Man with knife.

This item was published in the local paper today, might be of interest to some of my Aussie readers...

“Portland Observer.”

Monday, August 9. Page 5.

“A knife at the movies leads to large fine.”

A knife?? At the movies?

On the screen, surely??

The plot thickens…

“I’m going to cut you into little pieces”; police said the defendant told a woman, sent to escort him from the theatre.

A fine? For an offence as serious as this?? Is this some kind of joke??

I noticed at the top right hand corner of the page that the paper I was reading was the “Hamilton Spectator”, not the “Portland Observer”; clearly a misprint. Tell me that a man armed with a knife threatening a woman with death and dismemberment & only receiving a $650 fine, was also merely a misprint.

It cannot be fair dinkum.

But the more I read, the clearer it became to me that this was not fiction. It was not a bad movie. It was fact.

I spent the entire morning after reading this article researching the legality of the matter, because something did not seem right to me. In my days as a ‘walloper’, a man with a knife, threatening to cut a woman into ‘little pieces’, would have been charged with ‘Threat to Kill’ under the Crimes Act. Is this kind of act not STILL an Indictable offence, punishable by a term of imprisonment?

In my time as a serving police officer- over ten years- this kind of situation would call for nothing short of a hand up brief. I dealt with many such situations, as most police officers sadly do, and our efforts were usually rewarded with the offenders being punished appropriately. But now?? Have we eased up on offenders threatening innocent people with knives? If so, why?

Is a knife not considered a serious weapon any more??

I was stabbed in the line of duty while stationed in St Kilda, and know first hand how much damage a knife can do. A few short years ago, I was attacked by a man armed with a knife while waiting for lights to change at an intersection in Ferntree Gully, a suburb of Melbourne. I reported it to Belgrave Police. They investigated, the offender admitted to the offence, and I never heard anything more about it.

Clearly, being armed with a knife and threatening to use it against innocent people is no longer a serious offence.

Not wanting to believe any of this, a voice inside my head reminded me I might not be in possession of all the facts.

But what the hell else do we need to know? The matters for consideration are so simple, is it not possible we are simply labouring under the groundless misapprehension that we have missed something?

Here are the matters again, one by one. One idiot. In a public place. Armed with a knife. Threatening to cut an innocent women up ‘into little pieces’. What on earth else could we possibly need to know?

And this piece of garbage is awarded a fine. Of an amount comparable with that awarded to Grandpa if he allows his registration to expire.

It beggars belief. It defies comprehension. I simply cannot get my head around it; a clear threat to kill and dismember in a public place. I keep thinking, ‘what if that woman had been my mother’?? What if that woman had been his learned worship’s mother? I have a feeling the punishment would then certainly have fit the crime. But this woman was an ordinary person, who clearly had no mates, no contacts in the judicial system. I can only surmise the offender must have been a mate of someone in that very same system, to get such a light tap on the wrist.

I see the way this works now. It doesn’t.

What the hell has happened to us? What has happened to this country? What the bloody hell has happened to this town??? Once upon a time this town & its citizenry would not have stood for such shoddy backwoods inbred ‘justice’. It was common enough in the city to see this kind of transgression, where the chances of getting a fair shake from the judicial system was a game of two up…but here?

This town used to give a damn. It used to look after it’s own. But now?? Am I the only person shocked by this distinct ambivalence toward the citizens of Portland & their safety in public places?? Am I the only one whose breath has been taken away by this gross corruption of community values and standards pertaining to decent behaviour in a public place?

It was only a few short weeks ago I had to tackle a thug such as the aforementioned, behaving in much the same manner on municipal council property, in public and in broad daylight. What on earth is going on??

We have lost so much of what our Diggers fought and died for.

Did these brave warriors fight and die for our right as men to carry knives & threaten women with dismemberment if they dare to question our boorish behaviour?

Somehow I don’t think so. I haven’t seen a Digger lately to ask- they are a little scarce, and there are very few men left who know what this spirit is- but I don’t think so, somehow. Can you imagine a Digger of the type who spilled blood at Gallipoli putting up with an ill-mannered lout with a knife, threatening to kill people in a cinema?? Not on your bloody life.
The fact that our judiciary have seen fit to thumb it’s nose at prevailing community standards & give this offender a smack on the behind instead of a punishment fitting the crime, causes me nothing short of abject despair.

I don’t know who or what we are in this country anymore, putting up with outrageous crap like this. This is not the Australian way. This is not what I grew up believing.

So what do we do? What can I do?

For starters, I can extend an apology.

I apologise to that poor woman who had to put up with this oxygen thief with the knife, & had to wear a highly offensive threat which she did not deserve from the worst kind of misogynistic antisocial garbage, all for doing nothing more than her job. I have been carved up with a knife for doing nothing more than my job, and it ‘aint pleasant. I truly sympathise with this poor woman, not to mention those in the cinema audience who had to witness this shameful spectacle; a show they did not pay for, with a very crappy ending.

It is unforgivable; not only the nature of the offence, but the fact the court saw fit to let the offender off so leniently.

To that woman…I’m sorry. We as a community have let you down.

When I was in the Police Academy, my Law Sergeant once told me ‘you can forget about justice; it just doesn’t exist.’ As a young trainee, I did not believe him; but now I suspect he was probably right.

There is no justice.

Not for that woman, nor for the next woman inevitably and inexorably to be threatened by this unconscionable brute, now acting for all intents and purposes with the blessing and sanction of our incomprehensibly relaxed legal system.

The courts may have forgotten the right of the citizens.

But I shall not forget. Not ever…

“Lest We Forget”…



John Warwick Arden

Portland Action Committee.

soulsevolve@hotmail.com

The Love Imperative

You might remember a few weeks ago I mentioned that a local doctor committed suicide; it has been a topic of much conversation in town ever since.

I spoke to a friend recently, who shared with me the details of his own suicide attempt. As I heard his story, I waited patiently for the reason why he wanted to end it all. And the reason?

A broken heart.

That makes sense; those MF’s can hurt. I listened as he spoke of being in love, and then from out of nowhere- no warning- she left. I sympathised, from the comparative safety of my own relationship, and thanked God this was not me- until my own relationship collapsed in a similarly unexpected fashion shortly after.

I am not the most stable chap walking the planet, but I was not seized with a frantic urge to end it all. I’m not against suicide; certain toxic creatures ought to finish up if they imagine there is a chance they might hurt or kill others. But I did not feel possessed by an urge to take an early exit myself.

Why? Because I know how to break up.

I’m not all that good at keeping a relationship afloat, but I am well versed in the art of the collapse. I have had plenty of practice at it. And it was at the conclusion of my latest effort that my mind went back to the friend who shared his own sad story, and his own ensuing suicidal feelings.

All this man wanted was to love, and to be loved.

I remember at the time, saying to him, these were not unreasonable expectations.

Or are they?

I know the importance of self-love, and unconditional love for others, but I also know there is another kind of love; and in this age of the self-help generation, it has almost become an unspoken filthy little secret.

I would rather tell people I have a foot fetish than a childlike crush. By force of habit, I seem to have become conversant in hiding my need for a special ‘groovy kind of love’ as if it were a dirty magazine. In the age of existential chic, diminished expectations, and the romance of living ‘lone wolf’ style, I realized over time I have come to be almost ashamed of my secret desire- the desire for romantic love.

I wonder if I have not become so estranged from this not unreasonable or unnatural desire that I now exist in the half life of a perpetual state of self sabotage?

I am so cool, I know romantic love is a rarity- and it remains so because I keep it so. Not unlike regarding a hamburger as a delicacy merely by not allowing myself to have one- or having one, denying myself full enjoyment of it.
Henceforth, I keep love at arms length, so that when it inevitably ends, it does not hurt the way it might do if I immersed myself fully.

Nor, of course, do I feel the relationship as deeply as I ought.

The answer? Probably to shoot myself.

Which brings me closer than I imagined to how my suicidal friend at the beginning of the story felt- albeit in a very different way, for different- and yet in a strange way identical- reasons. We all want to love, and be loved.

We fail, and are told it is something we are doing wrong, until we correct it.

We then fail again, in different ways.

Over and over again, as we drift further and further away from our core self and its natural, authentic impulses, in a tangle of weird compensatory strategies, knot upon knot until we no longer know who we are or what the hell we want; and in the process we become so desolate, self-destruction makes perfect sense.

My own hypothesis is that humans are stuck with this self- perpetuating destructive streak, and pursue it to its inexorable conclusion into war and desecration of nature…

All because we are unable to love.

We had better find a solution; ere we wipe the species from the face of the earth in an orgy of addiction to self hate…

Time to lay down our weapons of fear and loathing, and return to where it all began…

To genuine, old fashioned home-style love??

Maybe…