CHARLES WOOLEY
Bert Newton’s joke at TV’s annual night of nights, the Logies, sends humourless socialmedia “critics” into a ludicrous over-the-top lather.
In the wake of the Logies and the fuss about poor Bert Newton’s very funny speech, I wish the newspapers wouldn’t dignify the narks of social media with the term “critic”.
They are not worthy of the title. They are mostly bored and boring, idle and ignorant fools whose lack of humour is exceeded only by their illiteracy. The label “critic” should imply some schooling, some knowledge of the subject and some informed deliberation before panning or praising. I don’t want to hear dumb, uninformed opinions (“having so many of your own, Charlie” you might be cruelly tempted to say) but grant me an opinion on this one because I was there and the socalled social-media “critics” were not. Indeed they were so busy dementedly keyboarding I doubt they even heard what wonderful old Bert had to say and how masterfully he said it.
The problem with social media is it is an echo chamber for every splenetic and vapid opinion. Drop in some half-witted, halfbaked assertion and hear it reverberate and magnify as the mentally unemployed join the clamour, drowning out Bert Newton’s masterful performance on the Gold Coast last weekend. See how the narks just love to take offence mostly on behalf of others who aren’t themselves offended. Indignation by proxy gets bigger and bigger until finally it makes the newspapers.
I have cancelled all social-media engagement and don’t miss it a jot but still it finds me through print. It is lazy journalism to build a newspaper story around anonymously sourced material and it is also annoying and ruins my poached eggs. Bert walked on to a standing ovation and off to tumultuous laughter and applause.
He woke up next day to find he’d gone from rooster to feather duster overnight.
Bert was presenting the Graham Kennedy Award for the Most Outstanding Newcomer so it was no surprise he reminisced about the late Kennedy, his old friend and collaborator. “He enjoyed giving young people a chance on television,” Bert, 79, told an audience happy to eat out of his hand. “He was a great mentor, he mentored a lot of young people,” said Bert. We all knew this was going somewhere and a gag was imminent but we were in thrall to the master’s phrasing and comic timing. Bert continued, “You knew if you went to his dressing room and it was locked, he would be inside doing some mentoring.” There was loud laughter in the room and no gasps of horror, nor a collective pursing of lips. Indeed, anyone there who knew Kennedy would have known that no one would have laughed louder than “The King” himself.
Bert might be a bit out of touch with our humourless times and admitted as much when he said younger viewers might see him on the screen and ask, “Where has this old poof come from?” Oops again. The social-media narks were in feeding frenzy. They were as joyous as a mob of medieval peasants at a witch burning. I will only quote one of these anonymous “critics” who said, “F--- you Bert Newton … and f--everyone who laughed,” wrote @cinegirl 14. She sounds like fun.
I have admired the tenacity of the cablecar protagonists but is it starting to look like the project might not get up? With the Cascade Brewery declining to wet the baby’s head it is indeed looking like a dry argument for the developers. Maybe it’s time for the team to cut its losses and look elsewhere. I have just the scheme for them.
A couple of years ago it came to me in a brilliant flash. Like Martin Luther King I had been to the top of the mountain and had seen the Promised Land. Well, a promised island really: Birdspeck. While I was mooching about on the cold alpine heath, a bird had left a calling card on my windscreen but I wasn’t getting back out of the warm car to remove it. It was a mere speck and didn’t impede my vision. As I swept around one of the middle bends on the way back down I enjoyed that dramatic view of our empty river and then it happened. The bird speck suddenly superimposed itself about midway between Battery Point and Howrah. In that moment I thought of Pinchgut Island in Sydney Harbour or Alcatraz in San Francisco Bay. It was a message from the gods of the mountain. Every great waterway needs an island. The Derwent is a great waterway and Birdspeck Island will be like a jewel on the lovely throat of our river.
I envisioned just a couple of acres of floating island. The technology to do this has developed rapidly in recent years. The Brooke St Pier, built locally by Fairbrother at the Incat site, is in effect a tethered island so it’s proven we can build it right here in River City. I see a low-profile isle, a small beach, a busy ferry pier, a couple of cafes and a romantic boutique hotel. Chuck in some green space and a couple of trees and it will be a great place to take the family.
Yes, your family. Unlike every other loony scheme you are threatened with, mine is actually about us. We will build it for the people who live here rather than for the people who don’t. Tourists won’t need a passport to get on to Birdspeck but it’s you I hope to meet there. I first ”floated” the idea believing we might for once rejoice in insularity. United we might embrace this exciting project, without me copping more abuse than poor old Bert Newton. Our island capital needs an island of its own. This is an idea whose time has come. Birdspeck Island. What’s not to like? What could possibly go wrong?