Pollyana

I have to browse through shedloads of media articles daily, just occasionally one of them gets a complete

FOUR weeks ago, Anna Bligh was the doomed Premier of Queensland.
Notwithstanding the fact that she was young, attractive and female, Newspoll assessed her approval rating at just 26 per cent - among the lowest levels yet recorded.

Then it began to rain. And it rained and rained. ................it fell like manna for the besieged Bligh.

Then came her “We are Queenslanders” speech. Many Queenslanders beamed. The rest of us cringed. “We are Queenslanders,” she said, across national television, reminding her target audience – Queenslanders – where they lived. Were some unaware of that?
“We’re the people they breed tough north of the border,” she continued “We’re the ones they knock down, and we get up again.”

It was mawkish nonsense suggesting an outdated noble separatism: Queenslanders are different - tougher, bolder, braver, even better.

No they’re not. There is nothing narrow or exclusive about Queenslanders. Australians are born equal, like people everywhere, despite Bligh’s rhetoric that they are a breed apart.

It was for local consumption of course, and certainly found an audience, but it was an insulting remark to Australians everywhere who have watched the devastation of the floods and sought to help – giving money at banks, supermarkets and online and in some cases sacrificing holidays to lend a hand...........

They may breed them tough north of the border.

They breed them pretty tough down south, too.

So don’t insult us, Anna Bligh.

roaringmouse

Whilst the writer probably got most things right, he only got 1 out of 3 right here...

Bix

Depends on how old the writer was.......so maybe 2

fish.01

So it appealed to parochialism and was a bit cringe worthy....I really don't think it was such an offence at a time like that. What general doesn't invoke a bit of it before the troops lurch over the trenches? Most don't take it literally but use it as a rallying cry to action.

OK troops, stiff upper lip, we are brits and we will prevail...oh and exchange soldier sasha you can invoke the might of all tsars, oh and young pierre think of napolean oh and bruce, you think of ....

DeadVim

Nail/Head impact.

Scubaemma

I normally can't stand Bligh, and maybe I've just gone soft (or maybe I was just very over tired at the time when I watched it!) but I thought she was genuine with the emotion in that speech.

Maybe I was just knackered (I certainly was!), and she certainly looked knackered herself, but she's been working long hours as well and I can't believe that seeing some of the stuff she's seen, and being in the position she's in, she didn't genuinely feel emotion for the people effected. I really think it must get to you. It got to me seeing some of the stuff I saw and had to deal with.

The whole 'Queenslander' stuff does grate somewhat though, as if people in other States, or indeed other similar countries (like the UK for example) would just have rolled over and not battled on. What utter bollocks.
Now in our house, every time OH does something good he says it's cos he's a QLDer, and it's the QLD spirit etc.... he should be a stand-up comedian, my OH......

Julia G has not impressed me at all. I just cannot stand to hear the woman speak! Could she speak any slower? She sounds like a complete numpty. Totally agree with MP's post about the saucepan.

Campbell Newman though has impressed me a lot, I think he's been excellent (despite refusing to look at the camera when he's being interviewed!). Well done that man

PJLondonSydney

FFS people move on. She was tired and emotinal after after a torrid time and delivered a hasitly written parochial speech pretty well designed for the people who live in the state. She didn't say "no-one else counts". She didn't say "if other places had a flood their population would run around wringing their hands and be ineffectual blithering idiots as they are not from Qld. As for the idiotic "don't insult us" article. So contrived and by a supposedly senior journalist. It was more cringe worthy than the speech - comparing the numbers of VCs recipients on a state basis - how utterly pathetic. It also coveniently ignored the many occasisons where thanks have been given to everyone who has contiributed or offered to contribute, whether they be Australian, resident in Australia or living overseas. I suppose it did what it was meant to do, which was cause debate and met with the standard of "good" communication - appealling to the lowest common denominator.

Pollyana

Yep!
Personally, having had her stand in my office and say (off camera but with all her media entourage advising her) "Thank you to all you Queenslanders for helping each other" - when the office contained a Scot, 2 Englishmen, a guy from S Aus, one from NSW, 3 from Vic and me, along with 3 Qlders, I know how I feel about it and no-one explanations are going to change it. It was the height of the event and we were ALL knackered but if we said a word about the politicians who kept turning up and getting under our feet, we were being blasted for it.

DeadVim

I wonder if "The Maroons" will have to change their name?

Pollyana

At the risk of causing the usual condemnations from language purists to fall on my head..........I wonder if the Maroons will ever learn to pronounce their name

DeadVim

Seeing as the cricket is still on I will smirk at all things colonial, parochial and generally backward ...

Australia Day tomorrow, chin up, abuse a minority and win a prize

Pollyana

Australia Day .... ah yes, perfect, I shall be able to sleep right through it