Daily Prompt – Flash Talk

You’re about to enter a room full of strangers, where you will have exactly four minutes to tell a story that would convey who you really are. What’s your story?

Hiiiii, I’m an alcoholic. Just kidding, I’m addicted to heroin. Again… Kidding.

15 July – Scandal

Kerry Washington is speaking at the conference next week. What do you think has been the biggest scandal so far in this decade?

 
Well in terms of Australia, there’s been quite a few ‘scandals’.

5 June – Ignoring Comments

Are there any comment sections online that you refuse to read?

Generally speaking I usually avoid comments sections because past experience has shown me that a) there are too many basic bitches out there who don’t understand what comment sections are actually for; and b) there are some ranty bitches out there who feel compelled to go out of their way to write a mini thesis on something completely unrelated.

Jan 30: Persuading Others

If you could persuade people to do one thing right now, what would it be?

I would actually try to persuade people to have more of a social conscience.

Only in the past few years have I really developed more of a social conscience in terms of being more vocal about things that I believe in – things like animal rights, climate change, marriage equality, boycotting companies that don’t support the same beliefs that I have.

And then we end up with this complete and utter monstrosity, Tony Abbott, as our leader, who is so completely backwards, he almost seems to be determined to try and inflict as much damage as possible, so that when he gets voted out at the next election, him and his Liberal government will then have all this damage and destruction to use as a platform for the incoming government, and use that to make them look inadequate because they won’t be able to fix it overnight, and they wont have billions of dollars at their disposal to start trying to undo all the damage that the Abbott government has, is and will cause to our country.

Without actually thinking about the country that we live in and the world that we live in, people tend to just sit back and ignore or avoid these kind of things because they don’t think it affects them; or they think that they can make a change, (or maybe they don’t want to?!) but the fact still remains, that there is a lot of shit that happens in this world, and not enough people really seem to care about it to do anything to create a positive change. Yes, there are a number of activists out there, but more often than not, they give the actual term ‘activist’ a bad reputation.

What’s the first thing you see in your head when you hear the word activist? I’m just gonna go out on a limb here and suggest that it’s something like a person with some signs / placards, chaining themselves to a fence or a tree, or maybe standing in the way of a bulldozer in a picket line. Perhaps they’re rocking out a giant mop of bushy dreadlocks, screaming into a megaphone, barefoot, with a face full of piercings and referring to themselves in the third person by their alternate non-religious name of Sapphire or Moonflower.

That doesn’t have to be the case. Any body can be an activist without having to resort to that kind of action. You can do little things, small every-day things, that will at least make you feel like you’re doing your part to help a worthy cause.

Personally, I’m not going to go out of my way to go to a rally. Even if it’s for something that I support, I generally loathe them, because you see those people I just described, and they make me want to throat-punch them. Instead, I do my own stuff. I’ll sign petitions; I’ll buy only free-range eggs; I’ve even gone to the point now where I completely emptied my entire bathroom skincare and hair care products for cruelty-free brands. I’ll donate money to charities like the RSPCA, or supporting initiatives for the homeless. I refuse to support companies that don’t support marriage equality, or have financial ties to anti-gay organisations like the christian lobby. I no longer donate clothing to The Salvation Army or The Red Cross because they refuse to help people who are in need that are homosexual. Those people are more than happy to take my hard-earned pink dollars, but if I ever found myself in need of their assistance, it’s so disheartening to know that the people who gladly took my money would refuse to help me.

Why would I continue to support that. Especially when I’d blindly been doing so for so many years. Part of me wishes I could ask for a refund of everything I’ve donated to them, just so I could give it to a more deserving charity.

But I am just one person. I cannot make a big enough difference to influence any change, but I can tell other people about it. And they can tell people, and so on and so forth. But there’s a difference between agreeing that there is a lot of stuff that is wrong in this world and actually stepping up and doing something to make a difference.

So if you were to sit there and make a list of what do you feel strongly about in terms of a broader social aspect, what would you write down? What are your top five issues? What small steps can you take to make a small difference?? And for those of you that believe in it, I think we can agree that by making a positive change for a social cause will bring you good karma.

And everybody wants good karma, right?