Gobbledegeek 2.o

Bendigo 12 lost to Cobram 24 at Koonoomooo, 5 June 2010.

The Fighting Miners suffered their first ever defeat at the hands of the Cobram Dust Devils at Koonoomoo last Saturday. The Dust Devils entered the competition in 2008 but have not been competitive until the current season.

In Saturday’s game, the Dust Devils got on top in the second half after the scores were deadlocked at 12-12 at the break.

Bendigo scorers were Jeremy Solomon in the tenth minute and Nick Poingdestre in the 35^th minute.

Bendigo had the upper hand in the first half with a dominant scrum, good rolling mauls and good hit-ups on the fringes of the rucks by the big men. This dominance resulted in a string of penalties to the Miners and kept the Dust Devils on the back foot.

Team: 1 N. Poingdestre, 2 T. Henderson, 3 J. Tuitupou, 4 S. Kelly, 5 E. Tuitupou, 6 S. McGrail, 7 D. Fallaver, 8 K. Fepuleai, 9 N. Dehnert, 10 Jon Solomon, 11 S. Queally, 12 S. MacDonald, 13 J. Learai, 14 Jeremy Solomon, 15 J. Manderson, 16 S. Paterson, 17 P. Clark

Scorers: Jeremy Solomon, Poingdestre tries; Manderson goal.

W. Coulter

Read the full match report here.

The Miners have a bye this weekend but you can still see them in action when they take on an ‘old boys’ selection as part of their 40th Anniversary celebrations. Why not head up to Shadforth Park and watch?

The Victorian Rugby Union Country Division competition resumes with round 6 on 26th June at home against the Deniliquin Drovers.

Saturday’s opening match of the 2010 Country Victoria rugby season saw the Fighting Miners suffer a 14 – 26 defeat at the hands of Puckapunyal at Shadforth Park, Bendigo.

Defensive frailties on the fringes of the ruck and in the backline of the Miners gave the Boars repeated opportunities to score but the Miners held on to trail by only seven points at the break, 7-14.

Bendigo’s points were scored from a try to five-eighth Steve MacDonald when he sliced through the Puckapunyal defence at the back of a line-out and a conversion by Josh Manderson.

Puck opened the second half with an unconverted try to stretch its lead to 12 points at 19-7.

Bendigo responded with some strong running from improved set play. This led to a string of high tackles by the Boars’ players as the match threatened to become spiteful. Referee Wayne Pick took strong action, sending three Puckapunyal players to the sin bin simultaneously in the twentieth minute of the second half….

by W. Coulter

Read the full article here.

The Bendigo Fighting Miners are still in desperate need of players to sign for the proposed youth squad. If you aged between 14 and 16 and are interested or know someone who may be, please call Mark Luatutu on 5434 5822 (work) or 0427 315067.

Last night I made a note to write a follow-up to Beware the Butcher of Bendigo following the news that Barry Rochford had been found guilty of animal cruelty, according to United Press International, but in reality I should be commenting on the legal system.

The 6 month prison term handed down by the court was pitiful, in my humble opinion and combined with his current sentence of four years for multiple arson, he would be eligible for parole in early 2011.

Wow! It’s almost enough to make you want to take up a life of crime!

Edit – I just realised I posted this with the title ‘Barry Rochford Found Hanged’. I swear it wasn’t wishful thinking, just a slip.

I find it not a little disturbing that the vast majority of visitors come here by way of a Google search for nude photos of Julia Gillard! This is the reason why they come, ergo the reason the post appears in Google’s search results but is anyone able to explain to me why one would be Googling for images of Australia’s Deputy Prime Minister in her birthday suit?

No disrespect Julia but there’s only one thing slightly more disturbing and that would be the notion that some people search for explicit imagery of Kevin Rudd!

For those of you who have arrived here in the false hope of seeing The Honourable Ms Gillard in the buff, I apologise for the anti-climax but offer the following snippet of trivia instead…

…the Deputy Prime Minister of Australia was born in Wales, no less and if you’ve read anything else on here, the significance of that statement will be clear.

Waving it for Wales!

…and still bottom of the gene pool.

Well, it’s not really news is it? Bendigo is again honoured with the prestigious accolade of being the state’s Hoon Capital! A label loved by many and one set to remain for the foreseable future, or at least until genetic manipulation becomes legal/acceptable.

If you’d like to read the article, try here.

What motivates these fuck heads? I mean, if dicing with death is something that substitutes Viagra for these homosexuals, why not simply shoot up an Ice/Crack/random semen cocktail once in a while? That way, you get the rush you crave while never really knowing whether you are going to die a horrible death or not but should it be the former, and we can live in hope, you only ruin the lives of your family.

I cherish the moment one of these Neanderthal toss pots crosses my path or puts my children at risk.

Of course, being of little intelligence, they often bemoan the ‘personal vendetta’ carried out by the local police force in the pursuit of their deemed innocent high jinks, rather than targeting paedophiles, murderers and well, any other criminal activity than theirs. Bendigo Police receive precious little praise for their work against Bendigo’s botty-boys who use hooning as a cover.

Read an article about Bendigo’s Traffic Management Unit here.

One dick-less wonder in particular seems not to understand that his actions have consequences. Poor Joshua Shelton lost his arm as the result of his misguided passion for hooning and while I wouldn’t endorse such radical and extreme body modification, especially for someone who seemingly enjoys driving, it doesn’t appear to have quashed his appetite for the socially repulsive activity. Donkey bollocks Joshua was caught twice in just 90 minutes, having already lost his license! Numb-nuts Josh is THE most effective argument for genetic manipulation if ever there was one.

Read about silly Joshua Shelton from Bendigo here.

Incidentally, this really gets my goat and, just between you and me, I don’t even own a goat! The social misfits, fortunate enough to harm themselves while hooning, are even eligible for compensation payouts from the Transport Accident Commission!

Even if they were deemed negligent and ultimately responsible for an incident, most were still entitled to a lump-sum impairment benefit, she said.

Read more on this insanity here.

I will give intelligent readers one guess as to who pays these dim-witted dick-nibblers? Hoons can obviously have several but I suggest you right in for the answer because you’ll be here forever otherwise.

If you are reading this, then the chances are that you are just slightly/somewhat/rabidly (delete as required) curious about Bendigo Forums or else very lost. The following information is for the benefit of the former, although the material is for general consumption and so encourage the latter to read on regardless. It goes some way to explain what the site aims to do, why it was created and by whom.

Created back in early 2007, this modest little site was born with communication in mind; the collation, discussion and dissemination of information. You might think that there is already enough of this sort of mundane tripe parked up and down the ‘Information Super Highway’ and that by adding to it, I’m merely wasting valuable bandwidth, not to mention burning a hole in my pocket. However, my mate Google informed me that Bendigo did not have any significant online discussion board or at least one that wasn’t affiliated with a commercial venture and so I took it upon myself to create Bendigo Forums. 

“How very altruistic and philanthropic of you.” I hear you think but the truth is that my family and I were new to the region and tools such as the Interwebthingy and Bendigo Forums, enable us to network, discover the region, answer questions, share views, discuss local and national issues and who knows, maybe even make real friends (As in ugly bags of mostly water as opposed to the virtual ones who exist only in Cyberspace).

Forums, sometimes referred to as discussion boards, are unlike conventional chat room facilities in that participants are not required to be present at any given time in order to take part. They can log in and read or join in the discussion when it’s convenient for them. Also, each individual discussion has its own unique thread which is in turn filed within the relevant subject category. These categories are created in advance by me or the nominated Moderators but should demand prove it worthwhile, additional categories can be easily added. The various topics are saved so that they might be visited at any time in the future and thus serve as a useful archive.

The great thing about forums is that as virtual meeting places, they do not discriminate against race, religion, age, sex, disability or even which AFL team you follow. Forums and their users are neither affected nor restricted by time or location. They are open to anyone at anytime from anywhere on the planet (with the possible exception of Belarus, Burma, China, Cuba, Egypt, Iran, North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Tunisia, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Vietnam who have recently been ‘blacklisted’ as ‘enemies of the Internet’ by human rights group Reporters Without Borders  ).

Bendigo Forums aims to be a family-friendly, fun and informative free resource for anyone and everyone with an interest in Bendigo, Victoria, Australia and as such, I encourage you to pop over there now and sign up for your free membership and get posting now!

Above all, I hope this site will be of some use to someone, somewhere but if nothing else have fun!

You might also like to read Bendigo Forums.

….dead in the water or simpy ahead of it’s time?

The development of an online community can be seen soul-destroying given the amount of work that one can put in for such little initial reward, and by reward I mean satisfaction and not financial gain. The methods employed by commercial and non-commercial social networks to increase participation are often very similar but for very different reasons.

Increasingly, companies are integrating social networking concepts into their online presense to build brand loyalty, push products and services and generally increase their market. Very few Australian businesses have recognised the potential of integrating a simple discussion forum into their sites, for example (obviously where relevant). There are examples in Bendigo, including one that did but paid very little attention to its importance.

When your customers form alliances with others to share their views, business needs, and interests, it can forge stronger emotional ties to your brand. These social networks grow virally and exponentially after customers invite their friends and colleagues to join and so on.

However, while the ‘IT business that shall remain nameless’, will no doubt come back with a more fully-featured, interactive community section having seen the potential of a rival site (their words not mine), there will always be the presence of commercial fluff to distract the user. This is the obvious aim and one which should be pursued as it will eventually pay dividends for them and rightly so.

Bendigo Forums is not commercial. Other than possibly introducing a few Google Ads to help pay for the running costs, that is the way I intend it to stay. Bendigo Forums aims to encourage a social network based on a mutual interest, Bendigo. The potential for local government, business and the community in general to benefit from a site like this is great and probably the reason others will hurry to jump on the band wagon once they realise.

I’m a social entrepreneur by nature, with very many fewer self-serving interests than your average businessman and no corporeal product or service to sell but I do believe Bendigo Forums has the potential to offer something to the community in terms of the general concepts of social networking.

As the numbers of those who engage in online communities grow, more and more look towards forums and discussion boards when researching a product or service. After all, wouldn’t you like to talk to the customers rather than just the sales staff driven by the desire to sell? With this in mind, it is increasingly likely that those in search of information pertaining to Bendigo and the surrounding region will look for discussion groups and forums related to the area.

With relevant content, visitors will stay long enough to read and glean the information they require. With healthy debate and discussion on all aspects of the subject matter, visitors are more likely to sign up and participate. Visitors need a reason to return and their involvement in discussion is just one. There are numerous other methods of promoting ‘stickiness’, from offering chat facilities and interactive games, to regular competitions and multimedia sharing facilities. 

The attitudes of most of those who have already been invited to participate in Bendigo Foruns are disappointing and there are alarming parallels in the attitudes, delivery and uptake of Information and Communications Technologies in the region, to those in rural Wales over ten years ago! I was very much involved in the development of the ICT infrastructure for rural regeneration and development in Powys, Wales and so I’ve seen it first hand.

For the moment Bendigo Forums is little more than a hobby I’m willing to share with anyone who’s interested and not a conscious effort in community development. It could be though! With a little effort on my part it could take off very quickly.

And so if you have an interest in Bendigo and the surrounding region, get yourself over to Bendigo Forums, sign up and start posting. It’s free and very simple.

Read about Bendigo Forums.

….and you know what? I bet nobody else gives a shit! But that’s the beauty of a blog; I can write what the hell I like and libel laws aside, I will argue that point to the grave.

I don’t know what’s worse, these tossers (see below) for their inability to park correctly or me for actually giving a shit!

Every fucker used the PEDESTRIAN walkway as their own private parking space

I could almost accept parking like this from a woman

Navigating a busy street with a push chair and four additional small ones is far from easy at the best of times but when you are forced into the road, instead of the relative safety of the sidewalk, it can be particularly dangerous. My children have no choice but to ride or walk in the road. Are you so fucking thoughtless that you simply park where you feel is ok for you? In a residential area? The mind boggles at the thoughtlessness of, it has to be said, the overwhelming majority of vultures who drove to scavage the leftovers.

Thankfully our suburban road is relatively peaceful and traffic free, other than the obvious aforementioned morons but their ignorant actions speak volumes for the laid back ‘fair go’ attitudes, synonimous with Aussies. If we were located on a more busy public road, the baseball bat would be getting up close and personal with a couple of dick head’s cages.

Aussie ‘fair go’ attitude? More like Aussie ‘couldn’t give a toss’ attitude.

Bendigo dog owners are rightly outraged and more than a little disturbed with the knowledge that a sick, sociopathic miscreant is skulking in the shadows, ready to pounce on their beloved pets. The depraved thug is known to be responsible for the callous and brutal slaughter of at least a dozen local dogs including an entire litter of puppies which were bludgeoned to death.

If the thought of an animal serial killer on the loose does little to stir any compassion, take into consideration the very real links between animal and human violence. Many researchers have found that a history of animal violence indicates a high propensity for interpersonal violence. Put simply, those who abuse animals usually move on to human victims. That said, not all animal abusers become serial killers but most serial killers began their killing ‘career’ with animals.

One of the known warning signs of certain psychopathologies, including antisocial personality disorder, is a history of torturing pets and small animals. According to the New York Times:

“the FBI has found that a history of cruelty to animals is one of the traits that regularly appears in its computer records of serial rapists and murderers, and the standard diagnostic and treatment manual for psychiatric and emotional disorders lists cruelty to animals as a diagnostic criterion for conduct disorders.” and “A survey of psychiatric patients who had repeatedly tortured dogs and cats found all of them had high levels of aggression toward people as well.”

This is a commonly reproduced finding and for this reason, violence (including sexually oriented violence) towards animals, is considered a serious warning sign of potential serious violence towards humans. The following are a few examples:

• Russell Weston Jr. tortured and killed 12 cats, by burning, cutting their tails, paws and ears off, put toxic chemicals in their eyes, blinding them, forcing them to eat poison, hanging them from trees; the noose loose enough to create a slow and painful death, as the cat/kitten struggles to free itself as the noose gets tighter with each attempt. Later killed 2 police officers at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, DC.
• Jeffery Dahmer loved to dissect animals (he learned this in school). Later he dissected boys and kept their body parts in the refrigerator. He murdered 17 men.
• Albert De Salvo, the Boston Strangler, would place a dog and cat in a crate with a partition between them. After starving the animals for several days, he would remove the partition and watch them kill each other. He raped and killed 13 women by strangulation. He would often pose the bodies in a shocking manner after their murders.
• In 1998 in Springfield, Oregon 15-year-old Kip Kinkel set a live cat on fire and dragged the innocent creature through the main street of town. He walked into his high school cafeteria and opened fire on his classmates. Two classmates were killed and 22 others injured, four critically. Later that day, police found his parents shot to death in their home.
• Edmund Emil Kemper III, who murdered his mother and 7 other women, was known to abuse cats and dogs.
• Carol Edmund Cole, who murdered 35 people, admitted that his first violent act was strangling a puppy.
• Eleven-year-old Andrew Golden and 13-year-old Mitchell Johnson tortured and killed dogs. A friend of Golden stated that he shoots dogs all the time with a .22. In 1998, in Jonesboro, Arkansas, Golden and Johnson shot and killed four students and one teacher during a fire drill at their school.
• Richard Allen Davis set numerous cats on fire. He killed all of Polly Klaus’ animals before abducting and murdering Polly Klaus, aged 12, from her bedroom.
• The 10 year olds Robert Thompson and John Venables, who killed toddler Jamie Bulger had a history of violence towards animals.

Despite the historical recognition of the link between cruelty to animals and violence toward humans, law enforcement agencies, the courts, and social service agencies have, until recently, ignored the well established connection.

• A survey of pet-owning families with substantiated child abuse and neglect found that animals were abused in 88 percent of homes where child physical abuse was present (DeViney, Dickert, & Lockwood, 1983).
• A study of women seeking shelter at a safe house showed that 71 percent of those having pets affirmed that their partner had threatened, hurt or killed their companion animals, and 32 percent of mothers reported that their children had hurt or killed their pets (Ascione, 1998).
• Still another study showed that violent offenders incarcerated in a maximum security prison were significantly more likely than non-violent offenders to have committed childhood acts of cruelty toward pets (Merz-Perez, Heide, & Silverman, 2001).
• An English researcher found that 83% of families reported for animal abuse also had children listed at high risk of abuse or neglect.

There is also support for the hypothesis that cruelty to animals may be linked to other mental disorders. It can also be an indication that other forms of abuse are also occurring in the home, such as child or spousal abuse. If that wasn’t enough, Schedel-Stupperich (2001) state that some animal abuse incidences have a sexual connotation, and in general, the link between sadistic sexual acts with animals and sadistic practices with humans or lust murders is well known.

Some murderers tortured animals in their childhood, with some of them also practicing bestiality. Ressler et al. (1988) found that 36% of sexual murderers described themselves as having abused animals during childhood, with 46% of them reporting that they had abused animals during adolescence, and that 8 of their sample of 36 sexual murderers showed an interest in zoosexual acts.

So with this in mind, I wonder how Bendigo Police and the local authorities are treating this case? Given the limited intelligence associated with such depraved people, I wouldn’t expect the perpetrator to possess the ability to turn on and use a computer, let alone read this blog.

But should he (and I’m putting money on it being a ‘he’) somehow overcome these debilitating obstacles and find himself reading this……You are obviously deeply disturbed and I would strongly suggest you seek urgent psychiatric help before these cowardly acts escalate into a ‘career’ involving human victims, who incidentally, will most certainly fight back.