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Welcome to the Third World, or The Dark Ages, or Hell(?)



Knoxfield, Vic, Australia                                                                               
Saturday, 2nd Feb 2019


There are no non-Murdoch owned dailies in the newsagent.
The Age “wasn’t delivered for the second Saturday in two weeks” – evidence of the new owner’s – the Nine Network, downsizing, and solely financially-interested acquisition.
And so, rightly, I conclude, the descent of Oz into Third World status.

30 years ago, we had free universities for all and a vibrant print media. Now 20 years after the internet’s adoption, what...?
In the suburbs...?
The place where the voters live...?
Where a house will cost you a million dollars...?
In supposedly, the most progressive state of the nation…? –
God help us!

And so it is here I find myself with nothing to read and respond to – no dialogue;
And a writer in a Third World Country, or the New Dark Ages, if you prefer, can ONLY respond to what he or she sees, hears, feels, experiences – an ILLITERATE land,
A TRULY PRIMATIVE culture,
Where the only currency in ideas…
Is the dollar.

“God”, the Modernists said, was “…in the SHOUT OF THE STREET!”
What is that shout now? –
The streets are empty.
People HOME-ANAESTHETIZE (they call it “entertain”),
And when they shout it is mainly incoherent swearing
With the $dollar signs blocking out the ‘rude’ letters;
The mind/soul in a Hell on Earth.

One must argue that the only defense that The People
In Third World Countries have on their side has been COMMUNITIES;
But what do you call this automated/automaton Third World Country,
Where community is mostly absent?

And why I call it HELL, rather than Purgatory,
In that Purgatory at least has a WAY OUT – as long as SOULS UNITE…
To lift one out of its dominion…

No, when there is no JOINT CAUSE,
Because we are so IDEAS-POOR,
THERE IS Hell! –
The land from which there is NO WAY out.



©Mel From Melbourne 2019.

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