent, sexist, immature sleaze. It distracts attention from your unsubstantiated accusations. Enough of the disgusting sexual references Ian, they only lead us to the conclusion that you lead a small and frustrated life.
Jennifer I can’t comprehend how you can gallop around on your high horse of good parenting skills and then ignore Ian’s paedophile comment. Meanwhile you edit and delete plenty of other innocent enough remarks simply because they present inconvenient truths for you. That reflects as badly on you as on Ian.
Well Daniel has it wrong on at least two counts. For a start, it is Terri Irwin who is the Tourism Ambassador, not Bindi. Secondly, to say not one person is standing up to say “is this appropriate”?. Where has he been? It has been debated on every talk-back radio show, cuurent affairs program, women’s magazine, blah, blah, blah.
I find it incredibly amazing how people can preach as if they know what is right for others whom they have never even met. Where do people get off telling others what they think of their parenting skills in a public forum? If anthropomorphising is bad for animals, how can it be justified when people place their own emotions on other people who actually have a voice?
As for the comparison with Ian’s comment, and Ian’s comments in themselves. Really irksome quite frankly, and they seem to be getting worse. I can’t understand how some of the comments here, such as Rog’s “abo” one and Ian’s Scandinavian holiday fest plus the above, get to stay but others get deleted because…? because they don’t conform with the mother’s club POV?
Libby and Pinxi,
The original post, by me, was about a speaker at the NPC presenting misinformation about Koalas.
The issue of parenting, specifically by Terri, was raised by Libby.
There are now a few choices?
Should I start at the beginning of this thread and delete all comments?
Alternatively just edit out those comments that relate to Bindi and parenting?
If I had seen some of the comments, including by Motty, when they were first posted I would have edited if not deleted then and there. But once the next comment feeds on the one before? It becomes difficult particularly becauce Pinxi will scream censorship whatever decision I make.
Anyway, where do you think I should start?
PS I don’t read every comment and am not aware where the ‘abo’ and ‘scandanavian’ comments are. I usually delete comments when the request is made. As regards the above thread, Luke specifically requested the comment from Ian stay. I consider Ian’s comment both offensive and insightful.
On censorship I object because:
– you’re highly biased and selective according to who supports you
– you edit posts rather than think or justify your claims
– you edit without stating that you have edited a post (an attempt to get away without justifying your position). That is the lowest of the dishonest sneaky lows.
Why make this out to be complicated unless your own values are confused? Just replace Ian’s paedophilia line with a sentence that says “offensive sentence deleted by Jennifer”. Easy. Makes it clear that you’ve edited out that content and discourages further offensive content.
The line’s usually clear when illegal and widely offensive actions come up eg violence or destruction to certain people or listed heritage and conservation items, paedophilia, several 4 letter words, and abusive racist terms. The line is very clear, your readers are telling you, whenever Ian brings up irrelevant sexual content as he keeps doing; and whenever rog makes racist slurs.
I just read your PS. What the hell is insightful about “blow up Bindi sex doll for rock spiders?” and why would you pay any attention to Luke now when you usually reject the scientific content he posts? Isn’t Luke toying with you? You’re one confused puppy. Leave it in, personally I think that reflects appropriately on your judgement and ‘insight’.
In answer to my last question, what next? It is obviously the resurrection of the lord Steve as the second comming of Christ in La La Land.
Defamation is an interesting concept. It means comments designed to induce people to shun someone. Here in Queensland, due to recent legislative changes by Beattie to satisfy the Power Industry Unions, it is no longer against the law to defame the dead. This change was made to enable open slather on Premier Joh by unionists intent on revenge for 20 year old wrongs. And the end result was that a man who left politics with not much more than he entered politics 25 years earlier, was branded corrupt in a way that was deeply offensive to his grieving family and many other Queenslanders.
And as the law now stands, it is impossible to defame a pseudonym or a person who cannot be identified. So a non person using an alias like “pink pants” or a part person known only as Luke, Travis or Libby, cannot be defamed because any public comments cannot be traced back to the private individual.
It is only those who use their full name in public forums who can be defamed and even when the defamatory statement is made by a non-person, or part person, a real victim of the crime of defamation is quite within his or her rights to subpoena the records of the publisher (blog host) to identify the perpetrator and seek the full range of legal remedies.
In the posts above, a copy of which I have already taken, there are a number of attempts to turn my comments, that convey a contempt for paedophilia, into some sort of evidence of the direct opposite. Indeed, Travis has, by his pathetic, early teen use of an implication that I am a “homie”(sic) also managed to breach the sexual discrimination legislation.
Now this may give a certain impunity to a pup who probably has not yet even qualified for a credit card. But others on this forum who may have accumulated a modest net worth should be well advised to be in no doubt that, should they place themselves squarely in the legal cross hairs, as it were, that I am capable of taking all necessary legal remedies.
Those who might care to read my past posts would realise that my invective is rarely directed at identifiable individuals unless preceeded by an exchange of provocative statements. My stongest statements are always directed at either an occupational class or a political persuasion, not individuals.
And in a nation where people are routinely villified and persecuted on the basis of their farming occupation or family background, this is nothing more than giving the perpetrators a good dose of their own medicine.
And if anyone here needs a lesson in the importance of the distinction in law between defaming an individual and an indeterminate class then I will be only too pleased to provide it. Make my day.
One of those personas you ignorantly attack Ian has made their full identity clear and posted here many times in an expert capacity. You’ve chucked your soiled envelope at them and called them offensive names without taking any note of the identity and expertise of that person.
Why would anyone else want to make their identity clear when you’ve threatened to come around and perform violent acts to their person?
The paedophile reference offers no more illumination than did your youthful sexual tales that made us all vomit.
Ian – nice try. This is not about defamation. Don’t get all high and mighty about use of the law. Pretty piss weak and gutless really for someone involved in robust debate. It’s about exceptional poor taste.
It’s OK to play this game pretty hard, an occasional bit of verbal biffo and the vernacular are fine, but I think there are some standards.
You could say “I withdraw the comment” and Jen could then delete all related comments and we’ll never mention it again. (But that’s up to you).
We could then return to beating each other quietly with rhetorical 4 x 2s.
P.S. It was interesting that those power workers sacked by Joh were not the ones who turned off the switch. My father in another industry had his termination notice handed to him by a neighbour’s child even though he had no vote in the strike. So don’t talk to me about Joh’s standards ! And Joh’s decision not to take super was his own. Meanwhile back at the ranch.. .. ..
“The issue of parenting, specifically by Terri, was raised by Libby.”
This was because of a comment you made about what is good for 8 year olds that you later deleted and also your comment at 1:12pm on 21 January “they are really putting her out there”. It seems to have been a progression from this particular comment (plus the deleted one).
Ian, common decency is all it takes. Some here have expressed concern for your past comments, but any rational human being would take a step back and say ‘sorry, let’s meet on some common ground’ not rabbit on about defamation and legal proceedings. Travis was obviously not referring to you as a “homie” but rather that you were using terms used by such a group, so who is doing the twisting? What did Russell say about anger management classes?
Jennifer: We seem to have lost sight of our Koalas here
For the record I did not delete, and have never deleted, a comment that I have made. I did add to a comment in the above thread IMMEDIATELY after I posted. I did not intent to change its meaning, though I may have.
As regards the comment by Ian Mott, I don’t think it was mad in anger or intended to some how condone paedophilia. I suspect that Ian simply does not agree with Steve Irwin’s environmental politics or with 8 years girls being thrust onto the world stage and potentially exposed to an adult world.
A problem at this thread is that many would like Bindi and the Irwins to be revered, not critised.
I can’t think of a precedence for the current situation. Indeed 8 years old actors and dancers have become celebrities, but Bindi is being turned into a celebrity to sell a political and evangalistic message.
Those who agree with the message may come to revere her as they did her father.
Is there a precedence?
and equally…
Those who DISagree with the message may come to DESPISE her as they did her father.
I would be inclined to ignore most defamatory posts as most observers can see through the facade. But “pink pants'” last one made the completely false claim that I had threatened a poster with physical violence and that I had been banned from this site. The only absences from this site on my part have either been for holidays or out of disgust at the activities of gutless people who hide behind pseudonyms.
So, leaving aside all this confected outrage, wot about these bloody koalas?
We might have to leave this ‘discussion’ there.
Ian Mott is correct to point out that I have never banned him or anybody else from this site. It is possible to ban a commentator by blocking their IP address.
I have deleted comment from Ian Mott, Pinxi and others on various occasions.
I do not intend to start blocking IP addresses. However, I am going to stop further comments at this thread at least for the moment as Pinxi is continuing to re-post comment after it has been deleted.
I regret having to do this and it is a first time.
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Update 5pm 22nd Jan
Libby has requested this comment be added to clarify her position:
Jennifer,
I do not wish to harp on with this particular point, but I am incensed that you are saying you did not delete a comment you made regarding how you question if it is healthy for 8 year girls to be doing what Bindi is doing. This was on 21 January, in the post now timed at 4:46pm. The comment was added to as well, which prompted me to reply regarding zoos, and you have recognised this.
In the greater scheme of things, it doesn’t matter, but I do not wish to be made out to be fabricating points. As for it being “A problem at this thread is that many would like Bindi and the Irwins to be revered, not criticised.” That is extraordinary. Maybe the problem is that some here would like to see the Irwins criticised. Is that at all a possibility?
You did after all, post this thread criticising Bindi Irwin for ‘getting it wrong’ on koalas.
And why is it a “problem” anyway?? Is it then also a “problem” when people at this blog don’t agree with whaling, or logging or culling or AGW or threatened polar bears?
I originally posted a response to this saying that Bindi Irwin had said “could” regarding the extinction of koalas in her life time. This had nothing to do with not wanting any Irwin to be criticised, and for the record I have plenty of criticisms. The fact now anyone who defends the Irwins has/is a problem is really irrational and as evidence-based as all your other arguments.”
end of comment.
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