A 94-year-old’s heartfelt plea about cruelty to animals, the neglect of children and the elderly, and our failing responsibility as caretakers.

The Measure of Our Humanity

Today you hear of so many incidents: I cannot call them stories, of cruelty, neglect, and downright "don't give a damn" attitudes that you reach the stage where you say, "Please don't go into the details. It is too upsetting."

I can't listen to any more distressing accounts of what someone has done to a child, an animal, or an elderly person.

We, as human beings, have brains.

We have hands and fingers. We have developed all sorts of things that can help those who depend on us, whether they belong to the animal kingdom or to our own species.

But if we don't speak out, who will? At 94, my sense of urgency is a reminder that time is short for all of us to act on what we know is right.

The More We Bury the Truth

The more we bury the truth, the deeper the innocent are buried with it.

It's easy to look back at history and wonder how ordinary people failed to see what was happening.

How could whole towns live in the shadow of barbed wire and later say they knew nothing?

After the Second World War, Allied forces marched German civilians through the concentration camps. Ordinary men and women - bakers, schoolteachers, shopkeepers - were made to walk past piles of bodies, to smell the stench of death, to see the emaciated survivors, and to confront the consequences of evil that had been allowed to grow in plain sight.

It was a reckoning.

Not only for those who committed the crimes, but for those who chose not to ask difficult questions.

No, Sire. It Is a Revolution.

It's easy to forget, but revolutions don't just fall out of the sky.

They brew.

Slowly.

Like a storm gathering on the horizon that everyone convinces themselves will somehow blow over.

Take France in 1789.

Paris was in turmoil. Bread was scarce. The government was broke. Protesters filled the streets. Then came the storming of the Bastille. Heads were carried through the streets on pikes. The old order was beginning to crack.

A famous story tells how King Louis XVI, safe in Versailles and struggling to grasp what was unfolding, exclaimed, "This is a revolt!"

One of his advisers quietly replied:

"No, Sire. It is a revolution."

RATTY NEWS EXCLUSIVE

The Great Sausage Tax Scandal and the Return of Laughing Jack McKooka

Council Warns of Escalating Avian Threat as Citizens Told to "Keep One Hand on Their Snag"

By Roderick (Whiskers) McNibble, Chief Correspondent, Dusty Gulch Bureau

DUSTY GULCH – What began as a simple case of a missing sausage, last seen on a Qantas jet heading to Ireland,  has spiralled into the greatest feathered crisis in the town's history.

The trouble started last Saturday at the Dusty Gulch Memorial Barbecue Grounds, when three sausages, two bread rolls and an entire plate of onion mysteriously vanished.

Witnesses reported hearing a familiar sound from the gum trees above.

"HA-HA-HA-HAAAAA!"

Within minutes, rumours spread like wildfire.

Laughing Jack McKooka had returned.

When ideology excuses everything and responsibility belongs to no one.

I recently picked up Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky again after many years. Funny thing about old books - you read them at twenty and think they're about someone else. You read them again at seventy and suddenly realise they're about everyone.

At its core, the novel is simple enough. A young man commits a terrible act and then discovers something that every civilisation eventually has to learn: we are responsible for our choices. We cannot turn back the clock and pretend the damage never happened.

We carry our mistakes with us.

That is why the book feels so disturbingly relevant today.

Because Raskolnikov never really disappeared into the Siberian snow. He is still with us. Every age produces its own versions of him.

He is the overeducated, self-important intellectual who believes he sees further than ordinary people. He contributes very little, yet somehow feels qualified to judge everyone else. He is angry, resentful and convinced that his ideas place him above the normal rules of right and wrong.

By Roderick (Whiskers) McNibble, Investigative Laundrologist - “Warning: The following article is satire and uses exaggeration and humour to make a point. Not intended as literal fact.”

Dusty Gulch, 2026 – In a world where truth is hung out to dry and speech is tumble-dried into compliance, the Dusty Gulch branch of the Country Women’s Association has had enough. Armed with pegs, petticoats, and an encrypted washboard, they’ve launched a daring resistance movement -  one laundry tip at a time.

Leading the charge is none other than Dorothy “Dot” Snellgrove, president of the Dusty Gulch CWA and former codebreaker for the local Bingo Association. “If you can’t say it outright,” she says, “embroider it on a tea towel and peg it on the line.”

Dusty Gulch Tavern regular until he was caught with an air trumpet in his left boot, Benedict “Bruiser” Arnold  (local roo shooter and enemy of Mayor Dusty McFookit ) claims he was only “documenting local sock sorting techniques for the Pentagon and helping out with hearing aids.” CWA sources allege he was attempting to livestream Doris McLintock’s sheet folding strategy. Local Cop Bushie McBush said investigations were ongoing and local emus were helping with enquiries.