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Last updated on July 12th, 2017 at 11:23 am
Outrage in south-east Queensland:
An offensive email suggesting Ipswich is full of “bogans” has sparked outrage in the community.
The email, which has circulated to Canberra, Brisbane, London and even as far as Argentina, makes fun of people who participated in a Queensland Times street survey.
The version I received – sent by a Queenslander, as it happens – only republished (without comment) the original Queensland Times survey. People are evidently a little sensitive over public displays of imperfect teeth.
- Posted by rightwingprof on 2007 12 22 at 12:54 PM • permalink
Bogans? Are you sure they didn’t mean begonias?
As for the citizens of Ipswich, anthropologists will be coming around to measure their skulls.
Does this story have any relation to the Ipswich Ripper problem?
Do all those folks live in a caravan park, or just that one guy?
Posted by Mystery Meat on 2007 12 22 at 01:32 PM • permalink
#2, bogans are the Australian equivalent of trailer park trash, although I thought the original senders of the email would have used the Queensland version, ‘bevan’.
Having had a three year posting to Amberley twenty years ago, the people pictured in the QT survey were some of the better representatives of the Ipswich community. I have an abiding memory of Ipswich, walking through the mall and hearing a mother screeching at the top of her voice at her toddler daughter “just you wait ‘til I get you home, you f***ing little c***, I’ll knock your f***ing block off”. I sadly thought about what that little girl was going to grow up to be.
#2. Here’s a clue from England.. http://www.chavscum.com/index.php
Whoa! That sounds like the last time I visted the local Walmart…
(Yes, we have lots of rednecks/trailer trash in rural California.)
Posted by Spiny Norman on 2007 12 22 at 05:23 PM • permalink
Further to six, and seriously,
GET OVER IT!
As long as you burr up about being rubbished (and you must admit the material for rubbishing flows in abundance in Ipswich), you will become a target.
I was in Ipswich shopping on Thursday night and I must have seen several druggies wandering around, odd couples, off their faces,
“Babe, we gotta pay the rent.”
“I’ll do it tomorrow, Babe.”
“We need milk and cereal. What else do we need.”
Must’ve been pension day.
There was another one whose kids, she said, had been “stolen” by their father. Sad. As she talked more it became obvious that she’d probably partaken of booze or some kind of recreational drugs.
No wonder the kids were gone.
There are good people in Ipswich, I know some. But the morons certainly stand out there. (A bit like the reporting of the Camden meeting, I’d say!)
Surely you are talking of England! Why are Queenies getting worked up?
Posted by Wimpy Canadian on 2007 12 22 at 06:13 PM • permalink
#3 Mr. Meat, how saddened I am that you brought that up; right spoiled my evening of dypsomania.
I despise those who hurt professionals. One should pay and thank them.
Posted by Wimpy Canadian on 2007 12 22 at 06:18 PM • permalink
OK I just googled Ipswich, Australia. Now I understand. It is a town of honest hard working folks. It was originally the limestone city, rather like Kingston, Ontario (two hours drive from moi).
Hey, it could have been the state capital!!!
Posted by Wimpy Canadian on 2007 12 22 at 06:25 PM • permalink
#9 Entropy, WTF is a “boonah”. I haven’t heard that one before? Not even in Broome.
Posted by Wimpy Canadian on 2007 12 22 at 06:27 PM • permalink
1865 – Queensland’s first railway line was completed between Ipswich and Grandchester.
I live near Grandchester.
#9,15
Boonah is a place. Often the area is referred to as the “Ipswich Boonah Triangle”. To do with, er, inbreeding and associated genetic and congenital, er, problems. Boonah is south of Ipswich. (It’s not a real epdemiological study result, though, I think… it’s just how some rubbish others – we do it with Tasmanians all the time… Two heads and all that.)
#16 Not that page Kae, but a similar one full of info.
Outside of th3 convo, but amusing: I was asked by someone at work why Ozzies don’t celebrate thanksgiving. Well, it’s easy to understand once one knows hte hiostory.
Posted by Wimpy Canadian on 2007 12 22 at 07:31 PM • permalink
Ipswich is no more bogan that most of SE Qld or Oz, for that matter. There are bogans sure, but there are plenty of well adjusted, normal people. It’s a very nice town and is a town which generates its fair share of talent – from politics, business, sport and many other public arenas.
The prejudice that Ipswich is backward and bogan stems from the tough times that the city went through in the 70s, 80s and 90s after the closure of several major industries in the town – wool mills, cotton mills, coal mines and railway yards.
Anyhow, Ipswich is what Parramatta was to Sydney in the 90s. Exploding with long pent up potential.
The QT are simply kidding with that survey. They should have more sense. They would know of the prejudices against Ipswich.
p.s. I’m married to an Ipswich lass and I’m batting way above my average. Habib will vouch for that.
p.p.s My wife is not holding a knife to my throat.
Murph, I don’t mind Ipswich, much of the derision it receives is not warranted, but that’s the way it goes.
I think the newspaper is responsible for portraying the locals the way they did, and it seems, just by appearances, that it’s living down to expectations.
I lived in Ipswich in the late 80s and it wasn’t so bad. If only the council would stop stuffing around with the CBD, they’ve killed it, and from the ashes they have created, across the Bremer River, River Link. Yeah. If it doesn’t keep up with the local shopping centres as far as variety and access and parking it will go down the drain too.
You sure she’s not holding a knife to your throat?
I must confess to working with four denizens of that fine city to the west of Brisbane. Two of them went to Ipswich grammar and the other two are recent imports. All are fine, upstanding citizens. They even regularly brush their teeth.
What are those serial numbers at the bottom of each photo for? Just where did they find this bunch?
- #34
Ent
They’re obviously from Gailes, Wacol &/or Riverview.(It’s rumoured that these suburbs house the familes of internees at the Wacol Prison. Supposedly undesirables. Riverview and Ipswich are the reasons that Moggill residents don’t want a bridge instead of the car punt and also don’t want the Motorway bypass, they fear it will be a conduit for undesirables. Having said that, I must admit to my snobbery, I would love to live in Karana Downs – and I could have afforded it 2 years ago, but now, sheesh, the market has blown out and I’m looking at Ipswich outer eastern suburbs.)
#10, even though I was a junior RAAF officer in my early/mid 20s, I was fortunate enough not to have any ‘meetings’ with the local constabulary in Ipswich.
I did have an encounter with the RAAF Police, getting pulled over on the perimeter road for speeding. The young Corporal was full of attitude, lecturing me and demanding my ID in a rather rude tone. I got my ID out and waited patiently for the attitude change, which came with the heels snapping together and a salute. After that he was a bit sickening, saying “sir” all the time. I remember that the Ground Defence Officers and ADGs didn’t have much time for the RAAFPOL – when I did the final exercise for Basic Staff Course, the name of the RAAFPOL character in the simulation was Corporal Cretin.
We have a few enclaves of such folk in my loc vic.
One is Taft. Then there’s Pumpkin Center and there’s always Oildale.
The Oildale folk are called Oh Eighters because that’s the last two digits of the zip code to that area.
How do you tell the age of an Oh Eighter woman? Count the tattoos and divide by number of remaining teeth.
Oildale is also where the parts of the U2 spy plane were manufactured. That was a distributed manufacturing process parceled out to highly capable cottage level industry in that workshop dominated area.
Taft, according to lore and legend, is where one goes to gander at 300+ lbs of 5’ woman stuffed into a sports bra and spandex cyclist shorts while out shopping. I am told that such sights are common in that area.
Don’t know why anyone would want to go out of their way to see such a thing. Sounds painful to me.
- Booner/Boonah is used widely around the ACT. Bogan is definitely the southern term, Bevan was widely used while I lived in QLD for some 28 years. Poor old Ipswich cops it much the same way Queanbeyan does down here in Canberra (except Queanbeyan deserves it).
Last time I was in Brisbane I noticed the Bevan’s stronghold seemed to be in Browns Plains.Posted by CanberraNeoCon on 2007 12 23 at 05:53 AM • permalink
I watched Keeping Up Appearances last night. I like Onslow. And his wife, Daisy, and sister-in-law Rose. I believe they live in something called a “council estate”. I got that term from Dr. Who, in which show his assistant, also named Rose, lives in a council estate. If they were in Australia I believe they’d be called bogans.
In Ohio, we call them “hard” as in they live a hard life. If you want to see actual examples, come to a wronwright family reunion. I’ll introduce you to some cousins.
Posted by wronwright on 2007 12 23 at 10:58 AM • permalink
I was going to leap in with some pithy remarks due to a little local knowledge but I see everyone has beaten me to it. Fact is, though, that bunch look fairly typical of the citizenry of the Ipswich-Booval area. Had to laugh though when mention of Boonah (SE Qld town) came up though – back in the ‘80s it had a population not unlike Ipswich so it’s amusing to find the name’s used for bevan/bogan elsewhere. Boonahfolk also used to look down on the yobs from Ipswich (local break-ins were always carried out by out of towners from Ipswich). But both Ipswich and Boonah have reinvented themselves as successful bedroom communities now SE Qld is getting used to the idea of the 2 to 3 hour commute, same as Sydney.
On the Gold Coast, historically our bevan heaven was Nerang – hence Nerang-utangs – but that too has been reinvested over the years. Now it’s Palm Beach due to high concentrations of the unemployable, a needle exchange program and 3 high profile teen crime gangs.
—Nick
Posted by The Thin Man Returns on 2007 12 23 at 04:52 PM • permalink
#32, Canberra NeoCon, there’s at least one Queanbeyan resident here, although I now live in the more salubrious 2619 postcode area. I’m also a graduate of Queanbeyan High School and I went to university too! Having lived in both Queanbeyan and Ipswich, the Q is a much better place. Canberrans mock the place but it’s more representative of the rest of Australia – just remember that Queanbeyan hides the millionaires while Canberra hides the million dollar mortgages.
They all look happy. Except for the capitalist pig who chooses to work rather than celebrate Christmas.
Posted by Infidel Tiger on 2007 12 23 at 07:00 PM • permalink
Another reader criticised those sending the email saying: “I think that this opinion of Ipswich and its residents is typical of the ignorant, bigoted, arrogant attitude of the uneducated lower class citizens and businessmen of other cities that are jealous that we live and prosper in the most liveable city in the world.”
Christ, what a predictable, hackneyed, worn out spray.
On the other hand, it’s good to see Beetroot has attained its rightful place as tradtional Christmas fare.
What is it about y’all and beetroot? We gave you turkey and hamburgers already. That means you have good food available. Why the beetroot?
Is it some pathological need to be punished or something? Y’all, maybe, got broken genes in the taster part of your tongues?
It’s gotta be something deeply embedded and comprehensively distributed.
Hmmm, is the next comment supposed to be, “You can milk my arrowroot biscuit anytime?” Just wondering, Dean.
Posted by dean martin on 2007 12 24 at 04:25 AM • permalink
But paper does come from “wood.”
Posted by dean martin on 2007 12 24 at 04:41 AM • permalink
What has Ipswich got over Port Adelaide?
1. You can drive out of Ipswich in several directions. When you drive out of Port Adelaide you have to go through Adelaide.
2. Ipswich is attracting developers. Port has less construction cranes than Adelaide CBD which is saying something because the only cranes you see in Adelaide are building Government offices.
3. Ipswich has a future. Port is the arse end of a redundant State economy.
“Probably not, I live by myself in a caravan park”
Haha, that answer is just too perfect!
Posted by cyclosarin on 2007 12 25 at 11:01 AM • permalink
There’s no way that is the actual collection of photos. Like, no way. I was in Queensland in 95-96 and i suddenly feel the urge to…. shower. And floss.