Hey everyone, I've been pondering for a long time what it might take to attract the apathetic to get involved in this sourt of action, YD that is.

I was apathetic about politics for most of my life so I thought I'd describe how I used to live without getting involved or even interested in politics.

Maybe someone will get clues about how to change others.

I grew up in outback Australia, the NT and there really wasn't any politics up there then. The NT was administered by administrative arrangement mainly from Adelaide meaning there were no politicians to speak of.

So I never heard about politics. I grew up in the Beatles era so I lstened to music and hated the news etc. So world and national events outside music made little or no impact on me and everyone I knew.

Older family members were devoted to news and talked about such usually while drinking so it was usually an argument or worse. So I didn't hang around, found other things to do and think about. At that age there wasn't really a lot of thinking to be frank.

Once I left home etc I travelled. I hitch hiked around Australia for about a year, saw every State and lots of roads and people. Had a bloody great time actually. But no one ever talked about politics then either. Most of the people I got rides with were either truckies or families on holiday and their interest was usually in getting to the next town.

I worked around the country in physical jobs as well to pay my way and there's not a lot of politics discussed at those work sites. Only which pub we were loyal to. I suppose that's politics of a sort!

I saved enough money and travelled overseas for about a year. Travelled overland through Europe all the way to Singapore and returned to Australia with the knowledge Australia was indeed the lucky country. The nicest people I met were the Afghanis so that's where we stayed the longest. So another year and more passed without even seeing newspapers. Let alone hearing any news.

After getting back I got married ( my partner was with me O/S ). We started working and had a good life, lots of friends and fun. Then there was children, buying a home, living on one wage, sharing child care when my wife went back to work at night and so on.

In other words we just had a normal suburban life. Any spare time had to be saved up as baby sitters were needed and you had to plan ahead, quite far ahead usually.

Travelling to and from work took about two hours out of the day. Not a thinking or meditation zone standing up holding a strap for an hour each way.

Gough grabbed my attention and I started looking and reading a bit. I thought he had some good directions but they rushed it and, and, and.

Then Fraser did the Kerr thing and I got angry and lost interest. Avoided politics all the years until about 4 years ago when I stopped working.

In between those periods I and everyone I knew avoided politics like the plague, just like we avoided religion. Mainly because both always caused grief, anger, fighting etc.

I regarded anyone passionate about politics as a (I have to say this) wanker as I could not understand why they wanted to waste their time on something that was so corrupt and ineffective.

Now I'm a wanker and I want to convert those that "don't understand". But I know that telling them won't work. I know that shouting at them just confirms their suspicions as to my label of wanker. I know that I can't make them read anything relevant as they are bored with that and "have a life".

In retrospect I think the Fraser incident just told me there is no equity, no real democracy and if I ignored it everything would be OK. And it was. Nothing really happened that shook our world. Maybe it never will.

9/11 did shake our world of course but to most Australians I think that just meant be afraid and vote for Howard. That's probably what sparked things for me, 9/11.

But now I'm a wanker and want change and I think it's urgent. Maybe if I and many others had become interested thirty years ago the people in charge today would never have got there. I wouldn't be there but there were certainly better people than what we've got today.

Perhaps a Tardus would be useful.

Any thoughts anyone?

Pegasus, still dreaming.