When the Australian PM gave departing Mexican businessman, Sol Trujillo, his fondly ethnic farewell, as I mentioned this morning, it was not, I repeat, NOT a case of racism, as Trujillo later claimed. OK it did recognize that the slimy little grease-cojone is a Mexican, but it was not denigrating him because of that fact. Trujillo (and many of the denizens of the dark heart of the American continent [expat Americans often excepted] but North and Middle mainly) just don't get the Australian national sense of humour. [Aside: this does not mean that Kath and Kim is funny. It is not. Same for Paul Hogan. Or Mel Gibson. In fact as soon as a comedian is famous or popular or goes to America, he or she isn't funny any more; it's axiomatic.]
Instead of being racially denigrating, the PM's jibe was denigrating because the lizard thinks he is some fucking Gordon Gecko-type, some Master of the Business Universe. As it turns out, he is merely an incompetent rip-off merchant who bled AUD$36million from our major telecommunications company in the form of salary and bonuses and rather than rescue said company, as promised, he left the once proud off-shot of the PMG (which my dad worked for in the 50's, until he died) even more bruised and battered, barely on its knees*. In fact, after only four years of confrontational mismanagement - "a ham-fisted, amateur-hour, antagonistic approach"- he has "all but killed Telstra." (Quotes from Adios, Amigo SMH.)
Mr Rudd's hilarious and ironically dismissive "Adios" shows that our man in Canberra has the Aussie sense of humour after all. For everybody in Australia, from Granny in the garden shed to little Johnny on the school-bus, knows exactly what he really meant:
"Fuck off you GREEDY little cunt, and NEVER EVER think of coming back to our great southern land, girt, as it is, by sea... Australia! Oi!"
E@L
* I know in the greater world of big business out there, this is considered the EPITOME of success, but by the terms of the Great Australia Moral Code (formerly aka Fair Go, Mate!) if you fuck something up, you are a loser no matter how rich you get from the deal.
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16 comments:
"But my point is that [racism] does exist and it's got to change because the world is full of a lot of people and most economies have to take advantage - including Australia - of a diverse set of people.
"If there is a belief that only a certain people are acceptable versus others, that is a sad state."I think the words "Fuck off" are most appropriate. The guy even looks like the slimeball he appears to be-and like the Mexicans working to build the McMansions here in American seems to have forgotton that immigration is a two step process:
Immigration and Assimilation. The little bastards have the hardest time remembering that last little bit.
Maybe he should take his Mexican ass to Japan and see what real racisim looks like.
So what tax haven is he living in now?
reading the news article tells me that this man was indeed a poor manager. according to the article his is nationality is american. his ethnic background has nothing to do with his lack of the appropriate skill set for the job he was hired to do. who hired him and why seems to be the better question. xoxo
(of course, i could be reading the whole thing incorrectly, sugar.)
The reality of his failure and his continued misunderstanding of the job he was hired to do was research.
He should have done his research and know that he was going to be running a partially gov't owned business that was in recent times a totally government owned entity. Sol was constantly arguing with the gov't when they had been the major shareholder of that business it is always going to be the case they want a say. Beyond that as the government encouraged the Mum & Dad investors to get into the game and own stock in Telstra they feel an obligation to look after the national interest by keeping an eye on what is going in at Telstra. This may be misguided, but Sol should have easily understood that.
What really killed him was that he went off to the USA to hire a team of managers to support him in running the place when equally incompetent people where already working their way up the ranks of the business (internally). There seems to be a tradtion for Australian businesses to hire a foreigner to run the company feeling they must have superior experience. Hardly racism, it would appear to say they are seen as better than the locals...
Sol should pull his head in and accept he failed and should be on the scraphead, hopefully the $30+ million 'failure fee', (exactly what Obama + the Aussie regulators are complaining about) will be enough to keep him off the doll...
Skip: he was constantly depicted in the media, in cartoons e.g. with a sombrero. He and his two aides, were referred to as the "three amigos"... In those 4 years he certainly was not able to to make friends - even John Howard, one G.W.B's biggest supporters, and ultimately responsible for hiring him, ended up hating him because of his confrontational style.
Our version of Rush Limbaugh, Andrew Bolt (son of Dutch parents) whom I normally detest - not for his cheese-head heritage but for his block-head opinions - makes the valid point that that sort of "racist"joke is meant as a test for "wogs" (see Dick Headley's latest post) and other "New Austrlians".
If you can laugh, if you get it, then you are "Australian", you have moved on from your chip-on-shoulder immigrant status and have assimilated. Your family's race and culture in fact doesn't mean that much to you any more, you are not that person any more, you can laugh at yourself - you are now an Australian! (There are not enough novels written about this traumatic process! There are many failures!) Remember this country is MUCH younger and yet more culturally diverse than most other "Western" nations and its ego can be quite strong as it asserts itself in order to differentiate itself. If you want to be accepted as Australian, even if your mum only spoke Serbian or your Dad still lived in Ho Chi Minh City, you had to laugh at all the racial jokes - they were a test more important than the Higher School Certificate.
Sav: see above. Trujillo had Mexican parents, that was enough. He had to be tested. If he had turned up a party dressed as a Mexican, sombrero et al, we would have loved him! Also, in case you hadn't guessed, Australians tend not to like serious people. Relax. Chill, what's the problem? Yuck it up a bit. Everyone is The Dude in Oz. Even when we get aggressive - we also use a lot of sarcasm...
Yes, who hired him? The previous government. They lost the election, Trujillo being one of the reasons.
BTW it was $31 million Trujillo scored while fucking up Telstra. Remember the Alamo. Remember Enron. Remember to take your tablets.
Scott: was wrotig mine as you posted. Does Obama have an opinion on this?
cultural nuance, sugar! your explanation is a perfect example of it and why most of the time americans miss the boat in foreign countries. this lack of understanding has certainly set our foreign policy on its nose more often than not. sometimes, i think we're just too damn literal! xoxoxo
(i read dicky's entry, too.)
(i'm drinking wine instead, is that ok, sugar?) ;)
Sav: I really don't have politically correct opinions on this - mine are still very hippy and of the currently debunked "why don't we all get along" liberal school...
Here is a semi-sarcastic run:
I think there is a strong 'nationalism' of sorts that manifests in different ways in Asutralia. The frontier spirit in Australia was way different to the frontier spirit in America (cf "Tree of Man" by Patrick White). To an extent, my generation's cultural memory only extends back as far as WW1 and the diggers at ANZAC Cove (cf Mel Gibson in "Gallipoli"). Very young country. Even the Gold Rush of the 1850-60s is something of a blur to us BabyBoomers... After WWII we were hit with a massive wave of European migration and the population nearly doubled in a few years. Being seen as Australian was very important for the wogs and dagos, but only because we 2nd, 3rd and 3th generation Aussies made it so. Then in the 70's the Asian wave started (cf Russell Crowe in "Romper Stomper")...
Nowadays amongst the young we are seeing a lot more cultural pride, so that the Lebo's and the Slopes (the Koreans are the scariest - they have imported the Korean type of mafia/yazuka here, I am told) tend to stick together in gangs and have massive brawls - witness the "race riots" in Syndey a few yearsd ago. Probably that seemed 2nd generation Lebanese (Australians) against 1st and 2nd Serbians and anyone else who had been watching Fight Club too many times... (more likely Christians against Muslims.) But I only saw it only TV from HK, so that may be biased...
Australia. A melting pot.
I'm drinking Dark Berry Mocca Frapuccinno, now you mention....
Oh I don't know. I should shut up about race, religion, sex and gadgets.
Funniest thing down here in Oz was a small piece which said that Sol bore a remarkable resemblance to Ron Jeremy and, perhaps, he would have prferred that comparison. He certainly performed Ron's greatest talent on Telstra!!!
don't ever shut up, sugar! and thank you for y'alls semi-sarcastic explanation! ;) (i <3 you)
*snickering because i know how much y'all love txtspk*
Oh my, Sol as the Hedgehog. Now that's a picture. At least Jeremy wanted his partners to enjoy their screwing.
"The wattle, the wattle, symbol of our land. You can put it in a bottle you can hold it in your hand. 'stralia! 'stralia! Oi!"
Why give up the most important and interesting topics in life?
Sav: I freaking turned my head the wrong way for that and didn't get it - had to go to Answers.com! LOL! I am hopeless...
Jay: That my buddy Bruce's favorite piece of Python!
Scott: why not just head out for a coffee and cookie breakfast instead? Brilliant idea E@L, get off the freaking computer...
Sav: ps. we all <3 Sav right back!
It really pisses me off, as a semiotician, that we use the heart symbol (<3) as symbol which means "love" - I <3 NY = I Love New York - yet ever since god knows when we have been pronouncing it for some reason, "heart" to indicate that we are reading or indicating the heart symbol for love and not the word love. That must have thrown some Professors of Semiotics out of their chairs.
It's a tough choice but I have to say that that is one of my favorite MP sketches followed by the Lumberjack Song and the Dead Parrot sketch.
"Crack tubes!"
One wonders if the first board meeting at Telstra didn't go like that. "We'd like to welcome the Amigo bastard to God's own Earth..." Shame that the humor would've been lost on him.
Yes but when you’re rich, and don’t have to worry in the least about repercussions, and you can live in all the comfort there is, why should they worry about who says what; - you fucked up - they don’t give a monkeys..
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