There is a cake and pie shop in Bowral named ‘The Gumnut.’ On its front window it has a very impressive lists of ribbons of yearly ‘best pie or best cake’ of the year won at Sydney’s yearly agricultural show called ‘The Easter Show.’ We often in our daily walk stop to have a coffee and a pie. I still succumb to a ribbon or award winning meaty one but Helvi prefers the vegetable pie with roast pumpkin and sun-dried tomato. Each to their own.
Tomorrow at 10am all TV and radio Stations will broadcast the results of the $120,000,000,- postal vote on SSM. With all that is going, some Ministers and Parliamentarians will try and throw sand over the issue by putting up their own bills safe-guarding religious beliefs or matters of conscience. It is generally predicted through polls that the SSM will get a healthy 60% Yes vote and a 40% No vote outcome.
Many on the extreme right, will under the pretext of protecting religious or conscientious views try and make things more difficult than they are. Some politicians are using the example of cake makers forced to sell wedding-cakes to Gay or Lesbian couples against their conscience or religious beliefs. Can you believe it? For some time now this cake selling has been popping up almost daily in adult right-wing Parliamentarians seriously rambling on about it on the TV.
One particular Minister gets red in the face about the prospect of SS couples being sold a same sex wedding cake. It gets worse. ‘What about those renting out wedding cars or those celebrants whose beliefs might run against SSM? And so it goes on.
And, while 15000 scientists are warning time is running out for the world to be spared the collapse of our ecology, Australia talks about wedding cakes to SS couples. Are shops at present sussing out homosexual couples and refusing to sell them vanilla slices? I don’t think so. I often see openly gay people munching away on cakes or sausage rolls. Who cares? Why would shops refuse to make a wedding cake just because it might get eaten by people born with a difference. What next. Stop selling cakes to people with beards or with blue eyes?
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-11-14/climate-scientists-issue-dire-environmental-warning/9147334
Yet, not much about the plight of hundreds of asylum seekers now after two weeks without urgent provisions of food, water and toilets on Manus island. Sometimes during my mind’s meanderings I wonder what my father would make of present day Australia. We used to be progressive and forward looking but now have sunk to inane and silliness. Who would have thought that wedding cakes would be discussed while at the same time being tolerant of untold cruelty to refugees?
Tags: Australia, Bowral, Gay, Homosexual, Lesbian, Ministers, Parliament, Pie, Religion, Sausage roll, Scientists, sex, SSM, Vanilla, Wedding Cake
Oosterman Treats Blog 
November 14, 2017 at 5:00 am |
We need another Gough in Federal politics, and another Don Dunstan in State affairs!
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November 14, 2017 at 9:14 pm |
I reckon even picking someone out of a crowd while blindfolded might be better.
A Gough now a fond memory, held dear.
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November 14, 2017 at 9:23 pm
Same with Don Dunstan, those were exciting, progressive times for South Australia.
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November 15, 2017 at 3:40 am
Or Wran for NSW.
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November 14, 2017 at 12:18 pm |
The SSM vote is only a questionnaire run by the ABS. It’s not even a plebiscite, but, who cares, neither is lagally binding. Just a massive waste of money, with escalating threats of harm from both sides of the debate, with children suffering untold mental damage from SSM, to gay teenagers killing themselves like lemmings.
I really hoped this could have been debated in the parliament, then senate, in a rational manner based on scientific, philosophical and legal principles. So much money could have been used elsewhere.
As for the 580 on Manus, I believe that 200 have had their bona fides disproved. What is to be done with them? I’m not sure, I guess they get sent back to their last point of departure. I’m unsure if the other 380 have been processed. It sounds like our government is hoping they’ll all disappear into the jungle??
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November 14, 2017 at 9:24 pm |
I think that unless something gets done, such as allowing them to come to Australia, the refugees will just die off. If Australia has allowed them to stay in limbo in the past, another 5 years of the same will continue. I am really disappointed that Labor hasn’t taken a leadership and pushed for a humanitarian approach.
Did I hear last night that the UNHCR or the UN will contemplate a charge of crimes against humanity to be heard in an International Court?
None of the refugees have been charged with a crime, yet they are being held in indefinite detention.
As for the SSM, it is just silly and expensive to have had this postal survey, Big M. It should have been dealt with during Gillard’s time.
It is now used by the extremists to exploit. It puts me right off my pudding.
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November 14, 2017 at 7:04 pm |
Do people still watch TV in Australia? Here in New Zealand, most people seem to be watching Internet based programming – now that we finally have ultra fast broadband. Even people my age have abandoned TV.
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November 14, 2017 at 9:35 pm |
Yes, but the broadband speed in Australia is now slower than before, Stuart.
I now click on the ABC News and go shopping in Bowral hoping the download will have eventuated by the time I return.
We were fleeced by Turnbull with his idea for the optic cable just going to the corner of the street.
With previous ADSL we had at least a modem that we put high up the tree ( Manchurian pear) to get reasonable fast reception.
What, with the noise of protesting wedding-cake makers, and all the political disappointments, life has to be moulded and continued to our own imagination more than ever before. I like the silence of the evenings without TV.
It is heaven!
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November 15, 2017 at 2:29 am |
We hardly ever watch TV for entertainment. We too turn to the Internet very often. I can’t stand the commercial stations. Our ABC shows some good English tv programs.
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November 15, 2017 at 3:48 am
We watch the news on the computer and some English programs on the TV.
The comedy shows depress me so much I prefer to get my laughs from reading obituaries of politicians.
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November 14, 2017 at 10:35 pm |
Your question “Who would have thought that wedding cakes would be discussed while at the same time being tolerant of untold cruelty to refugees?” is powerful, and timely, Gerard. Excellent post. Yes, why this goes on I do not know. 😦 It makes me very sad.
Where has the progressiveness, the forward thinking and the compassion gone? Seems the world is taking great strides backwards. 😦
(((HUGS)))
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November 15, 2017 at 4:57 am |
Yes, hopefully it is temporary and Australia will rear up and protest against the cruelty meted out to refugees.
I can’t believe that after so many years and New Zealand willing to take some of them that this issue will just go away.
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November 14, 2017 at 11:18 pm |
I think that politicians are bigots and hypocrites. Yes, they should be worrying about the death of planet earth but most, of if not, all prefer to dwell on inconsequential matters. Same here in the states. Only a few have any sense.
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November 15, 2017 at 5:06 am |
Australia is jubilant this morning and there have been tearful scenes in Parliament. The most vehement opponent of the SSM legislation was seen seated at the bench shaking his head and hiding between his hands.
The Yes parliamentarians broke out in applause and some even cried. Such a relief SS couples can get married if they wish to. The same as the rest of us.
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November 14, 2017 at 11:49 pm |
A great post Gerard. We have many of the same problems with the stupid people who refuse to do business except with others who believe as they do. When did all this start? Life used to be simple with people buying wedding cakes and getting married without anyone asking their sexual preference. Does it make the cake taste different?
Over here we have people grabbing unsuspecting people out of their beds and shipping them back to their own country. The climate is getting hotter by the day but our Prez seems to be cool with it. Keep bowling Gerard and I’ll try to keep painting. That’s all we can do. Helvi’s pie sounds good.
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November 15, 2017 at 5:15 am |
Thank you Kayti.
Just now the Australian Baker’s Association have thrown their weight behind the SSM legislation and don’t want a bar of boycotting wedding-cakes. They also promised the cakes will rise magnificently with plenty of yeast.
For the sour no-voters to suggest they might pass legislation if it includes flat wedding cakes made without yeast, or excluding same sex couples featured on the top cemented in cream is just too silly for words.
Yes, Helvi’s pie with baked pumpkin is very healthy but I prefer the meat one.
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November 15, 2017 at 12:15 am |
PS…Yay for pie! I got so distracted by the serious stuff I forget to comment on the pies! Pie makes the world a better place! 😀
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November 15, 2017 at 4:54 am |
Yes, the SS pies are jubilant this morning, begging to be tasted and licked. Australia is a better place this morning.
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November 15, 2017 at 6:57 am
Even in this confusing, sad, angering world…there are always so many things we can find, daily, that are beautiful and bring us joy! 🙂
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November 15, 2017 at 12:57 am |
The wedding cakes were a huge issue here, as well Gerard. Idiotic is the word that comes to my mind. The culture wars go on and on and on. –Curt
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November 15, 2017 at 4:52 am |
This mornings results 62% in favour of SSM. The No voters now plan to pass special legislation to punish the Yes voters to somehow limit the joy of SS couples being finally given the same rights as the rest.
They want the cake makers to band together in banning yeast so that the SS wedding cakes won’t raise suggesting lewdness and unbridled lascivious thoughts.
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November 16, 2017 at 6:28 pm
Those folks never stop, Gerard. They have convinced themselves that God is as prejudiced as they are. And that their stubbornness will get them through the Pearly Gates. –Curt
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November 15, 2017 at 3:35 am |
Well, the majority voted yes, just waiting for the puerile arguments from the Mad Abbott and Co. Even Brandis, sort of, came out on the side of SSM yesterday.
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November 15, 2017 at 3:52 am |
I drove through the Woollies car park and not a single sign of rampant sex by Lesbians or Gays. Nor were there any cake throwing or hurling of pies in front of the Gumnut shop. There was just a stray dog scratching its fleas.
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