Category Archives: Sport

JOHN MENADUE. Cricket – alcohol and junk food.

Posted on 28 December 2016

Cricket has a dangerous relationship with alcohol and junk food.  

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MUNGO MacCALLUM. The Olympic Games. A chance to celebrate and honour human achievements.

Posted on 19 August 2016

  My favourite Olympic Games story comes not from Rio in 2016 but from Persepolis in 492 BC. The setting was the court of King Darius I, who styled himself Darius the Great. His Persian empire was vast, but there … Continue reading →

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STEVE GEORGAKIS. Sport is only sport if you participate; otherwise it is a spectacle

Posted on 18 July 2016

  The highpoint of sport occurred more than 2,000 years ago when the ancient Greeks established an education system which placed a significant emphasis on the playing of sport and in particular the educational value of participation in sport. The … Continue reading →

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KATHY CHAPMAN & BRIDGET KELLY. Unhealthy sport sponsorship continues to target kids.

Posted on 15 July 2016

In the final month of the countdown to the Olympic Games, our sports stars are probably not eating and drinking the Games sponsors’ foods. Again, as in previous Olympics, the Olympic Games sponsors are Coca-Cola, McDonald’s and Cadburys, whose foods … Continue reading →

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JOHN TULLOH. Olympics and oil – a tale of two South American countries.

Posted on 13 July 2016

  Back in 2009, the International Olympic Committee made a bold decision. It decided the 2016 Games would be held for the first time in South America, a continent not noted for its political, economic or social stability. Rio de … Continue reading →

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PETER DAY. Despite alcohol and gambling in sport, let us never forget ‘the backyard’.

Posted on 14 June 2016

Sport is a majestic thing. Just like our imaginations, it takes us to so many good places. The backyard: where gran and grandson become batting partners in a fiercely fought family ‘Test Match’. The beach: where sand and water gently accommodate the … Continue reading →

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STEPHEN LEEDER. Alcohol and sport.

Posted on 4 June 2016

Queensland’s victory over NSW in the June 1 game was reported as the highest rating State of Origin match ever and ‘the top TV event of 2016.’ Both teams carried alcohol advertising on their clothing into the match. The association … Continue reading →

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MICHELE KOSASIH. Seven years on and still itching for change on the negative impacts of alcohol.

Posted on 21 May 2016

2016 marks seven years for the Foundation for Alcohol Research and Education’s (FARE) Annual Alcohol Poll (conducted by Galaxy Research), and we continue to see Australia’s concern about the negative impacts alcohol has on the community.

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Evan Williams. The seven sacred cows of Australian politics

Posted on 16 April 2016

We are indebted to the Hindu religion for that useful term sacred cow. As every schoolboy knows, Hindus venerate the cow and forbid its slaughter or abuse. Our political landscape abounds in sacred cows – institutions or practices that are … Continue reading →

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John Dwyer. ‘Health’ products and treatments that are often unproven and sometimes dangerous.

Posted on 29 January 2016

                  Health Care Advertising and Consumer Protection There are far more irritations than pearls available currently to those of us trying to champion the importance of having our health care underpinned by credible scientific evidence of clinical effectiveness. Though we … Continue reading →

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John Menadue. Supporting Adam Goodes.

Posted on 24 January 2016

This blog is a repost from 1 August 2015. Adam Goodes has been bullied and vilified because he has reminded us of our dark history and the discrimination that continues against him and many others in Australia today. We don’t … Continue reading →

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Robin Room and Michael Livingston. Alcohol companies target the 20% of Australians who drink 75% of the alcohol.

Posted on 23 January 2016

Researchers have known for a long time that alcohol consumption is quite concentrated in a small part of the population. They argue about the exact distribution, but there is substantial agreement that, so long as alcohol sales are not heavily … Continue reading →

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Michael Thorn. Caught Out: How Cricket Australia maintains Aussies high drinking average.

Posted on 23 January 2016

  The runs are coming thick and fast in the current Victoria Bitter One Day International Series between Australia and India, bested only by the onslaught of alcohol advertising both on and off the pitch as well as in the … Continue reading →

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Steve Georgakis. The unholy trinity of sports advertising in Australia – betting agencies, junk food and alcohol.

Posted on 20 January 2016

Why we shouldn’t be surprised that tennis is implicated in match-fixing. The first day of the Australian Open was marred by revelations alleging widespread match-fixing and cover-ups in men’s tennis stretching back more than a decade. World number one Novak … Continue reading →

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Peter Day. Professional sport needs more ‘Pats’.

Posted on 17 January 2016

Despite all the feel good talk, the rags to riches stories and wonderful qualities that people like to associate with professional sport, when all is said and done, what really shapes and drives it are these three things: Results 2. … Continue reading →

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Dennis Hemphill. Essendon Football Club

Posted on 14 January 2016

Their club failed them, but Essendon players can’t excape blame for doping ban. Fingers are pointing again at the Essendon Football Club for its failures in the long-running supplements fiasco. This follows the Court of Arbitration for Sport’s (CAS) decision … Continue reading →

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John Menadue. Cricket and the sound of summer.

Posted on 31 December 2015

For me, the most memorable comment of the cricket season so far has been by Steve Smith, the Australian captain, explaining that the VB logo on their jackets wasn’t really advertising alcohol. It was only ‘branding’. I notice that he … Continue reading →

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Sean Gorman. Goodes is gone but the confronting truth remains.

Posted on 9 October 2015

For many AFL fans, the last week in September is the time of the year where we reflect on a season that could have been and dream of next year. One thing we can be sure of is that we … Continue reading →

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Sandra Jones. Don’t worry about the kids: Let’s just protect the alcohol industry

Posted on 26 August 2015

A recent study from Monash University found that a quarter of all alcohol advertising on Australian TV was during televised sports. Importantly, 86% of alcohol advertising between 6.00am and 8.30pm (that is, when kids are most likely to be watching … Continue reading →

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Andrew Pridham. Adam Goodes and Rosa Parks.

Posted on 3 August 2015

Before last weekend’s match between the Sydney Swans and the Adelaide Crows, the Chairman of the Sydney Swans, Andrew Pridham, gave a very challenging speech about Adam Goodes and racism in Australia.  He said that recent events are a seminal … Continue reading →

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Marcus Woolombi Waters. We all know and admire the Haka … so why not one of our own?

Posted on 1 August 2015

The first I heard of the Adam Goodes Bumala-y Yuurrama-y (war dance) I was in Aotearoa/New Zealand. I had been watching my son play rugby. It was a carnival (under 12s) and they had just lost the grand final. After … Continue reading →

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Tim Soutphommasane. Adam Goodes has made some people feel uncomfortable.

Posted on 31 July 2015

Racism comes in many forms: overt and covert, crude and subtle. The harms of racism also come in many forms. We know from a large body of research that racism can lead to stress, negative emotions, psychological damage, even physiological … Continue reading →

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Peter Day. Warning: role models may shrink

Posted on 11 July 2015

Role models: We love them. We look up to them. We say we need them. We want to know them. We want to live through them. But who are they, and what purpose do they serve? In Australia they tend … Continue reading →

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Alcohol is a bigger problem than ice.

Posted on 11 April 2015

In the Herald Sun on April 8, 2015, Jeff Kennett, the former premier of Victoria, said that it was time to stop the promotion of alcohol. See link to article below. In this article he says ‘If it is good … Continue reading →

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John Menadue.  Alcohol and junk food – winning at the expense of our health.

Posted on 7 April 2015

If you seriously follow almost any major Australian sport as I do, you will be conscious of the saturation alcohol and junk food advertising. And in the run up to the centenary of Gallipoli there are no holds barred to … Continue reading →

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Ian Webster.  Alcohol-drenched cricket.

Posted on 2 April 2015

Michael Thorn is right; the ICC Cricket World Cup was an alcohol-drenched event (SMH Tuesday, 31st March 2015). Cricketers were once models of sportsmanship. There was even altruism and some became statesmen. Recall, “That’s simply not cricket.” No longer, as … Continue reading →

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ICC Cricket World Cup: Alcohol-drenched culture needs to change.

Posted on 31 March 2015

Many media outlets today have drawn attention to the alcohol influenced behaviour of Australian cricketers as they celebrated winning the International World Cup. At the celebration in Federation Square in Melbourne yesterday morning, the Australian captain Michael Clarke seemed to … Continue reading →

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Michael Kelly SJ. Phillip Hughes: reality bites

Posted on 30 November 2014

Seeing Australia from outside the island continent offers some very strange views from time to time. The outpouring of grief over the tragic accident that took the talented life of cricketer Phillip Hughes went global within a very short time. … Continue reading →

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Clare Condon SGS. Sanctioned Violence: What does it do to our society and relationships?

Posted on 1 September 2014

Some violent acts, depending on where and how they were perpetrated, are regarded as criminal. Others, however, are sanctioned by society, even applauded and cheered. Some are blatant; others are covert and subtle. Some are justified by cultural norms, by … Continue reading →

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