Giving a damn

World Environment Day last week made me reflect on my green credentials. We should all be minimizing our carbon footprint - that’s a given. But somehow COVID and the house renovations gave me an excuse to become cavalier. We are guilty of buying over packaged meat and veg from the supermarket. We recycle what we can, but cling film and those moisture absorbing thingies end up in land fill. Teabags can no longer go in the green waste as they apparently contain micro plastics so into the red bin (landfill) they go too. I save lids from juice and milk but I don’t know where to send them now. I’ve previously given them to the Council for craft activities and to the Lids For Kids charity which seems to have folded. Sometimes I take an extra bag on dog walks and pick up the rubbish I find. Mostly I forget. Is green fatigue a thing, like compassion fatigue? Both seem to be a reaction to the enormity of the issues the planet faces.

Recently a smooth/fast talking Pommy guy came to our door representing the Cancer Council of NSW. He ingratiated himself by admiring our dog and shaking hands (with us not the dog) before launching into more bonding gestures and patter.  He made much of the fact that he has the same name, Reuben, as one of our cats. We got chatting about the fact that he was born in Bristol, where my sister was also born, actually  in the Forest of Dean where the TV series Pennies from Heaven is partially set. Inevitably we talked about people I’d lost to cancer – my mother and my dear friend Mon .before I knew it he was taking my details and signing me up for what I believed was a one off $50 donation. It quickly became apparent that it was in fact a monthly donation which we can ill afford. He suggested that, if after three months, I found (now what was the phrase he used?) I had a change of heart, or my heart was no longer in it, I could revoke the commitment. I know he used the word ‘heart’ about five times…

After he’d gone, I got a confirmation call from the Cancer Council. I was able to instantly cancel my pledge. The caller asked for feedback.  I was too flustered and upset to go into detail. I just stated that we were not in a position to make monthly donations and I had felt manipulated by the encounter. She struck the commitment immediately and suggested I visit their website if I still wanted to donate. Now e while I had previously been persuaded that contributing to the cost of cancer care was something that mattered to me, I now felt resistant. In the next 24 hours I gave $50 to WIRES and pledged $25 to the vet costs for a stray cat.

WIRES protect native animals. Cats are introduced predators whose population is growing because people either don’t care to or can’t afford to get their pets desexed. What strikes me is that (a) I’ve chosen to support services to animals over those for humans and (b) that I’m funding both ‘deserving’ and ‘undeserving’ species.  Where is the consistency? What are my priorities?

Reuben from the Forest of Dean triggered some reactive behaviour and existential questioning…  His door knock came amidst the general deluge of demands I, and I’m sure most people, get on social media, via email and regular mail. In the past fortnight these have included  Labor against One Nation, Amnesty International, Avaaz, Assange,  Change.org, The Guardian, The Conversation and  Ovarian Cancer research, to say nothing of the plethora of direct Go Fund Me and sponsorship approaches I’ve had.  It is dizzying and however worthy each cause is I can’t support them all. So Wires and cat rescue won out, oh, and the Salvation Army when a neighbour came to our door collecting for them yesterday.

Reading about the psychology of donating*, mainly in articles used to train people like Reuben from the Cancer Council, a few factors stand out:

·     Appeal to  potential  donor’s  values base and sense of empathy – the ‘heart’stuff
·     Reduce the scale of the issue by using specific individual examples of who will be helped
·     Set goals /targets e.g. we aim to raise $70K by end July
·      Reward the donor, foster the ‘warm glow’ of giving by telling them what their $s will achieve
·       Leverage their sense of wanting to be as generous as their peer group – what do you think is an average commitment across this neighbourhood?

These are basically sales ploys. Significantly WIRES doesn’t really use them – they tempted me with a ‘we’ll double your donation’ campaign. The animal shelter excels at individuation, using photographs and bios for the adoption candidates. It’s shamelessly anthropomorphic and only works because I am soppy about animals, and, as the above apparent contradiction suggests, that emotional connection with animals transcends their context. That doesn’t mean I don’t support reduction of feral animal populations. I do. 

Donating blood/plasma is a whole other topic area that I won’t expand on here… It uses some of the above techniques to sustain commitment but has no cost apart from an investment of time which for me is amply rewarded by being able to read uninterrupted and getting a Byron Bay cookie at the end of the donation. It is a low effort way of doing something beneficial and, unlike supporting Palestinian and First Nations causes, which from time to time I do, isn’t likely to get me into heated debate with ‘cookers’ on Facebook.

So marsupials, moggies and the Salvos’ clients are the recipients of my meagre donations this week. My motivation may be muddy but does anyone’s bear scrutiny? Should it have to?

 *Sources:

https://neurolaunch.com/psychology-of-giving/

https://nonprofitpoint.com/donor-psychology-motivations-charitable-giving/

Avoiding Hard Banjo Tunes

We saw Tim Maddren perform The Man From Snowy River at the Wagga Civic Theatre’s season launch late last year. The vigour and conviction of his interpretation, his magnetism and rich tenor voice totally engaged us. He could not have been a better advertisement for Banjo. His performance at the launch and a strong recommendation from a thespian friend clinched it and we booked. We saw the show this week. Their flyer describes Banjo as ‘a sweeping theatrical journey through ambition, legacy, mateship and identity (that) explores the tension between the bush and city, romance and reality…’

Our thespian friend did warn us that the dance segments could have been trimmed and a goodly proportion of the world’s popular music audience deems Coldplay whose music was interwoven with Paterson’s writings in this Got Ya Back production ‘inoffensive or overly earnest’. Prior to this I only knew Viva la Vida which is catchy nonsense. Whether that describes their entire repertoire I couldn’t say, but blending it with Paterson’s 19thC romanticisation of the bush is what Humphries from Yes Minister would consider ‘brave’.

Dear reader, you are probably sensing by now that I was not enthralled with Banjo. While purporting to both celebrate and critique Paterson, this production settles for sit com renderings of Henry Lawson’s (and others’) accusations of hypocrisy and inauthenticity and completely sidesteps any examination of the context in which he wrote i.e. rampant colonialism, indifference to Indigenous culture and history, the comforts of a middle class profession and  Gladesville home . The most cursory look at AB Paterson’s biog proves his stint as a pastoralist was brief. For the bulk of his career he worked as a lawyer and writer. So to dwell for as long as this production does on his father’s ill fortune farming in Illalong and its impact on Paterson’s psyche is something of an indulgence. His father’s words:

I toiled and toiled while lived the light

And dreamed of overdrafts at night 

are quoted in the program and used twice in the 90 minute performance.

Banjo is a highly selective presentation of this revered poet’s life. Lead, Maddren and guitarist Mat Brooker never falter in their energy and enthusiasm. Musical styles are eclectic and pacey with what (questionably) seemed to be Indigenous rhythms invoked as well as Oklahoma-style barn dance tunes, folk music and of course Coldplay tunes all in the mix. Foot stomping is employed to a degree that made me fret for the potential impact on Tim and Mat’s podiatry and lumbar health. Bush balladeering is a male dominated genre but two works that gave dancer/choreographer Steph Maddren a chance to shine The Road to Gundagai and As Long As Your Eyes Are Blue were included.  Slight but droll describes the first, its geographical references went over very well with the Wagga audience; nauseatingly sentimental describes the second. Ensemble equity is the only explanation for these interludes. In fact the percentage of stage time given to uninspired dance sequences especially pas de deux between Steph and lean Bejae Ingate who seemed to be representing both the youthful Banjo and any fill-in character required was excessive. The choreography was clichéd, channeling the Graham/Graemes, Martha and Murphy, with the addition of cringeworthy hip hop ‘moves’ a la Raygun. It didn’t help that there was little chemistry/synergy between Steph and Bejae.

Tim Maddren and Mat Brooker - Got Ya Back promotional poster for Banjo 

If the rendition of The Man From Snowy River was the standout, and Clancy of the Overflow was delivered with genuine warmth and affection, the performance of Waltzing Matilda was disappointingly muddled and filled with mugging and ‘business’ that robbed it of its melancholy power.  

Enough, I fear I have already offended an audience that seemed to be lapping Banjo up with a misplaced nostalgia for a pastoral Australia based on confiscation of First Nations’ lands and an idealisation of the squatter’s tenacity and not altogether uncomplaining stoicism in the face of the hardships of making a living on the land. I don’t mean to trivialize the courage and endurance it took and still takes to run a property or to downplay Riverina residents’ love for this part of the world. However exploring the ironies and complexities that informed the work of Australia’s bush poets and those inherent in AB Paterson’s writing would have produced a far richer theatrical experience.