Jul 6, 2009

Boys Behaving Badly

Ah, the National Rugby League. A game full of fine, upstanding young gentlemen, full of enthusiasm for a healthy and active lifestyle, with impeccable manners and enormous respect for women.

Toilet training, however, seems to be optional.

This evening, Roosters player Nate Myles was suspended for six matches over a drunken incident in a NSW Central Coast hotel yesterday morning. Apparently, an extremely inebriated Myles attempted to barge his way into the wrong room, before being discovered naked and disorientated in a fire escape. But the classiest part? Myles was found to have defecated on himself in a corridor.

I don't know. Perhaps he thought the hotel was a dump, and decided to crank out a three-dimensional critical review.

Now I'm not a drinker. Despite what The Wah claims about that time in Scotland when I had to skull a pot of beer and a peach schnapps in order to win a trivia contest*, I have never been drunk. So I don't know how bad things can get when you're completely muntered and need a privvy urgently. But honestly, how bad does it have to be to drop trou in the middle of a inn to get half your middles out?

Then we've got the revelation that a bunch of Aussie sailors on the ironically-named HMAS Success have been sent home after their cute little "See How Many Chicks We Can Bang" competition was discovered - no doubt by humourless femminazis who weren't featured on their charming list.

I was astounded by the number of people calling talkback radio today to say various versions of the following:

"Oh, it's just young people with healthy libidos. It's been going on for years! Matter of fact, when I was in the service, it was the GIRLS who used to rate the blokes! What's all the fuss about?"

Now I know that being in the military, or police, or politics - or any kind of workplace really - might often seem like a school camp, full of that away-from-home unreality magic. I remember my own Year Nine school camp, when Andrew Barlow gallantly asked me to "snog him", despite his outright loathing of me during normal school hours.**

I appreciate that people like to have sex with other people, and that the achievement of said sex can become a hot topic amongst various peer groups. But to keep a ledger? And award points?

It's so... it's so... it's so Schoolies Week.***

I don't like to draw too much of a conclusion about the macho cultures of rugby league football and the Royal Australian Navy, but I will say there was a fair whack of Hahn Super Dry consumed after our impro show last Saturday, and the worst result was a hangover that caused several players some uncomfortable "I-need-to-stay-in-a-cool-dark-place" moments the next day.

There's always a fair bit of sexual tension in scripted theatre too - with cast crushes common, and cast party shenanigans almost compulsory. And yet, and yet! We've all managed to keep our bowel movements private and our sexual bragging modest.


*Yes, that's right, the Scots found a way to incorporate a drinking contest into their trivia competitions.

** I refused. He was seeeeeeedy. Then he didn't talk to me for three years. I didn't mind.

***Which I didn't go on. Being a non-drinker, and not particularly interested in more potential Andrew Barlow-style offers, I didn't mind.

4 comments:

  1. I have to say, I don't know why the navy thing is worthy of more than 1 article in the news, even Rudd is commenting on it (but admittedly he will comment on any half arsed crap that makes the news). I personally have never competed or wanted to compete in something of that nature, but the kind of people who I want in my military are the kind that will.
    I will try and explain without digging my grave - i think i am going to fail but anyway....
    The ledger was a bad idea, granted - YOU DO NOT KEEP RECORDS, so that was stupid.
    There is however 220 people on that boat and they found 4 people involved, caught because they wrote it down. 2%. But what is the percentage of people on that boat having sex with each other for no monetary gain. No where in anything that i read was anybody forced to have sex with any body else.
    I understand there are rules about fraternisation but, social Sex (which is what we are talking about) between consenting adults is all about initiative, I would prefer that my Navy wasn't filled with people who were too scared to talk to the opposite sex or wanted who to spend all their spare time knitting or surfing Youtube for vids of cats playing piano. But i also believe they should have been more discreet. The sailors in question (all male, but i wonder if there may not have been at least 1 female in the game - like Elaine from Seinfeld) should have gotten in trouble BUT it's not national news.
    The rooster crapping in a hallway is though. That guy is a dickhead and deserves to be named and shamed.

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  2. "Rudd will comment on any half arsed crap that makes the news"

    He didn't comment on Myles' one!

    The only real surprise re the Navy story was that it was women they were competing for.

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  3. Can't believe that any of this shit is classified as news.

    i.e. Drunk fooballers act like idiots & if one locks enough men and women on a ship for months at a time, then cabin fever takes over. Who'd have thunk it?

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  4. All in persuit of the Golden Rivet
    or the submarine on wheels
    Ancient Man

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