Dr John Dee

Do we have to go round in this circle again? Having locked a previous thread I've felt disqualified from commenting until now, but I'm also getting to the point of wondering why this thread needs to stay open.

Well, maybe that's got something to do with his being a Richmond supporter.

Seventh post in. Honestly.

All this thread is doing is trying to reopen a discussion which Jack closed for good reason. Give Goodes a rest for a while, please.

This might not quite belong here (although it does contain one suggestion about improving the game) since it picks up on a few other threads/arguments, mainly Munga's observations about responses by strangers to the game and Special Robert's spoonful of sarcasm about a nineteenth century 'golden age' ... maybe there was a golden age closer to us, and maybe someone unfamiliar with the game could see what we certainly can't now. I came across this in doing some research on spiritualism in Australia (don't ask, but no I wasn't desperately looking for a more radical solution to the MFC's woes). It's from Arthur Conan Doyle, perhaps paradoxically a spiritualist despite his famous creation's obsessive rationalism. Conan Doyle visited Australia in 1920 and was at the grand final that year: One of my first afternoons in Melbourne was spent in seeing the final tie of the Victorian football cup. I have played both Rugby and Soccer, and I have seen the American game at its best, but I consider the Victorian system has some points which make it the best of all—certainly from the spectacular point of view. There is no off-side, and you get a free kick if you catch the ball. Otherwise you can run as in ordinary Rugby, though there is a law about bouncing the ball as you run, which might, as it seemed to me, be cut out without harming the game. This bouncing rule was put in by Mr Harrison who drew up the original rules, for the chivalrous reason that he was himself the fastest runner in the Colony, and he did not wish to give himself any advantage. There is not so much man-handling in the Victorian game, and to that extent it is less dramatic, but it is extraordinarily open and fast, with none of the packed scrums which become so wearisome, ad with linesmen who throw in the ball the instant it goes out. There were several points in which the players seemed better than our best—one was the accurate passing by low drop kicking, very much quicker and faster than a pass by hand. Another was the great accuracy of the place kicking and of the screw kicking when a runner would kick at right angles to his course. There were four long quarters, and yet the men were in such condition that they were going hard at the end. They are all, I understand, semi-professionals. Altogether it was a very fine display, and the crowd was much excited. It was suggestive that the instant the last whistle blew a troop of mounted police cantered over the ground and escorted the referees to the safety of the pavilion. (Arthur Conan Doyle: The Wanderings of a Spiritualist, Chapter 4) This is an expanded version of Conan Doyle’s thoughts given in an interview with The Herald at the time, which can be found at http://australianfootball.com/articles/view/%27The+best+game%27+says+Conan+Doyle/1080 While some things change, some stay the same. The rapid entry of mounted police at the end of the game might have amused/bemused Conan Doyle, but since it was a Richmond-Collingwood game it seems through local eyes entirely normal. But the spirit of Harrison’s ‘equalisation policy’ might productively be revived by the AFL, whose own view of equalisation is hardly as ‘sporting’ (there’s a lost word nowadays) ... although perhaps Conan Doyle's suggestion might help bust the game open again (though not yet ... not until we've got some runners).

Probably as good a place to put this as anywhere: I see Josh Gibson's been 'equalised' with another fine. Nice to see that standards are being maintained.

I’ve said this before on another thread sometime but I’ll say it again since you seem to be making a virtue of repetition on this topic: there’s nothing more politically correct than accusing someone else of political correctness. If you want to silence objections to your opinions then do so by producing something like a reasoned or empirically supported argument. Merely tossing accusations of political correctness isn’t and oughtn't be a way of fielding objections to anything you’ve got to say. As for the Goodes situation, here’s a proposition for you (it’s actually no more than an extension on what others, like Hardtack and Goffy have already pointed out): it is absolutely clear that a portion (and none of us knows exactly how small or large that portion is) of the crowd at match after match has taken to booing Goodes for entirely racist reasons. Some other portion appears to join in for perhaps a whole range of grievances they believe they’re entitled to hold against Goodes for the way he plays or played; and then, no doubt, there’s another element that gets involved because they think they’re being funny or it will put Goodes off and help their own team. The problem is that these other booers are now giving both cover and comfort to the racists and they really need to start recognising that this is what they’re doing or they too will, perhaps should, find themselves implicated in the racist behaviour since giving succour to racists isn’t all that far from racism itself. I’m pretty sure some people have already reached that conclusion but it worries me that this is all heading in another far too polarised direction. If everyone who’s inclined to boo for whatever other reasons they’ve got just decided to desist for a while it would leave the racists standing on their own and exposed, and no doubt they'd shut up pretty quickly. The AFL could deal with this even more efficiently, since Gillon’s already jumped on his high horse. They could take a leaf out of UEFA’s book and just close the venue for the next home game for the Eagles or whatever other team’s crowd might get itself involved in booing that the AFL doesn’t think is acceptable. But I won’t hold my breath for them to put principle before profit.

Agree, Munga. There's an active thread on Roos anyway.

We should support them loudly. That'll scupper any bid from either.

(a) that's not what Russell's teapot is about. It's about the burden of proof in relation to an unfalsifiable proposition of which there are none involved here; (b) nice stereotyping (Johnathan Thurston & Benji Marshall say 'hi'). While there's a tendency towards a particular body shape in league, like any other sport it's often the departures from the norm who provide the measure of its possibilities in skills. Ball handling, passing and evasion are now at extraordinarily refined levels and have nothing much to do with 'fat necked enough body shape' © the analogy is of course absurd and perhaps meant to be if the bar is set at 195 cm. But I wouldn't want to be a kid who's my height now and dreaming of an AFL future; (d) no argument with the final observation.

These will be referred to somewhere in the final quatrains, surely.

Must be where the Sith Effrikaans migrate to.

As a former foetus I resent that.

I hope not. There might be consequences.

I take it there's nothing more to add on the topic of this thread.

Well, there's one (and in the thread title now).

Haven't seen it (I'm in Paris atm so in blissful ignorance) but I'd just like to add: now that's an uppercut, Lance.

let a hundred flowers bloom; let a hundred schools of thought contend (Chairman Mao)

Talking drivel seems to be an evolutionary inheritance in your case.

Just two or three would be enough to cause some serious havoc nowadays, Ernie.

And you can do better than that, Daisy. Please elaborate on those moments of ambiguity you detect in the original post.

Gonzo said 'you can do better than that.' Obviously he was wrong.

He. Haven't you ever heard of Johnny Cash?

Having an avatar who was Elizabeth I's astrologer, I'm a bit disturbed by your monopolising of the prediction business. Can you please stop being right all the time, Old Dee?

Thanks for your enlightening contribution, even if your examples are largely about ethnocentricism.