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Last updated on July 13th, 2017 at 07:12 am
Australian comedian Tom Gleeson meets the troops:
“I kind of thought of the defence force as being full of meatheads, not too bright, couldn’t do anything else. It’s the truth, it’s what I thought. I’m only happy to say that now because I don’t think that any more.”
Maybe he should have a quiet word with Mark Latham.
Memo to your partner: Afghanistan’s “the good war”.
Posted by Infidel Tiger on 2007 12 09 at 10:21 PM • permalink
“[Gleeson’s partner, lawyer Ellie Parker]..was also the only one, really, who said that going on the tour meant that I was condoning the war,” Gleeson says. ….[S]he still felt that, to some degree, I’m publicising it and talking about it and I’ll have positive things to say. That I’m still humanising it a bit.
What a Grade-A goose Parker is. No doubt she considers herself a feminist, but when soldiers put their lives at risk to defeat an ideology that forbade women to work, she’s on the side of the mysoginists.
Nice company you keep, Ellie.
Posted by The Mongrel on 2007 12 09 at 10:25 PM • permalink
Can these people not rationalise that these soldiers are doing a job that they love and believe in and are willing to die for their country and respect that that is a life decision that they have made with the full understanding of what that entails.
these people who are against the war in Iraq have every right to be but that doesnt give them the right to say negative things about a situation when they have no idea of the reality of the war. Keep your uneducated opinions to yourselves.
Good on him for not letting the closed mind of his partner get in the way of telling people his story
Nonsense, everyone knows they are completely different to the rest of Australians, much like these chaps.
Posted by thefrollickingmole on 2007 12 09 at 10:54 PM • permalink
Little did he know that they stopped raping babies just long enough to listen to his set.
Posted by Infidel Tiger on 2007 12 09 at 11:03 PM • permalink
“I thought I’d have nothing in common with anyone but I met people who could have been mates of mine or I could have been to uni or high school with.”
Great; he used to think our servicemen were meatheads, and now, thanks to his experiences, he thinks that they’re pretentious arseholes. That’s a step up.
Really, how could anyone be grateful for a minor celebrity saying to them “I used to think you were a low-life moron, but it turns out you could easily be as good as me!”?
Posted by blandwagon on 2007 12 09 at 11:07 PM • permalink
- I wonder if they’ve heard of other idiots like Doctors Kilcullen and Petraeus? Real dunces those boys.
Surely this says way way more about the intellect of the Arts community than it does the military’s. And like Grimmy I can’t understand how it now does not set off a cascade of questions in Gleeson’s mind about so much else military related.What I think would be interesting to know too is what other trades and professions do Lefties think are made up by wall to wall “meatheads”?Posted by the nailgun on 2007 12 09 at 11:08 PM • permalink
The notion that the military is made up of “meatheads” only lingers because the Left needs to believe that those who are brave enough to stand up for what they believe in, and face consequences far more real than a bit of criticism and a failure to get an arts grant, aren’t as smart as the Left is.
That way, they can still feel superior.
On the other hand, I went to an anti-war rally and it confirmed all my prejudices.
Posted by Infidel Tiger on 2007 12 09 at 11:41 PM • permalink
Lefties think that if you are willing to stand up and fight, you must be a meathead. Only an idiot sticks around to get shot at. They know that the “smart” thing to do is run away.
That’s not ‘dumb’ vs ‘smart’. That’s courage vs chickenshit.
That said, I did meet some utter meatheads during my time as a meathead. We usually figured the solution would go something like this if the poo ever hit the fan:
– see enemy
– shoot meathead
– engage enemyI’m glad Tom had his eyes opened. Us “not too bright” people quickly learned how to do the following things:
– strip, clean and operate more weapons than you can carry
– how to use a radio, including the use of codes, callsigns and numerous procedures
– navigation, by day and night
– calling in artillery (NOT something you leave to meatheads)
– how to live in the open air (ie, doing without a house, electricity, flush toilet, running water, a fridge, stove, bed and all sorts of other home comforts)
– how to function and fight as a teamI think Tom should find himself a new girlfriend.
Posted by mr creosote on 2007 12 09 at 11:50 PM • permalink
Just what I need. Tom Gleeson not to preach to me, and tell me how I feel.
I thought he was a comedian.
Didn’t he say in his promo for his new show, at the link, that the army in the war zone was a captive audience? They hadn’t had a laugh for months?
Nothing more to say, really.
Except the idiocy of the observation that Army blokes are just the same as so many other people, they could be “my mate”, and “ I could have gone to school with them…”.
Does he think that Military members are parachuted in by aliens or something? Wron brings them into the world in the Tardis?
”…Gleeson’s partner, lawyer Ellie Parker…”
Jeebus, saw that coming a mile off.
”…She was also the only one, really, who said that going on the tour meant that I was condoning the war…she still felt that, to some degree, I’m publicising it and talking about it and I’ll have positive things to say. That I’m still humanising it a bit….”
Spoken like a true lawyer.
Must be tough never having to really stand up and fight for anything you truly believe in?
Posted by Jay Santos on 2007 12 10 at 12:54 AM • permalink
“- how to live in the open air (ie, doing without a house, electricity, flush toilet, running water, a fridge, stove, bed and all sorts of other home comforts)”
Same sort of lifestyle I had when I was a jillaroo come mustering time.
Does that make me an honorary meathead?
I hope it does. I would feel extremely privileged.
What a precious pillock- who gives a rats royal ringer what some unfunny twerp from a lame “comedy” show that got axed quicker than a turkey at this time of year and his leftist parasite pettifogger partner think about a war or matters military in general?
If Tom the Twat wanted to be a real subversive and radical comedian he could do a gig supporting military action against murderous atavists and misogynist mongs, ridiculing the medaeval idiocy of Islamism and poke fun at the dribbling senility and irrelevance of the modern left.
Not likely to happen, is it, pantywaister?
On a related topic I was going to complain to the ABC about the last episode of First Tuesday Book Club, where walking compost heap Peter Cundall had the hide to speak on behalf of all diggers who’ve seen active service and stated No-one who’s ever served in a war zone could condone the current conflict; seeing as the most dangerous thing he’s ever tussled with is Pattersons Curse, I think he can go fuck himself and take Frank Hardy’s hideous descendsant with him. I couldn’t be arsed complaining- you’d get more staisfaction from a sex doll made out of sanpaper.
#19- I might add that a substantial number of us engage in military persuits and perform numerous other roles, including being funnier than Gleeson or any of his collegues, the only task they engage in and don’t do very well.
I wouldn’t give a fuck if I’d been at the arse end of the Hindu Kush, I’d have found a better use of my time than listening to that deadshit and his fellow fuckwads, like washing my hair or frenzied masturbation with a brillo pad.
If we got rid of the idiot local content rules for commercial television most of the current crop of comedians would revert to roles more suited to their abilities and imagination- “ya wan’ chips wif that, maaaaatttee?”
Something I doubt I could ever say:
“I kind of thought of the ABC as being full of meatheads, not too bright, couldn’t do anything else. It’s the truth, it’s what I thought. I’m only happy to say that now because I don’t think that any more.”
Posted by mr creosote on 2007 12 10 at 01:52 AM • permalink
How funny would it have been if after the first line from Gleeson, a pissed-off digger who was “ordered” to attend the concert yelled out ‘Fuck off Gleeson, your not funny!’.
Does he think we should be grateful for his imprimatur? I work with people who willingly forgo significant chances for personal advancement in the corporate sector to do what we do. For about as much as what a truck driver or general labourer earns. In some case, much less than what their equivalent in civvie street earns. How much money did we waste keeping this meatbag protected and fed whilst in the MEAO? If he paid his own money to go, it STILL wasn’t worth it.
Who, least of all the Diggers, gives a toss what this paid clown and his partner think about the military?
Posted by Pedro the Ignorant on 2007 12 10 at 02:31 AM • permalink
Several twat head life long snout in the trough uni lecturers whom I unfortunately have to rub shoulders with on a now and again basis have always knocked Bush, from their tax funded ivory towers; but they struggle when I remind them he is a fully qualified air fighter pilot and you don’t achieve that by being dumb, fat or gutless. Which are three qualities that I always associate with the snouts.
#27. CB, here is an apostrophe. ‘
Better insert it before the apostrophe polices catch’s up with us’s.
Posted by mr creosote on 2007 12 10 at 02:34 AM • permalink
Aaaah an excuse to self indulgently put up some Kipling!
For it’s Tommy this, an’ Tommy that, an’ “Chuck him out, the brute!” But it’s “Saviour of ’is country” when the guns begin to shoot;
An’ it’s Tommy this, an’ Tommy that, an’ anything you please;
An’ Tommy ain’t a bloomin’ fool—you bet that Tommy sees!
# 17, ‘I think Tom should find himself a new girlfriend.”
Too late mr creoseote , they’re getting married!
I have seen Gleeson a few times doing stand up and years ago on the comedy scene. He’s a terrific storyteller and very sympathetic on stage. You can’t judge stand-up in Melbourne by what gets to TV, which is certainly not to say that all standup is brilliant.
I saw TG in a gig where he spoke about his Iraq experiences and it was very interesting and engaging. He did not at all come off like a person who has contempt for those in Iraq, whatever his views on the actual war might be. I didn’t get his views on Islamofascism.Posted by carpefraise on 2007 12 10 at 02:44 AM • permalink
Good on Tom for openly admitting he was wrong in his preconceptions. And at least he went. Not like the Whitlams (it was them, wasn’t it?), who refused to go entertain the troops at all.
It’s kind of an indictment of society today that the default presumption re our troops is that they must be stupid idiots. Once upon a time, the default presumption was that soldiers were brave and noble. Interesting how it changed.
Converting one comedian to the side of rational thought won’t change their collective mindsets. I’d like to see Dave Hughes and Corinne Grant try their shtick in Talil or Tarin Kowt. Better yet, go to a SGT’s Mess during a dining-in night and have a good old cackle at ‘the meatheads’ who join the ADF. Not so funny now, with your head jammed further up your ass.
‘I think Tom should find himself a new girlfriend.”
Too late mr creoseote , they’re getting married!
Who is the meathead in this story then?
Posted by mr creosote on 2007 12 10 at 04:37 AM • permalink
- Oh, it’s Tommy this and Tommy that
And Tommy go away
But it’s Thank You, Mister Atkins
When the band begins to play…Posted by SwinishCapitalist on 2007 12 10 at 05:03 AM • permalink
#40. CB – only one ex-PM? I can think of two.
I’m told that if you were to wander into any Parliament back in the 1960’s on a night when they had a function that was something like “black tie and medals”, almost every MP had some ribbons on display.
In fact it was quite odd to find an MP back then that had not served. It was only the young whipper-snappers like Malcolm Fraser that ran around bare chested.
Different times.
Posted by mr creosote on 2007 12 10 at 07:41 AM • permalink
He struggles to understand how people can willingly go to a war zone, where they might die…
Uh… patriotism? Defense of a certain way of life? Nahhh. To these nattering nihilistic nabobs, nothing’s worth fighting for.
Posted by Tommy Shanks on 2007 12 10 at 10:22 AM • permalink
The left liberal elite think soldiers are meatheads not like them switched on savvy Taliban dudes, not to mention the incredibly trendy and with it Viet Cong, North Koreans. Iraqi Republican Guard, Al Qaeda.
Mark Steyn wrote something a while back about the link between civilian society and the military being broken with the ending of conscription based armies, warfare becoming a task only for the armed forces not the society as a whole.
We Military Police are referred to by many in the ADF as ‘meatheads’ so I therefore find the idea of an Army full of us as quite exciting! p.s. #33 – the only way the ‘Whitlams’ (either the band or the originals) could ever ‘entertain’ the troops would be if they were set loose naked in no-man’s land in southern Afghanistan.
Posted by AlphaMikeFoxtrot on 2007 12 10 at 02:57 PM • permalink
Young grunts tend to think of the MPs as “the other enemy”. That’s not right though and they eventually grow out of it.
MPs are actually a training aid to help grunts develop additional skills at E&E, resistance to interrogation techniques and a constant refresher for immediate action drills in the area of avoiding ambush, breaking pursuit and/or avoiding contact while inserting into an area.
And all that extra training can be freely accessed by simply going on liberty at any town close to a military base.
Don’t know Mr. Gleeson. But he sounds like yet another foole who thinks himself superior to those who pay to laugh at him. Forgetting that he is only a momentary diversion for those that carry the true weight of the world.
Could be he’s Hollywood material.
Posted by nofixedabode on 2007 12 10 at 03:42 PM • permalink
- AMF
The alternate term up here is “tête de boeuf”.CheersPosted by J.M. Heinrichs on 2007 12 10 at 04:30 PM • permalink
#40. CB – only one ex-PM? I can think of two.
According to here
Billy Hughes, Stanley Bruce, Earle Page, Harold Holt, John McEwen, John Gorton, Billy McMahon and Gough Whitlam were all vets.
I’d say of the group, Bruce and Gorton’s service stand out, Bruce having been awarded the Military Cross and Gorton spending 24 hours in the water after being torpedoed by the Japanese.
Posted by Quentin George on 2007 12 10 at 06:14 PM • permalink
#52: I remember Norman Gunston introducing John Gorton on his TV show: “the Liberal Party leader with the Labor Party face”.
(For US viewers: he had sustained facial injuries from the attack and had a subsequent reconstruction. You could say he had an, erm, “outdoorsy” look.)
Posted by Sensible Swim on 2007 12 10 at 06:24 PM • permalink
Next in Tom’s Amazing Journey of Discovery:
Not all cops are sadistic killers!
Many sports pros are NOT retarded!
Some Liberal voters don’t drink the blood of innocent children!
Posted by Sensible Swim on 2007 12 10 at 07:21 PM • permalink
- Jack Gorton
On 21 Jan 1941, Gorton scrambled to attack incoming Japanese bombers and soon found himself in a dogfight with their Zero escorts. His engine failed and he crash landed, smashing his face into his gun sight. He had a broken nose, 2 broken cheekbones and wounds to both arms. He was rescued by a Dutch officer and some Javanese soldiers and later taken by a small boat to Singapore. On 11 Feb he and another wounded pilot were put aboard the ammunition ship Derrymore. On 13 Feb the ship was torpedoed and Gorton spent the next day in the water, before being rescued by HMAS Ballarat.Gorton arrived in Australia on 7 March and saw his wife soon afterwards and never forgot his reception. He was understandably nervous. A conventionally handsome young man now had a battered, swollen face which would never be the same again. Betty’s response? “She accepted me”. John Gorton was never so grateful. John Gorton – He did it his way – Ian HancockGorton then went on to be PM 1968-1971.
Keith Miller, who was a WW2 pilot and famous post war Aussie Test cricketer, was asked once:
“Do you feel stress when you are playing cricket?”
He replied: “Stress?” “Stress is when you’ve got a fuckn Meschersmitt up yer arse”
Somehow, Kevin Rudd and Shane Warne do not measure up to these blokes very well.
We have lost nearly all these blokes and their wives and families who went through the depression and WW2, times that we can only read about and try to imagine what it is like with husbands, fathers and sons, Wives, mothers and daughter away with half the world trying to kill them.
We really don’t know we’re alive.
That some people think they’re “meat heads” angers me more than a bit, but I do note that ANZAC day crowds have been increasing year on year for twenty years, so I think these people in in the minority.
He struggles to understand how people can willingly go to a war zone, where they might die.
Perhaps Tom, you may want to consider what in your life was lacking to think that somethings are worth dying for.
Perhaps then you can truely understand those of us who’ve have volunteered to give our lives to protect those of you who make a living from deginerating those of us who choose to make you safe.
Signed, an ex-serviceman.
Then there is this bloke – Col Charles Anderson MC VC MP
WW1 -Military Cross
WW2 – Victoria Cross, prisoner of Japanese on Burma RailwayMember of Federal Parliament 1949-1961
Mild mannered, bespectacled farmer from Young NSW.
I get sick and tired of these so called intellectuals who only discover after they’ve met military personnel they are not what they thought they would be.
To me this is nothing but discrimination by so called elite who think they are better than everybody else.
They make me sick.
Guess what they have the same intellect but more importantly they have the intestinal fortitude to lay down their lives for what they believe in.
Unfortunately the same thing can’t be said for their arm chair critics.
#63 Pickles, you may be interested to know that there is a Charles Anderson VC Memorial Cup awarded to the winner of the annual Rugby Super 14 match between the ACT Brumbies and the Cape Town Stormers. He was born in Cape Town on 12 Feb 1897 and died in Canberra on Remembrance Day in 1988, so it’s fitting that both teams honour his memory.
No mate, I didn’t know that, but it seems very fitting. I went to a reunion of 2/19 in Bathurst in 2000 as a guest of his grandaughter. I had not heard the full story before that. The remaining old fellows told a lot of stories, as they do, but referred to him as a “little bloke with glasses, but Christ he loved a blue. He saved us at Parit Sulong, saved us in Changi and saved us on the railway, then went back to the farm.”
Do you really think Tom will be at the airport to greet his new ‘friends’ when they return after their tour in the MEAO? It’s just a sound bite to advertise his new show, to display another alleged dimension to what would otherwise be a narrowminded , introverted fool.
His Damascene conversion happened in controlled circumstances, under secure conditions, in a benign environment. That it happened at all is amazing, but I still put little creedence in the long term idea that Tom Gleeson will champion the soldiers’ cause on stages and in front of TV cameras around Australia. I’ll shout the man a beer the day he steps off the stage and joins up, at the very least in a reserve capacity. Someone with his obvious intelligence could probably do some good as an analyst or linguist. They are skills the ADF really needs, not overpaid and ill-educated buffoons, content to mock those who willingly put themselves in harms way.
Doesn’t understand fighting for freedom…yeah, there’s a surprise. Evidently it’s not a new attitude. I’ll try to have pity on this creature & others like him…but I’m not sure I’ll succeed at feeling sorry for their useless hides…
“A man who has nothing which he is willing to fight for, nothing which he cares more about than he does about his personal safety, is a miserable creature who has no chance of being free, unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.” —John Stuart Mill
- A “little bloke with glasses, but Christ he loved a blue. He saved us at Parit Sulong, saved us in Changi and saved us on the railway, then went back to the farm.”
Thanks for that Pickles (#66), I could think of no better epitaph for a soldier.Posted by AlphaMikeFoxtrot on 2007 12 11 at 02:58 AM • permalink
Tom Gleeson: “Who’s flying this aircraft? Someone from QANTAS perhaps?”
Loader: “Ah, just some meathead from Widgimooltha. Woo – check this out..”
C-130 practically rolls onto its back as it goes into a tight spiral for landing. Tom throws up in his lap.
en-route to a base in the middle of nowhere…
Tom Gleeson: “Who’s flying this Chinook? How much do civilian pilots get paid out here?”
Grunt: “Huh? Civilian pilots. Only us meatheads out here mate. (Chinook tilts onto side). Hey, check out that SAM going past.
Gleeson vomits into his eyelids.
Posted by mr creosote on 2007 12 11 at 05:33 AM • permalink
- Pickles (#59)
Thanks for that little snippet on John Gorton (ex Aust PM, for the mystified)
I had the very great pleasure of frequenting the same bar as the retired PM Gorton in Manuka (Canberra ACT) in the late 80’s during my enforced penal servitude in Army Office (Aust equivalent of the Pentagon) that every uniformed officer and many enlisted have to endure as part of their career progression.He was unfailingly a gentleman, full of humour, and loved to “shoot the breeze” with military men, in particular young knucklehead RAAF pilots and old WW2 hands. It was fascinating to listen watch air battles being relived and dissected with old wrinkled hands carving turns and banks in the air to an enthralled audience.It is a measure of the man that he voted himself out of the Prime Minister’s job with his casting vote. The cardboard cutouts that stole his job in later years never came close to being anything like the statesman Gorton was, and not until 1996 until JWH came along did any carry the same credibility.
Look at the present mob. Compare and weep.
Posted by Pedro the Ignorant on 2007 12 11 at 08:45 AM • permalink
The autobiography by Ian Hancock that I sourced that from is a very good read. It also has some great photos of Gorton laughing like a drain while on the piss and looking very bloody unhappy wearing a suit and top hat.
He was also a life member of NORML (National Organisation for the Reform of Marijuana Laws) Make of that what you will.
Looking back, perhaps if he had not fallen on his sword the nation may have been spared the folly of EG Whitlam.
Poor Tom Gleeson, he really put his foot in it, but at least he’s worked out his former “meathead” view of the military was just silly.
I respect that he was willing to do it, was willing to keep an open mind and see soldiers as human beings, and was willing to say “I was wrong” when he got back. I do think he should have a chat with his partner though, she doesn’t seem to get it.