The mealy-mouthed quality in Australian life

But the cult of quantification spread much further to politicians using extraordinary dodgy figures supplied by invalid methodologies to make suspect policy cases; to the tallying of bizarre sports statistics ("that's the 7054^th ace Roger Federer has served in his career"), the accumulation of personal data for advertising and more.

Once upon a time, the Judeo-Christian ethos used to underpin the socio-legal and political pillars of Australian society. Now it's quantification.

One reason for the mealy-mouth nature of the Australian people is a lack of spine; an inability to say what we think, unless they cower behind a pseudonym. The other reason is that it's far easier to talk about how much something is worth, such as a car, a house or a person.

Of course, we still have deeply personal conversations but the continual background noise being pumped out by what's left of the main stream media, by business peers and our family and friends, is all about numbers, statistics and metrics. It's not only who owns what but how do I get what they have?

You'd think that the obsessive pursuit of quantification would lead to increased emphasis and scrutiny on results. Instead, it has produced a greater volume of figures, which once reported, disappear in to the ether, never to be seen or heard of again.

It's as if we have embraced process – and in some cases, some highly suspect methodologies – while sacrificing results. The other side of the coin is where the figures are accurate and the results are appalling.

I hesitate to provide an example from my old hometown of Adelaide – where ideas go to die -because it's like kicking puppies. None of the figures below have been reported by Adelaide's mealy-mouthed media.

From April 2014, South Australia's under-employment number bounced around the 70,000-90,000 mark. That was extraordinarily high but in April this year, the Covid-19 restrictions saw the figure explode to 134,200 people.

While 40,000 South Australians lost their jobs (20,000 were fulltime) due to Covid-19, they joined the 56,000 Crow eaters who were already unemployed. That brings unemployment up to a whopping 96,000 people.

But don't forget the 134,200 people who are under-employed and who would like or need more work. Then add the 30,000 people who have dropped out of the workforce altogether.

There are about 850,000 people in the SA labour market but 260,000 of them are unemployed and under-employed and 30,000 have dropped out entirely. That's not a recession. That's a Depression.

Take sport. Test Cricket and the One Day games were dead before the virus. It's the same with Rugby League. One of the best examples of the mealy-mouthed quality in Australian life, is the fact that cricket and NRL commentators failed to mention their sports were dying at the turnstiles. Why should they? It's not in their best interests.

Indigenous people came here in wooden canoes. Our forefathers came is wooden ships from Great Britain. More recent arrivals came in boats from war torn Asia or the Middle East. We're all in the same boat now.

As a nation we can't keep limbo dancing under the lowest common denominator. It takes guts to step up and say 'enough'. I won't wait by the garden gate.