Weeping and gnashing of teeth - Matthew 13:42

“A myth is a way of making sense in a senseless world. Myths are narrative patterns that give significance to our existence.”

Rollo May

The chance of an existential crisis occuring when reality crashes through our unreliable perception has appeared before on this blog - quite recently! Just this week we have proclaimed "heroes" appearing processionally on our television screens in a public display of self-flagellation all because on a sporting field half a world away a small piece of sandpaper destroyed a persistently preposterous perception (well it wouldn't be a proper blog entry without some alliteration!)

Many have pondered on the disproportionate outpouring of grief. The crumbling fable that Australians are tough but fair could be at the heart of the matter. Way back when Philip Ruddock was cheerfully locking up asylum seekers and we supported (and voted in) the Howard government even after the "truth overboard" fiasco, Australians still somehow believed that we played tough but fair.

Then successive federal governments cut overseas aid to a trickle and still we played on, happily renovating and cooking as a diversion and a salve for our darkening souls.

All the while sad and pathetic "men" in this country continue to bash, rape and kill women in numbers that defy any understanding, and seem immune to sane analysis or policy.

Through this shattering of our myths, some of us apparently could still look to sport and manfully strut about crowing of our supposed prowess (even as females were actually the ascendant sports stars - another blow to hyper-masculinity).

So what do we now have? A parade of boys in men's bodies, crushed by the public exposure of their fragility, offering up their abject apologies on the altar of our collective sporting stupidity.  Men need to take up less space in this society (thanks Jane Caro). It may be timely now to discuss an alternative to promoting sweating time wasters as sporting gods. Less hurtling towards Idiocracy and more studied introspection and perhaps leadership from our political masters.

Yeah, no, probably not - did you see the Rugby on the weekend, wasn't it awesome? Those guys are gods amongst men. Don't we want all of our boys to grow up to be heroes just like them?

But what would he talk about at work if he didn't?