This article was first published at The National Times

As our lives become increasingly saturated with technology, digital media and the internet, it’s no secret that our younger generations are spending less time in the great outdoors. Whether it’s hours spent in front of the TV, surfing the internet, playing on a games console or a combination of these, kids today seem far less inclined to enjoy the natural world than in previous generations.

While older generations have long bemoaned a decline in the time spent outside, there has been growing speculation that such a shift might also have negative health implications for those involved. According to Dr William Bird, health adviser to Natural England, a lack of exposure to nature has the potential to adversely affect the mental health of society’s youngest members.

But while Generations Y and Z are more likely to spend time playing video games than recreating the adventures of Enid Blyton’s ‘Famous Five’, they are not without inspiration when it comes to enjoying what nature has to offer.

Bear Grylls is a former member of the British Special Services and has carved a place for himself in the popular consciousness through his TV show, Man vs. Wild. In the show, Grylls encounters various types of hostile terrain and places himself in stressful situations in order to demonstrate survival techniques.

The show has attracted some notoriety due to Grylls’ willingness to subject himself to otherwise-repulsive scenarios – eating unappetising critters for example – but it’s his passion for the outdoors and an unbridled sense of adventure that has the potential to inspire younger viewers to get off the couch and head outside.

As well as his Man vs. Wild adventures, Grylls has had a leading role in a number of truly impressive expeditions. In 2003 he led the first team to cross the North Atlantic Ocean in an ‘open’ rigid inflatable boat, in 2000 he led the first team to circumnavigate the UK by jet ski and in 1998, at the age of 23, he became the youngest Briton (at the time) to reach the summit of Mt. Everest.

But if Bear Grylls has the potential to motivate otherwise-sedentary TV viewers into action, then the efforts of Ed Stafford should be enough to spark an adventuring revolution among our younger generations.

Earlier this month the former British Army captain became the first person to hike the length of the Amazon River. The epic trek took Stafford 859 days to complete in which time he faced hostility from local indigenous communities, the constant danger of not finding enough food and unwanted attention from all manner of creepy crawlies.

Stafford’s journey began in April 2008 when he reached the summit of the Nevado Mismi, a peak in the Peruvian Andes which is widely credited as the source of the Amazon River. At that point Stafford had the company of friend Luke Collyer but after the two had a falling out and the latter left the expedition, Stafford continued on alone.

Five months into the trek, Stafford was joined by Gadiel ‘Cho’ Sanchez Rivera, a local Peruvian who planned to accompany Stafford for five days. When Stafford reached the mouth of the Amazon two years later, Cho was still by his side.

While it’s pretty hard not to be inspired by Stafford’s efforts, not everyone is going to find the idea of a two-and-a-half year hike all that appealing. In fact, only a small percentage of the population would even consider embarking on such an expedition.

According to to Dr Brad Wright, a lecturer in the School of Psychological Science at La Trobe University, it is a sense of ‘hardiness’ that sets the likes of Stafford and Grylls apart from the majority of the population.

‘Hardiness is defined by higher levels of commitment, challenge and control’, he said.  ‘Those with a drive to push themselves to achieve often gain immense satisfaction from achieving their ambitions.’

Sure, the efforts Bear Grylls and Ed Stafford might be beyond the reach of most people, but that’s not to say they shouldn’t be cause for inspiration. And, at a time when our younger generations are spending less time outside than ever before and the average Australian adult spends 90 per cent of their time indoors, there are certainly worse people we could be looking up to.

Image courtesy of the ABC

Given the lack of attention that Jason Akermanis has had over the past few weeks, I thought I’d spend some time analysing a little article that the Bulldogs’ forward penned recently.

For those that missed Aker’s charming attempt to play counsellor for gay footballers, the original article is well worth a read; if only for the story about a perfectly good team shower ruined by a gay team mate.

According to Akermanis ‘the world of AFL footy is not ready’ for gay players to ‘come out’, saying that such a revelation could ‘break the fabric of a club’. While I could terminate the discussion here by pointing to the excellent retort written by Gerard Whateley, I would be denying myself a tantalising opportunity to provide an overly sarcastic, holier-than-thou analysis.

Come to think of it, Akermanis is not that far off the mark. Sure, his assessment of the situation is fairly lacking in nuanced analysis but the idea that blokey sporting clubs aren’t ready for gay men to come out is, well, fairly spot on.

Having been a member of a decidedly blokey sporting club for some years I can confirm that sporting culture and empathy for homosexuality aren’t really the greatest of friends. I never played alongside any openly-gay teammates but the blokey banter was enough to leave me with a fair idea of the general attitude towards ‘poofters’. Indeed the use of the word ‘poofters’ should be indication enough.

I can also speak with some authority in agreeing with Akermanis’ suggestion that ‘locker room nudity and homoerotic activities’ are the norm in that environment. I always found it amusing when my teammates would slap each other on the arse during a match, happily shower naked together, and yet still use the word ‘poofter’ as an insult, completely oblivious to the ironic corner they had backed themselves into.

I also agree with Akermanis in saying that the outing of a gay man might tear at the fabric of an AFL club but, as Jack Marx points out, that might well be a good thing. The problem here is not that gay players are a threat to the manliness that football culture is built upon, rather it’s football culture that is a threat to gay players.

While it would be genuinely tough for an AFL footballer to ‘come out’ in the current football climate, few things could be more beneficial to the sport in the long run. What better way to combat institutionalised homophobia than to have proudly gay footballers declare their sexuality while being prepared to discuss it in the public arena? Sure, the footballing world might not know how to handle it initially but it would surely be a step in the right direction.

I mean, even Eddie McGuire thinks it’s a good idea for gay AFL players to come out, telling SX News that he ‘would love it’ were such a revelation to occur. Then again, Eddie also thought it was a good idea to describe figure skaters as not ‘leaving anything in the closet’ while commentating at the recent Winter Olympics.

But it’s not just sporting clubs that seem to feel threatened by homosexuality. If Channel Seven reporter Adam Walters is to be believed, the Australian public are so concerned about homosexuality that a story about David Campbell’s visit to a gay sauna is the biggest news story of the week. To foster a greater sense of connection between Jason Akermanis and the former NSW transport minister I would like to invoke the wisdom of Twitter user @heavyphotons;

‘Akermanis tells gay men to live a lie. David Campbell shows us how you’re treated when you do.’

For those that missed Adam Walters’ shameful excuse for investigative journalism, David Campbell handed in his resignation after ‘a 7News investigation’ filmed him leaving the ‘gay sauna’, Ken’s at Kensington. The initial accusation was that Campbell was at fault for using his ministerial car to visit the venue, but when 7News discovered that he was well within his rights to do so, the focus of the story changed.

As Jonathon Holmes explained on Media Watch last week, the issue morphed into a question of Campbell’s sexuality and the fact that he had allegedly been ‘living a double life’. Thankfully, 7News’ decision to run the Campbell story – ruining a man’s career and personal life in the process – attracted the scrutiny of many within the Australian media, not just the watchful folk at Media Watch.

Journalist and former Media Watch presenter David Marr was typically succinct when commenting for ABC TV’s Lateline: ‘Campbell was destroyed by Channel Seven for being gay, full stop.’ David Koch of Sunrise fame impressed many with his criticism of Adam Walters’ apparent double-standard and Crikey’s Andrew Crook took the criticism even further, accusing Walters of having a score to settle.

But perhaps the most telling reaction to the 7News’ ‘investigation’ was the collective damnation of the story by journalism educators around the country. As Crikey reported, more than 50 journalism academics put their names to the statement ‘we deplore what you did to David Campbell and his family’.

It goes without saying that the reaction to Campbell’s ‘double-life’ would have been far less had he been cheating on his wife with another woman. The fact that he seems to enjoy the attention of other men has turned a routine breach of a public figure’s privacy into a ‘gay witch hunt’.

Footy clubs have never been known for the progressive attitudes on matters of sexuality but David Campbell’s trial by media is a sad step backwards in our quest to achieve understanding and respect for everyone, regardless of their sexuality. Channel Seven’s attempt to assess  ‘public interest’ stories hopefully says more about the misguided direction of the network rather than society’s thirst for gay blood.

But lest we finish this evening in a cloud of doom and gloom, let’s be grateful that we Australians don’t have the likes of Fred Phelps throwing their weight around. Never mind gay ministers and gay footballers, if Mr Phelps is to believed, we Aussies have far bigger problems on our hands. The good pastor provided this glorious insight during the Black Saturday bushfires last year:

‘God hates Australia, land of the sodomite damned. The fag-infested land of Australia – the fire of God’s wrath is sending hundreds of those filthy Australian beasts straight to hell. We at the Westboro Baptist Church are rejoicing, and we are praying for the dear lord to burn many more Australians alive.’

All of a sudden, Jason Akermanis doesn’t seem like such a bad bloke…

For those of you who have been living under a rock for the last couple days, there have been a few of the ol’ bush fires around. In the days preceding yesterday’s extreme weather conditions, the Bureau of Meteorology had been predicting the highest fire danger in the state’s history. This is one prediction that they surely wouldn’t have minded getting wrong but alas, they were spot on. Temperatures in Melbourne reached 46.4 degrees celcius, with 47.9 degrees apparently recorded in Avalon. You have to feel a certain degree of pity for those Jetstar passengers who, thinking that they were flying to ‘Melbourne’, arrive at a tiny airstrip an hour’s drive from their destination only to be confronted with the highest temperatures in the state’s history and 100kph winds. Welcome to Victoria.

All silliness aside, it truly has been a horrific couple of days for all those affected by the bushfires and with the death-toll well on it’s way to 100, the events of the last couple days have almost been as deadly as 1939′s ‘Black Friday’ and ‘Ash Wednesday’ combined.
For those of us sitting in air-conditioned houses far from the many fires burning around the state, it is hard to imagine what it must be like to lose everything you have ever owned in just a matter of minutes. We look on with sadness and anguish as our fellow Victorians suffer. We also look on with great admiration and respect toward the tens of thousands of women and men, mostly volunteers, who have given countless hours to fighting the fires, organising relief efforts and supporting the many that have suffered as a result of the fires.

It is in testing times such as these that the difference in quality between the various media outlets becomes most obvious. Where ABC radio in Victoria dedicated it’s entire Saturday to live courage and updates on the fire situation, keeping listeners informed and aware, the commercial television networks’ dramatic coverage play like a cheesy horror film. Words like ‘inferno’, ‘nightmare’, ‘post-apocalyptic’, ‘war zone’ and ‘hell on earth’ are bandied around like they are going out of fashion. One woman on Channel Nine’s coverage this evening even referred to the devestation around her home as being ‘like the Holocaust’.

Furthermore, while interviewing people who have lost everything in the fires might be good to give everyone else a bit of perspective on the issue, surely a bit of sensitivity would be the order of the day? I refer to a specific incident during Channel Seven’s news bulletin last night in which a reporter was interviewing a gentleman who had lost his home and nearly his life in the fire. Obviously quite distressed,the gentleman told the story of how his home had been lost in the flames, before he promptly broke into tears. The reporter replied with the question ‘how are you travelling?‘ Well, I’ve got a couple of ideas. The bloke has just lost his house in the worst bushfires in recorded history and has subsequently broken down into a sobbing mess while explaining the obviously painful situation on camera. But no, he’s doing great, thanks for asking.

Potentially worse than using distraught people in order to create a compelling news package full of human drama is the sort of parochialism that commercial networks are famous for.
Last night, during Channel Seven’s coverage of the bushfires, anchor Jennifer Kyte spent a good ten minutes of the bulletin speaking to a colleague of hers whose house and wife were under threat from the fires, prefaced with the puzzling and almost offensive remark ‘the fires do not discriminate, I speak now with my fellow Channel Seven reporter, …’ (So by virtue of being a reporter with Channel Seven this reporter should, by rights, be less susceptible to suffering, a right which the bushfires somehow circumvented?)

The clearly distressed reporter explained to Kyte and those watching that he had no idea if his house would survive the blaze and, in between ferocious sobs, explained that his wife’s fate was also unknown. Now I don’t mean to sound harsh – I’m sure the reporter was genuinely mortified at the prospect of losing his wife and to a lesser extent his home – but the scenario faced by the gentleman in question was by no means unique and it is only by virtue of his employment with Channel Seven that the aforementioned interview made it to air. Would Channel Seven have aired a ten minute segment for every man who was worried about losing his home and/or wife? I think we know the answer to that one.

The Channel Nine ‘family’ appears to have suffered to an even greater extent, losing former anchorman Brian Naylor to the fire burning in and around Kinglake. Much like Channel Seven the previous evening, Nine spent the best part of fifteen minutes this evening reporting on the apparent death of Naylor, the two reporters in question remarking how ‘he always had his phone on and we had a sick feeling in our stomachs as we called him on our way up the mountain and he didn’t answer’, how great a bloke he was, and how ‘there was no way he would have left his wife’s side‘. I don’t doubt that he will be sorely missed and that Channel Nine felt a responsibility to honour their past champion, but what about the other 83 people who are confirmed dead? How many ‘good blokes’ are among that lot? Where is their fifteen minutes of fame? How many other people have tried to call family and friends and been confronted with chillingly happy answering machine messenges?

The real vitriol should perhaps be directed at the arsonists who are allegedly responsible for a number of the fires. One of the largest of the fires, the one responsible for Brian Naylor’s death, was allegedly lit by an arsonist and has now taken over a dozen lives and around 500 homes. It takes a special kind of person to light a fire in a thickly forested area like that, knowing that extreme temperatures and heavy winds will spread the blaze beyond control. Premier Brumby recently announced a dramatic increase in jail sentences for those that start fires – from two years up to the current sentence of 15 years – and for those that start fires that result in the loss of life, 25 years behind bars can be expected.

To everyone affected by the fires of the last couple days, our thoughts are with you and we hope for a speedy end to your suffering. To the people of Marysville and Kinglake, we wish you all the best during the slow and painful rebuilding process and we look forward to visiting you and your amazing communities again soon…