An Australian Christmas
Its summer here in Australia in December. It’s fire season, people run about in shorts and T shirts and suburbia is yet again putting snowman illuminations, velvet and fur clad Santas, designer Christmas trees with fake spray snow, ordering Turkey and cranberry sauce and turning on the lights and turning off awareness of global warming as shoppers crowd malls for ever more expensive elecronica now that children’s Christmas wish list included items over $250… oh, and then there’s the dog’s presents and the cat’s presents… we have pets which live better than most people in 3rd world countries (and better than many impoverished indigenous Australians in this 1st world country)… but, hey, its Christmas in Australia.
I put together an Aussie Christmas tree; essentially a metal vase with long grasses, willow and decorative birds, butterflies and starts attached to it to pay homage to the spirit of summer here and appreciation for nature.
I know we’re supposedly ALL believers in some Jewish boy born in October in the middle east 2000 years ago was meant to be the son of God and meant to commemorate that on Dec 25th but living in a country whose indigenous population have a deep spirituality, the history of which goes back more than 40,000, a pithy 2000 seems a little over inflated in its significance.
Christmas is meant to be a time of caring. Perhaps its time to think of what an Australian Christmas means and what it means to be Australian where most Australians are so oblivious to the true history of their own country we think we are buying tradition by taking home a giant illuminated red coated Santa Claus (started by the Coca Cola company in the 1940s, before that Saint Nicholas looks far more like the typical saint portrayed in Christian church windows).
Hopefully none of you will drown in wrapping paper or burst from enough Christmas dinner to feed a Sudanese village for a week. Maybe some of you will even get a handky, socks or underpants and actually feel content (ah, those were the days).
I’d like a few things for my Australian Christmas; and end to invasion in Iraq, the closure of Guantanamo Bay, an end to genocide in Dafur, some hope for polar bears without enough ice to have a future 50 years form now (hey, maybe we can have polar bear illuminations on our rooves with the snowmen)… but if I get a handky, I’ll be glad, at least I’ll have something to cry into in a shopping mall somewhere where an umpteenth Santa smiles for photos at $10 a go as tinny music plays cheery US cheerleaders singing Jingle Bells.
So, happy butterflies and birds to you all. I’m celebrating summer.
🙂 Donna Williams *)
Hi Donna,
I too am in agreement with the last paragraph. I would also add to this Christmas list: the halting of post office closures in the United Kingdom and better public transport (regulated and run for public benefit rather than profit).
In downtown Manchester, wind and rain has been the order of the day, interspersed with pine Christmas trees, gaudy lights and packed shops. For me, I know when Christmas has arrived if I can see an abundance of pine trees – and surround myself with the smell of them.
Stuart.
I want to celebrate summer too!! However, I live in Michigan so it’s quite wintery. But tonight I could see the Northern Lights!! That’s the second time i’ve seen them in my life…and very rare to see in Michigan.
Okay, sorry, off the subject. (the truth is i’m REALLY MANIC and i can’t stop going off on tangents!) Your Christmas list is beautiful. i’m just counting on the socks.
Yes, like Stuart, I heartily agree with the sentiments of your last para….Iraq, Guantanamo, Dafur and polar bears.
The problem here in Swansea is that we can tell that Christmas is coming because when we drive home in the evenings (even as early as 6pm!), we are aware of drivers who really should have left the car behind and taken a taxi.
This city has the worst figures for drunken driving in Wales… so hopefully, they’ll all eventually lose their licences and the roads will be safer for everyone else!
Seasons Greetings to you both from wet and windy Wales!
Well…..for those who want these horrors of Guantanamo and Iraq and Darfur and so on to end……..I do too, but for now, don’t hold your breath on it. Something else I want for Christmas is for non-auties to stop trying to advocate a cure for autism and let us “simply be,” as Donna so aptly says in her book…not once but several times……we have a huge problem with that in America. Curebie-ism…..
Don’t get me wrong, I am all for dealing with gut issues and sensory issues….and anything else that will not attempt to change the essence of who someone is…….that is, not try to force them to deny themselves in one way or another.
We’re working on that…..a little bit at a time………..
Athena Ivan
then perhaps the problem is in what is called autism.
if gut/immune disorders, disabling sensory-perceptual issues, disabling levels of motor planning issues, disabling levels of co-morbid mood/anxiety/compulsive disorders, lack of any augmented communication device/strategies are addressed/treated, then those with these AND autism become less ‘autistic’
hence in ANY PERSON WITH AUTISM WITH THESE things these are considered part of their autism and a treatment for it.
but like you, I don’t see it that way, I see it as a treatment for/addressing what it is- treatment/addressing of gut/immune disorders, disabling sensory-perceptual issues, disabling levels of motor planning issues, disabling levels of co-morbid mood/anxiety/compulsive disorders, lack of any augmented communication device/strategies- with a side-effect in those with these that many severely cognitively/emotionally/sensorily/perceptually/impulse control challenged people with autism often become less autistic when these issues are reduced.
So the question is
is the person still autistic afterwards?
-the answer – yes, usually, there’s still at least a residual level of autism
so have they cured the autism?
-no
have they reduced burdens upon it so the presentation is less severe?
-yes
is it OK to treat/manage these challenges
-yes, I think so
does this mean autism itself – the structural differences that lead to altered ways of processing information to the social majority- is bad or should also be reduced
-no
what if the person hates being different to the social majority
that’s a mind-set issue, a life journey, something they need social-emotional help to experience more positively, just like with body dysmorphia…
-one doesn’t just go cut perfectly natural and functional limbs off without trying to help the person come to terms with why they can’t stand those limbs.
so is it OK if we start to diagnose and treat what IS ethical and helpful to do so?
-I think so
and to leave intact, even appreciated, even loved, the natural quirkiness that is an autistic nature?
-I think so.
what’s more, I think its psychologically, emotionally, morally wrong to naggingly or persistently pursue someone on the basis of their quirks, as though they are a CASE not a whole feeling human being, just because they have socially non-invasive, non-harmful, non-disabling quirks that others find ’embarrassing’ or ‘weird’.
🙂 Donna Williams
http://www.donnawilliams.net
Oooh – and the fish, we need to watch what we are doing to the ecosystem for the fish – have you heard the report that there will be no more fish in the ocean by 2050? That is amazing that a species like ourselves can kill off the oldest form of complex life . . . good thing I went to go see my great white sharks this year . . .