All posts by Michael Burge

Journalist, author, artist
Write regardless!

Proof that you can read!

2 Comments

A Writer drowning in words.

I’M proofreading my first two publications right now, and I’m aiming to complete around 140,000 words in under a week.

It’s an ambitious task and thankfully I have some assistance, however, as an independent publisher (a fancy way of saying ‘self-published’, which carries a terrible stigma), this is my self-inflicted creative penance.

Cue the violins! Independent publishing is not all it’s cracked up to be!

“It’s no wonder everyone’s avoiding checking their own work – it was always a relatively crap job.”

Sure, it’s liberating when you don’t have to run decisions past anyone, but when it comes time to hit that publish button, where the quality of the finished product is concerned the buck stops with you. What’s worse it that although they pay very little for our books, quality has very high value placed on it by our readers.

If you’ve ever watched TV talent shows you know how risky stepping into the limelight can be for singers who have not been massaged into the public gaze by management and stage training. Quality comes across only when contestants have a decent amount of singing ability.

How cringeworthy is it when wobbly performers compete week after week slightly off pitch or rough on the high notes? It doesn’t mean they’re not talented, but it’s almost a relief when they get voted out, leaving the stage to more assured vocalists.

Art is a bitch that way, and writers have all the same potential to seem extremely unattractive in the public domain. No matter how schmick our book’s cover or what publicists we’re tempted to pay, we are prone to get voted off in the first paragraph.

Part of being match fit is ensuring our words are the best they can be, which means either paying for copy editing and proofreading, or doing it ourselves.

I’ve chosen the latter, because I have the skills, but this week I have wondered if this was the wisest course of action.

All writers have patterns. We use language in wildly different ways, and, despite appearances, there is no one language standard when it comes to the written word.

My particular weakness is hyphenation. If I can manage to slip-in an inappropriate or un-necessary hyphen, I will.

Yes, we have spell check and grammar guides in our word processing software, but do you know which standard of which language yours is set on, and have you ever tried to change it?

Yes, there are dictionaries, but have you ever wondered how many?

5113847621_10e4cbdb2e_bThe factual answer is nobody knows, but that doesn’t stay the judgmental hand of the average Grammar Nazi, who I imagine scanning free samples of eBooks instead of buying them, seeking out the errors as a form of bloodsport.

Language is an organic, ever-changing entity. To successfully proofread something, writers need to accept that they’ll capture the language they’re using for a brief moment before it continues its evolution.

If you decide to DIY your book’s proofreading, doing so consistently within that moment is your job, and that’s the really hard part, especially for the generations of writers who were not taught grammar at Australian primary or secondary schools from the 1970s, when it was deemed unnecessary, a directive that continues to this day.

I know several writers who claim to be unable to proofread their own output – journalists, mainly, who’ve had the luxury of sub-editors for decades.

But sub-editors are being shafted by media organisations across the English-speaking world, leaving journalists to proof our own articles.

It’s no wonder everyone’s avoiding checking their own work – it was always a relatively crap job that should be royally paid for, when at its core it’s basically clearing up the shit written by others.

write-regardless-cover
BUY NOW

I have one tip for writer-proofreaders aware of the reality that self publishing is expensive – shut the windows, put the cat out, tell your partner not to come knocking, and simply read your work so damned well it’s like the last time you’ll ever read it.

And I have one tip for writers willing to pay for proofreading – no matter how much you pay, it’ll never be perfect.

© Michael Burge, all rights reserved.

Check out Michael’s book on indie publishing.

LGBTIQ Equality, Politics

Marriage equality on the never never

Leave a comment
PYNE SURPRISE Christopher Pyne running the media gauntlet after being blindsided by Abbott.
PYNE SURPRISE Christopher Pyne running the media gauntlet after being blindsided by Abbott.

TONY Abbott has knocked Australian progressives and moderate Liberals into motionless disappointment on marriage equality.

The biggest political football of his government has been booted around by parliament again. There’ll be a few free kicks when the cross-party marriage equality bill comes before parliament, but Abbott’s moved the goalposts already, so none of the players will score.

The Australian with the highest hope for the Liberals on this issue – and at the greatest risk of being disappointed by her party – is Tony’s sister Christine Forster, a Liberal councillor for the City of Sydney.

She optimistically submits to interviews whenever she feels we are approaching a breakthrough. She’s also good-natured enough to engage in jokes about her brother, yet not hide her disappointment.

“It’s clear marriage equality will remain just a high hope.”

But it was Christopher Pyne who was this week’s highest-profile and most confident Liberal when it came to marriage equality, although his hopes for a free vote blinded him to a classic Abbott battle manoeuvre.

When the Prime Minister opened the discussion to the entire Coalition party room, including a wall of National Party MPs whose homophobia was guaranteed to bring out the same in everyone but moderate Liberals, Pyne’s reported response was shock. He then dashed through the media with the kind of sibilant schoolboy anger that often stereotypes him as gay.

As the dust settles, it’s clear marriage equality will remain just a high hope on the never never, that place where Australians know nothing will change in the short term.

I could analyse the chances of any of the dangling carrots – referendum, plebiscite, binding or free votes – but that would be to engage in the kind of hope Tony Abbott wants from me.

Progressives and moderates are good at hope, and at home in the southeast Queensland electorate of Bowman, there’s been plenty of it ever since Liberal MP Andrew Laming started filling letterboxes with his annual survey back in June.

Only one person per household could fill it out, and it didn’t mention marriage equality, just it’s poor cousin so beloved of right-wing religious Liberals – ‘gay marriage’ – which presupposes same-sex attracted people want something special, like ‘gay supermarkets’ or ‘gay sports ovals’.

FISHER FAMILY (L-R) Baeleigh, Monique, Adele and Caden.
FISHER FAMILY (L-R) Baeleigh, Monique, Adele and Caden.

I treated it as harmless until national media outlets started calling it a same-sex marriage survey. Long-term Bowman resident and LGBTQI activist Adele Fisher also had mixed opinions.

“I was aware, in previous years, people had reported not receiving the survey and had questioned both the statistical significance and accuracy of the results,” she said.

“A couple of friends and I decided to encourage as many people as possible in Bowman to complete Andrew’s survey and return it. We started a Facebook page.  We contacted Andrew and continued to speak with him during the lead up to the survey being released and throughout it being distributed and returned.

“We organised a rally which was well attended and had some fantastic speakers, including community members, clergy and politicians. Unfortunately, Andrew’s schedule changed and he was unable to attend, however, he did provide a statement that was read out on the day.

“The rally was fortunately held the morning after marriage equality was achieved in all 50 states of the USA, and with a quick media release that morning we had a number of media outlets contact us on the day,” she said.

“With the assistance of Australian Marriage Equality we were able to run a full-page advertisement in the local newspaper and received other excellent support from them. We attended markets and spoke with hundreds of people in the Bowman electorate.”

SKEWED SURVEY Andrew Laming's 2015 electorate survey, showing progress reports mid-survey (Photo: Facebook)
SKEWED SURVEY Andrew Laming’s 2015 electorate survey, showing progress reports mid-survey (Photo: Facebook)

I felt the same wave of hope across the region. My husband filled out Laming’s survey and duly posted it off, which meant our household was only half represented, but after the leaks about Warren Entsch and Terri Butler’s cross-party marriage equality bill, there was a sense that moves were afoot to deliver marriage equality by the year’s end, so my omission didn’t seem to matter.

Laming fuelled the hope by predicting he could be given a conscience vote on the bill as soon as parliament returned, but he did not bend over backwards to get his constituents to vote in the survey he promised would decide his vote.

“Unlike his fellow MPs such as Natasha Griggs (Liberal MP for Solomon, Northern Territory) and Ann Sudmalis (Liberal MP for Gilmore, NSW), Andrew did not offer an online option, an email option, a phone option or even a photocopy of the form for people to express their individual views,” Adele said.

“Questions have been raised regarding the validity of the survey process used. There are a large number of the electorate who are reporting that they did not receive the survey in the mail.”

According to Adele, Laming announced that people who had not received a survey could attend his office on one business day – August 6 – show their identification, and cast a vote.

Crunch time came so swiftly by August 11 that even the social media had trouble keeping up with events.

Not accustomed to being consulted on anything, even issues important to their rural electorates, like CSG, mining and native vegetation laws, National Party MPs may well have been stunned at being asked to have a say on marriage equality at a six-hour special Coalition meeting.

Late in the evening, when Tony Abbott made his captain’s call that there would be no free vote for Coalition MPs on marriage equality, Laming’s survey – and his support for a free vote – were rendered instantly redundant.

When he announced the results on August 12, they barely registered.

According to Laming, 58 per cent of respondents disagreed with gay marriage. To put that result in context, only 23pc of individuals in Bowman households responded.

RIGHTS RALLY Marriage equality rally in the Queensland electorate of Bowman, July 2015 (Photo: Carole Margand)
RIGHTS RALLY Marriage equality rally in the Queensland electorate of Bowman, July 2015 (Photo: Carole Margand)

“I have followed Andrew’s statements on marriage equality for in excess of five years,” Adele said, “since first attending a forum he held in Bowman, and have attempted to engage with him many times on the topic of marriage equality, in person, online and via email. Unfortunately, I cannot say that these have been productive.”

Adele and I have similar hopes on the future of marriage equality campaign.

“I think the events of this week were anticipated in part by many involved in the marriage equality campaign,” she said.

“Further plans and contingencies are in place for all of us who are campaigning for marriage equality. It has been a long journey so far and it doesn’t stop here. The campaign will continue and I’m confident will go from strength to strength.

“People are hurting though, and I have seen an outpouring of support for those people impacted by the decisions this week. Let’s never forget at the heart of the matter are real people, children, youth, adults and elderly.

“I think it is extremely important no-one loses sight of this.”

“Laming’s survey managed to get him squarely back in his leader’s good books.”

Even though the likes of Abbott and Laming say they understand there are strong feelings in the community on both sides, marriage equality supporters are too easily written off as attention seekers and bleeding hearts. This is the first week in years I have been labelled a deviant.

Some say the increase in vitriol means change is imminent, but I completely disagree. Without someone in the Liberal party rolling Abbott, or the electorate caring enough about the issue to vote him out, marriage equality is now years away.

And Laming’s survey managed to get him squarely back in his leader’s good books after February’s backbench revolt. Conservatives tend to do that sort of things while progressives hope.

© Michael Burge, all rights reserved.

My Story

Thanks (in advance) for the day jobs

2 Comments

A Writer lets go.

I’VE had my share of day jobs, those pesky positions that keep the bills paid and the artist fed while keeping dreams alive.

This week, my latest contract came to an end – a one-year editing position perfect for a writer, covering a colleague’s parental leave on a national news website.

After twenty-two years in a wild variety of day jobs, I’ve noticed some fundamental shifts.

You rub me the wrong way

Today’s workplaces are so understaffed they’ve become like skeletons with no cartilage – everyone’s grating right up against one another, and there’s plenty of friction. Back when my day-job career commenced, workplaces had enough staff to soften the blow between competing personalities. Now, there’s so few people on deck that the old workplace standards – like consultation, notice, give-and-take – seem to be lost forever. Feeling friction at work? That’s the new normal.

‘Flexibility’ means you’ll be stretched

These days we’re expected to do our work and that of other people, every day of the week. This is because there are not enough staff and/or several are on leave (invariably a result of overworking). Maintaining the right to prioritise your own work will signal your lack of flexibility, whereas once it was an indication that the human resources department needed to place several job ads for extra staff. Jobs are becoming less specific every year – you are expected to do anything for anyone, anywhere, anytime and for any amount of money. Limber up, peeps.

‘Manners’ mask incredible insults

I can’t watch the Australian series Utopia for the same reason as I could not watch Ricky Gervais’ groundbreaking series The Office, simply because it’s all too close to the bone. You’re more likely to be told: “Thanks in advance for doing it this way” than “let me know how you’re going with this” from bosses, desperate in their ‘right first time’ mentality, an outcome best achieved by a robot not a pesky human being. I found myself writing “thanks in advance for…” in one of my last work emails, but after trying to be polite, this way and that, it turned out to be the only phrase to telegraph to the recipient that the conversation was over, and a low point in my communication abilities.

Training is ‘all intuitive’

Back in the day, a quick instruction session from colleagues about how to navigate the pathways of the internal computer systems was all it took to start the job. Now, workers are hard pressed to find anyone willing to give even a hint of training, and the catchphrase: “It’s all intuitive” has come to signal: “I don’t know”, “I’m not telling you” and/or “work it out for yourself”. If you get instructions at all, it’s likely you’re being told the way a colleague would prefer you do your job.

Silence is the new no

Haven’t received a reply to that email you sent your boss asking for the passwords for Google analytics? Didn’t hear back about your leave application? If silence is the only response, you can take that as a clear “no”, and move on accordingly. The reason for this unwillingness to reply in the negative can be put down to a need for colleagues to avoid a firm paper trail on anything. No paper trail means: “You can’t pin me down”.

PIPs stick in my throat

While the concept of IQ is on the mat in its death throes and emotional intelligence is on the rise, workers are increasingly prone to being hauled in for Performance Reviews (yes, they are important, so they deserve Capital Letters) or worse, threats of Performance Improvement Plans (PIP). The former is now considered highly questionable as a way to improve any workplace, and the latter signals: “I want to sack you, and this is how I am going to achieve that, thanks in advance for signing this”. A PIP is unlikely to appear in any workplace contract, so never sign or agree to one, although your annual Performance Review is a time-wasting dance you’ll have to endure with your boss until your workplace realises just letting people do their job is probably a better use of everyone’s time. Phone conferences fall into the same category.

Equipped for solo work

There is one plus in the modern workplace for journalists, and that is the tiny equipment it takes to do the job. It once required three strong people to carry the average camera and sound kit. Recording a print interview once resulted in hours of transcribing quotes. Now, the same work can be done with hardware smaller than one of the batteries we once had to keep warm with our body heat on remote hillsides. There is a payoff, however: all that digital technology has stripped workplaces of staff, so you’re likely to be left to shoot, record, present, write, edit and promote the work all by yourself.

If you survive that, subject yourself to a Performance Review, give yourself top marks, and take the rest of the day off. 

© Michael Burge, all rights reserved.