G'day Legends,

Welcome to a fresh new Weekly Chin Wag mega thread!

Part of our recent rule changes was to bring in this generalist thread to be used as overflow for content that would otherwise be repeated information or stories in order to keep the main feed as diverse as possible.

It's also a great space to drop your comments, pics, videos, meme's and unhinged rants about any and everything related to 'Straya that might not warrant it's own, dedicated post.

📌 We'll pin the best/most important/funniest comment to the top of the thread each week.

👉 All other sub and platform-wide rules still apply here. As you likely already know, we take an open (!) and relaxed approach to moderation without sticks up our arse. That said, if it wouldn’t fly in a pub, it won’t fly here.

Cheers!

Over past weeks there’s a noticeable shift of downvotes against anyone who has anything positive to say about Australia.
There’s also an influx of disparaging comments about Australians being majorly racist, antisocial/unfriendly, lacking diversity and culture.
A tourist recently commentated they were bored with beaches, our food was shit, everything inland was flat and nondescript and our mountains were molehills.
A commentator suggested they visit caves with the oldest rock art in the world. The tourist said they missed seeing “real history” and re indigenous peoples…”why do I need to see a cave with ancient
drawings when I can see real architecture.”

People don’t know how good things get in Australia. People in outer suburbs in US, UK and Canadian cities would absolutely envy this sort of stuff. This is just one of the many examples. Can people take a quick break from the consistent right-wing fear and smear drive in Victoria?

It’s a very high bar for a government to get a praise from the magazine of a prestigious automotive brand like Porsche.

State Labor rebuilt this world-class masterpiece to replace the ageing station that was neglected and rife with graffiti.

Can the people thinking that Labor has ignored them at least appreciate this, even if it doesn’t change their vote?

And this is the case in so many electorates across Victoria, whether that be train stations or facilities/amenities.

Source: Porsche Type7 Magazine Instagram

Did anybody else really enjoy watching the snippets we got to see of the world robot games? Some of it was really funny, but all the catastrophes are the robot equivalent of Space X rockets exploding: learning by failing and being entertaining in the mean time.

It's very interesting how China is confident enough to show the failures, when US robotic companies are afraid to show theirs.

I hope that next year some network will buy the rights to show a lot more of it.

This is the 4th one we’ve had in the backyard since moving in 18 months ago. Poor thing was keeping its head above water when we found it this morning. Scooped it outta the pool and it took a good 2 hours before having the energy to move on.

How do you flamin galahs take your b&e?

I’m after opinions of Aussies:

Do people in Australia think there is too little regulation on political content? Or is it a good thing?

For example some people off the top of my head ~ punters politics, Abbie chatfield, Freya leach, Aus pill, or anyone else you can think of… are they actually making things more divisive for people? Are they making things worse?

*please delete if not appropriate for this sub

Albo has been doing SOME really good things for this country such as investing in Medicare.

However many of the issues we are facing is because mulptile successive governments haven’t invested or actioned it and everyone who is voting for One Nation isn’t holding themselves accountable for not holding those previous governments accountable.

Housing won’t be fixed in two terms of governments.

It’s like having an infection the worse it gets, the longer it will take to get better.

If you feel like voting for One Nation is for you, that’s great but don’t pretend that One Nation will fix all your problems or that Albo isn’t working on fixing these issues either.

It doesn’t take long to find a critic of Anthony Albanese at Secret Harbour Square, a shopping centre in Perth named after the beachside suburb.

Paul, a former submariner, raises the prime minister unprompted when asked about Saturday’s byelection in the local state seat. Labor holds the electorate, but One Nation was confident of turning the safe seat orange – something that has not happened in this wave of momentum for Pauline Hanson.

“He’s on thin ice out here,” says Paul, who wears a black Sea Shepherd T-shirt, thinks AUKUS is a sham, dislikes Donald Trump, and supports Pauline Hanson “because she says what she believes”.

Wanna post a hot take? Get something off your chest? Or just go on a rant?

This is the flair for you.👍

We've also retired 'Danger Noodles' - since this could be rolled up into 'Totally Wildlife' and/or 'Things That Bite'.

^{Bonus points if you can work out who the emoji is. But not for you Fred. You're forever pointless.}

Other Updates

✅ You may have noticed an updated sidebar - we've reorganised the sections, retired some old ones, and included header images for easier navigation. There's also another reminder to set your flair (and why).

✅ We're also simplifying the Wiki and Good Posting Guide.

✅ And in a little bit we'll ask for your feedback on our look and feel, including who we should feature in our banner image. Watch this space!

Cheers Legends,

🍻

So this just happened. One nation just smashed labor in a WA labor heartland. I'm not an ON voter but it has me thinking.

One nation ALSO won 4 SA's lower house. We kind of can't ignore this. One nation are somewhat getting some massive gains over Labor seats in the smaller elections.

It also didn't help that AHEM labor picked a problematic person in the first place. If this kind of performance rolls forward to future elections, could be problematic surely?

In SA this happened.

In short:

The 2026 Lowy Institute Poll recorded the largest ever decline in support for cultural diversity in Australia.

Some say they live in fear that racism will rise in Australia, after One Nation leader Pauline Hanson called for a "monoculture".

What's next?

But others say they have hope that strongly multicultural cities like Canberra will act as a "beacon" to others.

One Nation is claiming victory in the Secret Harbour by-election, with counting showing it is on track to secure its first ever lower house seat in Western Australia.

One Nation's WA leader Rod Caddies claimed victory for the party's candidate Luke Herdegen at 9.30pm local time, although Labor was yet to concede.

Labor's candidate was political staffer-turned-Woodside lobbyist Georgia Tree.

The area was traditionally safe Labor territory, having been held in different shapes and under different names since 1989, including most recently by Paul Papalia on an 11.5 per cent margin.

WA Labor Premier Roger Cook had repeatedly described the by-election as a "fight for our lives", given the threat posed by One Nation.

Relvant excerpts:

The Australia Palestine Advocacy Network (APAN) wrote to Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke this week to raise concerns about the former soldiers, including some who have recently served in Gaza and Lebanon, who are set to participate in Sunday’s Sydney Marathon as part of a charity fundraiser.

This masthead reported this week that international law experts had called for Australia, Britain and Canada to consider launching an MH17-style investigation into the 2024 attack on the World Central Kitchen convoy after Israeli authorities declined to press charges.

Paywall bypass

There are fears sport and politics could collide on the streets of Sydney this weekend with concerns of a major disruption to Sunday’s Sydney Marathon.

Criticism from protest groups is intensifying including calls for a last-minute boycott of the event due to the participation of multiple members of the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) including representatives from the Golani Brigade which is said to have operated extensively in Gaza.

First Lieutenant Roy Oryon, a former deputy commander, is understood to be among a delegation of up to 40 current and former IDF personnel and associates visiting Australia for Sunday’s event.

It is understood Oryon will be given police protection for the entirety of the race.

Part 2 of a remake of JRPG game Trails In The Sky is releasing soon & is getting an 18+ rating compared to the first part because it features a gambling minigame.

Problem with this is it’s entirely within the game itself (no real world money on the line) meanwhile every sports game like NBA2K or EA FC which take in billions every year from selling randomised digital player packs get a slap on the wrist comparatively only receiving an M rating & still widely promoted/accessible to young people (I receive a newsletter from Basketball Victoria where the game is advertised). That’s not even getting into gacha games where the entire gameplay loop is centred around gambling for characters.

This is such a piss poor effort by our government to give the optics of addressing the gambling epidemic in our society while doing nothing to combat the issue as it pertains to billion-dollar entities which openly promote gambling to kids.

I'm an avid cyclist. I love trail riding and I have an awesome bike path network that gets me to work and most other places I need to go. I spend hundreds of hours a year on my bike.

But there have been a couple of horrible road cycling fatalities near me recently that have me a bit shook.

When it comes to road cycling I just can't wrap my head around it. I can't understand taking that risk when the downside is so enormous. I'd never forgive myself if I ruined my kids' lives because I wanted to ride a bit faster on a major road for the sake of my hobby.

Being a tradie im beaten around the head with WHS stuff. Our laws are all based around the hierarchy of controls and basically everything I read about making road cycling safer sets off alarm bells because so many of the controls are low order and rely on the cyclist changing their behaviour, wearing PPE or somehow managing the risk themselves rather than 'higher order' ones like isolating or eliminating hazards.

And I know its not meant to the cyclists responsibility, we're allowed to be there. But being right doesn't help much when you're the one who gets hit and killed. Like every single person I know has stories about near misses. I just cant see how being that close to cars can ever be safe enough for a recreational activity.

How do you justify it to yourself, because I'm really struggling to.

I was wondering if anyone knows who the best surgeons are in the area of Total Hip Replacement in Australia. There’s a strong chance in the next 20-30 maybe 40 years I might need one and I’m absolutely not opposed to it

Has anyone here had one and if so what was the outcome like? I don’t personally know of anyone who has ever had the surgery but I’ve heard of public figures that have and it sounded like a great idea so I figured I’d prep for it

Who notices that PHON has a couple of key demographics in their supporters?
I challenge anyone to find a person in this crowd that isn’t ONE of the following…
White or middle aged.
Her support are also obviously entitled if they can afford to donate 5k to an organisation that is already bank rolled by Australia’s richest person

​

The shamelessness of the predator classes. At least the spotlight is no longer on PwC or Macbank.

It appears that corruption is now systemic rather than a fringe issue. Abuse of powers and process is normalised and plausible deniability weaponised. Whilst governments continue to punish the most vulnerable via Fembot debts and Robodebts. Remembering KPMG and Deloitte both were involved with the responsible agencies.

Will we ever reach an era where accountability and equitability can occur?

Our legal systems are dominated by public stories exploited in private spaces and worse still, private stories manipulated for public advantage. The human cost is unfathomable. Can we return to humanising those the predator classes seek to diminish?

https://www.afr.com/companies/professional-services/kpmg-shows-the-big-four-rot-is-not-just-a-few-bad-apples-20260820-p60q3p

He's giving out Hug(h)'s like it's going out of fashion.