My contention today is that there is something terribly wrong with the world. I will attempt to demonstrate this by proving my not unrelated contention that there is something very wrong with the channel 7 morning news/lifestyle program sunrise [the lower casing is an intentional design. They’re hip, you see]. For starters, in a bravura piece of graphic styling, the opening credits show the nifty abridged logo, sr, morphing into the more substantive [though still hip] main logo, the aforementioned sunrise. Now, not to be a pedant, though I have every intention of behaving just like one, I’d like to point out that ‘sunrise’ is one word, and that therefore ‘sr’ is an illegitimate acronym currently being perpetrated against the Australian viewing public. Gasp. I’d like to finesse a claim about this superficial inaccuracy being a symbolic omen of the more profound sense of implausibility that permeates the program in terms of tone, style and content, but that would be an exercise in simplistic over-reaching. And it would be far too neat. And short. So, as I have a lot of pent-up hot air to express, I have opted for the scenic route [whose length does not in any way entail that complexity and clarity will have been delivered by its end].

Okay. Just to make known the position of rectitude from which I am speaking, I must declare that the continued presence of sunrise on my beloved television leaves me bitterly resentful at times, and ungenerously contemptuous at others. In my better moods, I can regard it with baffled incredulity. But these statements should not hold great weight for you. I promised evidence of the crapness and jarring wrongness of sunrise [oh, and word to the wise, I consider loaded language to be my rhetorical prerogative], so now, in aid of my position, I will deliver some documentary material that I archived yesterday. […insert imagined sound of throat clearing importantly, perhaps even pompously…] On Thursday 24 July 2003, sunrise began in what I consider to be a questionable way. Whatever it was , it wasn’t subtle. Allow me to set the scene. The opening image presents us with the prospect of a boat steaming across an impossibly blue Sydney Harbour. Strains of The Age of Aquarius form the sonic backdrop. The voice-over begins as the images switch. We are buffeted in quick succession with ‘Australians enjoying their Australian lifestyle’ images, consisting of such sunny pearls as happy and care-free swimmers under the easy-going and MATEY eyes of life-savers, surfers basking in glorious AUSSIE sunlight [who are no doubt easy-going also. I mean, they are Aussie males], small children patting baby KANGAROOS, smiling ferry passengers dressed like Wiggles and waving colourful hats [I’m not exactly sure what message this is supposed to send. It might be considered fruity], more small children waving Australian FLAGS [a more responsible image, you must agree], and then footage from a Dave Matthews Band film clip which depicts a man hugging random people on the streets of New York. This is all odd. But it ain’t got nothing on the script that was aired over it. Set your face to horrified as I repeat the text, verbatim, that this program thought an inspiring beginning to both a purported news program, and, more importantly, to your day. Because, as you will see, what they most want to impress upon you is the notion that this show is all about you… though, it isn’t. Here follow the words that rocked me out of my early morning torpor; Stand by Australia, it’s time to make a difference. Time to focus on the good, and forget about the bad. This morning on sunrise, we launch our new campaign. We want Australia to unite, to share in the spirit of friendship. In fact, we want to give you a big warm hug… At this point voice-over man details the personages who are ‘on location’ in certain capital cities… They’re standing by, waiting to give you a hug. Plus, we’ll chat to June Dally-Watkins on the protocols of public touching. Right across Australia, welcome to the Age of Love. Welcome to the Age of Hugs. Welcome to sunrise on Seven. And now, from Brekky Central, David Koch and Melissa Doyle. I fucking kid you not. Now, before you say anything, this is not a sweet gesture originating from a humanitarian impulse. It’s a fucking devious self-promoting ploy, part of a new concerted effort at market repositioning that has been underway for a little while. Channel Seven has been running a lot of freaky and clunky adds spruiking the pleasures of a morning spent in the company of the sunrise team. One ‘catchphrase’ [though it lacks the catchy quality of such entities] that I can proffer as further evidence of an ulterior motive for this new Age of Love is this; [imagine voice-over man voice, and concomitant emphatic meaningful pauses] sunrise. The place for news. The place for optimism. The place for fun. Ads for the show generally contain many - oh god, so many - images of the hosts laughing laughing laughing, with a few playful swipes at each other thrown in for good measure. The message is clear, and it screams that sunrise is a riotous way to begin your day. Not that it promotes rioting at all, is that clear? And, should you choose sunrise, there’s a veritable bacchanal in store for you. But not in that unseemly way, okay? It’s good clean fun. And it’s fun. And clean. This is the message. And for some inexplicable reason, someone seems to have made the untenable decision of locating much of the show’s promoted ‘personality’ in the personage of David Koch [but you can call him Koshy, because he’s clearly your mate], who is a craphead. Anyway, back to Thursday the 24th July. The subtle-as-a-sledgehammer introduction was a foretaste of the new piece of preening that the sunrise team have dubbed Our Make A Difference Campaign [now, I’m not certain whether or not the ‘our’ is part of its official title, but as ‘our’ never fails to be attached to the rest of the campaign descriptors, I feel that such re-titling is not a misrepresentation on my part]. The rationale they proffer to justify inflicting such crap as this on us is that we need crap like this because of the miserable weather and depressing news. Fuck! They are spreading love through hugs! There might be other prongs to “Our Make A Difference Campaign”, but I didn’t stick around to hear them because I was going to puke [and because I wanted to limit my exposure to any actually constructive plans they might have so that I could maintain my rage, which is as follows]... Christ! They could fucking make a difference by bringing at least some semblance of fucking rigour to their presentation of the issues raised by the ‘big bad news stories’. Geez. But I must relent for the tale to continue. Hugs, yes. Koshy, of course, couldn’t pass up this opportunity to beat us over the head with his ‘jovial’ schtick. Oh, such merry times they were having, and what a great job he has ‘here at Brekky Central’ that it provides him with an excuse to manhandle his co-anchor, and all for a good cause [unspecified]. Oh Koshy, you’re one in a million. In response, Melissa Doyle does that laugh that she has to do everyday at Koshy’s incessant attempts to ‘lighten up proceedings’ and inject ‘personality’ and provide ‘fun’ through an informal [but oppressive] tone. I don’t know how he has managed to dictate the tone of this program, because he is its most recent addition. But the women do play along. Oh Koshy. Here he goes. Isn’t he just incorrigible? Blah blah blah. He’s jingoistic, incurious and set in his understanding of the world. Nevertheless, sunrise presents the same news as everybody else, despite its urgings to ‘forget the bad’, and despite the rollicking ride it promises to divert your attention from such unpleasantness. Which leads us to things worldly and disturbing on a more urgent level.

George Bush has hailed the deaths of Saddam Hussein’s sons as the end of an era. He says that their deaths [bloody and violent] are the clearest sign yet that the former Iraqi regime is dead; “Now more than ever, all Iraqis can know that the former regime is gone and will not be coming back”. I don’t know if he intended this to be a powerful statement, but such a thing is not comprised of reiterating the fact that, now that they are dead, two ranking members of a regime won’t be able to wield their power anymore, nor be able to instigate a movement to recapture their former positions, NOW THAT THEY ARE DEAD! Bush gave no indication that these deaths were not necessary to secure the certain end of the regime. And he gave no indication that these deaths were a bad thing at all. The whole death=bad nexus is being exploded and I’m freaking out. Actually, this particular nexus [god I’m a wanker] seems rather prone to explosion ‘in times like these’. And it is very disturbing. The news of such extra-judicial summary executions has been greeted with either calm or celebration. People are cheering in a satisfied ‘chalk-that-one-up-to-our-team’ kind of way. It’s upsetting. On Letterman, when he mentioned the deaths in his opening monologue, the crowd erupted with gleeful malice. I have a problem with this. Another problem I noticed was that, although the death of Qusay’s 14-year-old son alongside his father was reported in all the Australian news reports, there was nary a mention of it in the NBC reports that I saw on NBC Today. When a guest mentioned in passing that this was the case, attention was quickly directed to the other guest [by Katie, I’m ashamed to say], and it seemed that the ‘dead child’ element of the story was assiduously not being pursued. But, even if NBC isn’t touching it, it has to be getting reported to Americans, right? It must be. The ‘ferocious firefight’ is the dominant news story, and it shouldn’t fail to be mentioned that among the oft-repeated ‘4 dead’ is a young boy, right? Right? Even if his death will immediately be rationalised as ‘unavoidable considering the circumstances’, I think it says something strange that this information isn’t even being delivered in news updates and reports that deal specifically with this story, not even in that matter-of-fact tone that tries not to draw attention to itself. I don’t understand the reticence. This boy’s death is one of the primary consequences of this ‘great’ watershed moment. It is just as apt for airing as all the other facts being reported. And it’s important. I was never going to be of the mindset to be happy at the news that the US had ‘got’ Saddam’s sons. It’s anathema to me to be happy about any such thing. But the killing of the boy made it even more plain to me how important it was to prioritise apprehending people and putting them on trial over the idea [which is firming more and more into a principle] that killing people summarily, without an airing of the evidence and without allowing them the opportunity of defending themselves, can produce a good outcome. Basing the use of lethal force on a tip-off, and rationalising the use of such force because of its ‘effectiveness’, can lead very easily to very bad things, eg. the death of a 14-year-old boy. Shit. I actually don’t want to be the asshole who uses a death as a punch line in an argument, so you can just strike that last statement. I do not live in a world that could consume unperturbed such a crass use of information. I do not. I do not. I do not. I think that this point needs to be made, so I am making it; you don’t just kill people. And you particularly don’t just kill people when you are striking a fucking blow against tyranny in the name of freedom, justice, and democracy. This is a well-trodden argument, I know. But too much behaviour flies in the face of it, and does so without raising comment. Seriously, why can’t there be an emphasis at military training level on gaining skills in procedures that don’t consider killing the most viable option in such situations? Apprehending people who represent a danger to you is more the kind of conduct that best represents the self-understanding of a democratic state than killing them does. The absolute worst thing a democratic state can do, the thing that most blights and delegitimises it, is to condone and facilitate and perform summary executions, and to celebrate extra-judicial outcomes. Charges need to be examined, and challenged in relation to other accounts, so that a just repercussion can be decided. You know, that old chestnut. It seems that, without comment, things just proceed like this. We go crazy. Bad things happen. Then we remember that whole ‘equality before the law/ basic right of existence’ thing, and we promise that we won’t let our craziness override such overarching values, so that next time, maybe, we will keep our honour. And then we allow ourselves to let our concerns be mollified by partial justifications and a stampede of people rushing to judgment. So then BANG. Bad things happen. We run full pelt in the opposite direction to that which will do us any good, and it’s like HEY, WHA’ HAPPENED? God I’m a preachy little bastard today, and so unfocussed in my anger. Here’s the part where I say that ‘things don’t just happen’, and that ‘conscious choices are made to move away from a position that keeps important priorities in full and unobstructed view so that bad things don’t happen’, blah blah blah. I don’t like bad things. If they happen to others they can just as easily happen to me. So they should definitely be restricted to effect nobody. But when they happen they should at least garner a reaction. They should at least be acknowledged as bad things.