Sport can be a driver for change; it can make a difference in people’s lives and unify communities, particularly around national successes. But it can also create tensions and cause conflict.
Is the success of The Bachelor based on the spectacle of women psychologically tearing each other down for entertainment?
AAP Image/Network Ten
The Bachelor, like most reality TV, thrives on drama. But its particular style of conflict illustrates an uncomfortable point: women can easily be sexist against other women.
Doctors need to be able to discuss their patients’ weight, but they need to be taught how to do so delicately, for the best outcomes.
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An individual’s weight is a complex and sensitive issue, which may be related to many factors that are not only medical but social, environmental and emotional.
Rather than assisting in prevention and allowing children to mature out of offending, juvenile detention does the opposite.
AAP/Neda Vanovac
Important questions are being asked about why children were abused in juvenile detention in the Northern Territory. But we also need to ask why children are being detained at all.
Akbar Maulana, an Indonesian high school student in Turkey, talks with his teacher. Akbar is the main character in the newly released documentary Jihad Selfie.
Aswan
Why do boys decide to join Islamic State? A new documentary focusses on an Indonesian teenager who considers becoming a foreign fighter but takes another path. The film is now being screened to young people across the nation.
The Australian netball team after their gold medal win at the Netball World Cup in 2015.
AAP Image/Paul Miller
Netball – one of Australia’s most popular sports – is on track to turn professional. Is this an exciting new chapter for female athletes? Or does netball’s success draw attention from other sports, where women can smack balls, and roam freely?
There are a lot of myths about the way chickens are farmed in Australia.
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Do organic chickens taste better? Why are some eggs white and others brown? Are free range chickens healthier? There are a lot of questions about chicken production. Here are the facts.
Success in human drug development is painfully low.
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Paul Maruff, Florey Institute of Neuroscience and Mental Health
News reports this week hailing a breakthrough in Alzheimer’s research, saying a vaccine for the disease is a few years away, have raised hopes for many. But let’s take a step back from the headlines.
Labor’s ‘Mediscare’ campaign played to an existing belief about the Coalition’s health policies.
AAP/Mick Tsikas
Pauline Hanson and her party will potentially be a divisive presence in the next parliament. The challenge, for a potential Coalition government in particular, will be just how to handle her.
A hundred years later, the magnitude of the Battle of Somme can still be felt.
Newzulu
A hundred years ago today, the Battle of the Somme began. This conflict, in which a million men died in order to move the front lines about six miles, spelled the end of courage as a cornerstone of masculine identity.
It can be tough deciding where to give birth.
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More than 300,000 women give birth in Australia each year. Most (97%) give birth in hospitals (72% of these in public and 28% in private), while 0.3% are born before they arrive at hospital.
What’s on offer on issues that disproportionately affect women? Some minor tweaks that are useful but not change-making.
AAP/Lukas Coch
By continuing to see policies that affect women in economic rather than social terms, both major parties are offering little in the way of improved gender equity.
Eddie McGuire caused a furore by suggesting the drowning of prominent sports journalist Caroline Wilson.
AAP/Tracey Nearmy
Two AFL club presidents have created a furore with their ‘banter’ about the drowning of a female journalist. Here’s how it happened, and why it’s unacceptable.
How should the media report purported links between Islamic State and events like the Orlando shootings?
Reuters/Steve Nesius
Terrorism and links to IS – real or purported – need to be very carefully handled by the media for fear of reproducing propaganda.
Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk (2L) defended the government’s decision to withdraw teachers from Aurukun’s school following the latest incidence of youth violence.
Matthew Nicholls/AAP
Despite its insidious influence on the climate and our health, coal has a lesser-known positive side to its otherwise dark soul. It has provided us with some stunning fossils.
We talk about food with moralising – and judgemental – language.
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Locavore, freegan, kangatarian, flexitarian … what we eat has become a moral minefield. Religions have long enforced food-related prohibitions, but in a secular context we could do with a little less moralising at the kitchen table.