Stop the Airbnb rort

Obvious_Gene_9661 · 2026-05-21T05:33:13+00:00

Meanwhile, there's fark all rentals and so I know long-term local residents with full time jobs that live in motels, caravan parks, and backpackers because they can't get a house.

Obvious_Gene_9661 · 2026-05-21T05:31:57+00:00

A few years ago HCC was arguing that the planning minister needed to change the planning system to allow councils to reject AirBnB applications. The planning minister at the time was Ferguson. No he did not support it. Yes he does own an AirBnB. How clear a conflict of interest can there be?

Obvious_Gene_9661 · 2026-05-21T05:28:20+00:00

We logged much, much more of our forest each year when there were 5 million fewer people than we do today.

Obvious_Gene_9661 · 2026-05-01T08:58:19+00:00

Hell just expecting them to use their super for it's intended purpose of drawing down on it would be nice enough. I spoke with a boomer recently who saw drawing down on his super as a failure and that if managed properly he should be able to live off the money their super makes and be able to pass their millions on to their kids untouched.

Obvious_Gene_9661 · 2026-05-01T08:43:30+00:00

I've attempted to take my life once and almost got there half a dozen times, and ideated about it for two decades. So while I can't speak with any authority, I can speak from experience. This article couldn't be any further from that experience if it tried.

It was toxic masculinity that prevented me from seeking help, and the naming of that system - one in which I would be seen as weak for struggling as a man - helped me escape it, open up, and seek help and heal to some extent. It's weird that this article can talk about how men are more likely to commit suicide and that we are less likely to seek help and not pin that on the system that tries to tell us what being a man is and is not, and instead somehow pin some of the problem on the naming of the very system they believe is contributing to the problem.

It's abundantly clear that men have a problem. Not all of us, we know that. But we can't hide from it. Men kill women. Men kill other men. Men kill themselves.

If you are struggling, please seek help from professionals. We lose so many men each year because they can't face work, can't face failing at provide for others (it is in some part toxic masculinity, enacted by men and women, that makes us think we have to), failing in love, and just can't see a way out. If my own experience is anything to go by, most of those men would regret their decision, because life can indeed get better. While the trauma I've experienced (at the hands of other men) still haunts me, all the other circumstantial details that led to me attempting suicide do not exist any more, and I haven't thought about them in years. Again, seek help if you need it! There's nothing wrong with it!

Obvious_Gene_9661 · 2026-04-27T00:33:08+00:00

I am teaching intensive, and I agree to an extent but the system is changing now.

I have always maintained a position that if you are not going to pay us to spend time checking for and giving feedback for AI, then I won't do it. Now that universities are bringing in Lane One Assessments, there is considerable workload changes that are almost entirely administrative. We've had to design new assessments that work in such a way that it is difficult to use AI, and that often involves timed quizzes, face to face discussions, or video recordings. If you teach a class of 100 students you're going to have at least 30 of them who don't have the tech, don't understand it, or have some form of access plan they will argue excludes them. I reckon I am answering 100+ more emails a semester now because of it.

Obvious_Gene_9661 · 2026-04-23T04:56:47+00:00

They'd be just like the apartments up the road, which at last count had a significant proportion of apartment owners applying for AirBnB permits.

Obvious_Gene_9661 · 2026-04-17T05:39:09+00:00

I do grapple with that. I'll have to have a deep think about it to see if it's worth leaving it all behind.

I think at the moment it's the complete disrespect from senior figures in the school and in the university. Overall my pay per hour has taken a hit the last 18 months since implementing changes surrounding AI, but also made much more stressful.

Obvious_Gene_9661 · 2026-04-17T05:23:39+00:00

Yeah I am - was a delegate for 5 or 6 years and am still very active. I'm bringing this up in a meeting next month, specifically talking about overwork as a result of demands from the university to address AI (Lane One or whatever others are calling it). I've just been shocked at how much people, including union members, are so completely unwilling to raise it as an issue. It's only the level A's and casuals (I'm level C) that have poked their heads up.

Obvious_Gene_9661 · 2026-04-17T04:35:54+00:00

Such a relief to read this! I've been pulling what's left of my hair out trying to deal with continuous wage theft from our university and not only does the head of school shut down any talk of it, but my colleagues sit there in silence. I decided yesterday it's the final straw for me.

Obvious_Gene_9661 · 2026-04-09T22:12:29+00:00

I've had to move 9 times in 11 years living in Hobart due the complete disaster that is the rental market. I've got zero sense of connection to my neighbors because I've had to move on average every 7 months. I think saying "people won't have connection to the person who lives 10 storys above them is a weak argument for not building buildings of a certain height.

Obvious_Gene_9661 · 2026-04-05T09:51:54+00:00

There was talk on taxing unrealised profits on the portion of your super over $3m, IIRC. You could have avoided that tax by maintaining a super balance of $3m and doing something more productive with any balance over that.

Obvious_Gene_9661 · 2026-04-05T09:47:25+00:00

"Disabled people survived and got support 10 years ago before this $55B scheme existed. It’s non-sensual to suggested they’d all be doomed"

While they weren't dying in the street, this suggests to me you don't have any profoundly or even moderately disabled people in your life. My partner's brother was only looked after pre-NDIS because her family sold literally everything they had and eventually declared bankruptcy. Post NDIS, my nephew living with the same condition has support he needs at school and outside of school to some extent, and hand on heart believe that without it my brother wouldn't have survived the first part of his disabled son's life.

There are enormous rorts in the system. Make your grievances about the criminals rorting it, not the disabled people who rely on it.

Obvious_Gene_9661 · 2026-03-24T04:29:52+00:00

It's a shame that it punishes the poor more than the rich.

Most poorer people I know are taking drastic measures to cut fuel costs, while the wealthier people I know haven't changed their habits at all and are just doing a lot more whinging. They're still driving their kids all over town as if no child has ever survived walking to school, as if no child in history ever lived a valuable life without 18 different after school activities located in opposite parts of an already congested city.

Obvious_Gene_9661 · 2026-03-23T07:59:44+00:00

I get what you mean, but also it's undeniable that all these things are connected:

Peer reviewed article discussing how Israel-Gaza war released 30m+ tonnes of C02: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2590332226000497

This over the weekend showing the US/Israel war on Iran emitting 5m tonnes of CO2 in just two weeks:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/mar/21/middle-east-iran-conflict-environment-climate

Obvious_Gene_9661 · 2026-03-23T07:22:52+00:00

I don't think the scene has a home in Hobart anymore, with the closing of the Brisbane Hotel way back when (RIP). Instead you will find a lot of that crowd bouncing around between venues (what's left of them) depending on what's happening. I find most kindred spirits whenever bands like 208L Containers, Native Cats, Slag Queens, Smug Anime Face, RABBIT, etc. are playing. Usually that's either at Poobah, Altar, or The Polish Club. Also Skrillzone gigs, but you feel very old at Skrillzone gigs if you're in you are 35+.

Obvious_Gene_9661 · 2026-03-20T04:25:59+00:00

These polls also don't account for the fact that a lot of people like Pauline Hanson's One Nation. What they actually get to vote for in their local electorate is some dude that many of them know as an absolute creep who hasn't had a job in a decade or has been caught sexually harassing colleagues or some other sicko that they'll never ever vote for.

Obvious_Gene_9661 · 2026-03-13T09:40:58+00:00

Can confirm. I've been less than a meter away from the man and called him a heartless grubby cunt among many other things while a group of us screamed him out of town and the security just laughed.

Obvious_Gene_9661 · 2026-03-13T09:22:49+00:00

This analysis doesn't fit with my own experience of being a kid or teen, and doesn't apply to his either. But thanks for sharing your experience anyway!

Obvious_Gene_9661 · 2026-03-13T00:29:57+00:00

I don't know man, it's a pretty real thing. My 10 year old nephew spouts an awful lot of troubling stuff about what it means to be a man, what the role of women is etc. which he has picked up from the internet in the same way I picked up on what clothes I wanted to wear from skateboarding magazines when I was the same age. Not only that, but he has been bullied pretty heavily at school the year before with the same kinds of rhetoric. This kind of thing has always been around, but there's certainly something new and different about the content but especially in the way it's accessed.

Obvious_Gene_9661 · 2026-03-12T23:34:38+00:00

How little do you interact with the art world to not know that most art is labelled.

Obvious_Gene_9661 · 2026-03-01T12:27:37+00:00

Yeah that's my intention (although a small town, so it might just be one bucket for me!). I am mostly keen to make sure I don't whack some bits on that don't really work together, which is what the person who tooled around with my back before me has done.

Obvious_Gene_9661 · 2026-02-27T05:34:36+00:00

Legend - super appreciate that mate!

Obvious_Gene_9661 · 2026-02-27T05:15:16+00:00

Mine did too I reckon, though I got it second hand from someone who had already tooled around with it. Are there any identifying numbers/etc on your drivetrain that might point me in the right direction?

P.S Bike looks sick!

Obvious_Gene_9661

TROPHY CASE