KYD brings you a selection of links and miscellanea that have amused, enlightened and generally distracted us this week. If you’ve got amusing links we need to see, tweet them to us at @kyd_magazine!
Image: The Wheeler Centre
Based on thousands of voice messages sent by Abdul Aziz Muhamat, a Sudanese refugee inside the Manus Island detention centre, Behind the Wire and the Wheeler Centre’s new ten-part podcast The Messenger reveals, in intimate detail, the reality of Australia’s immigration detention regime in a way not heard before.
‘It wasn’t supposed to happen like this. It never is. Political satires aren’t real – they’re not predictions, they’re warnings.’ Donald Trump is all the worst fictional presidents rolled into one.
‘What would I be free to write and talk about if I wasn’t always expected to change the world? What if I was just allowed to live and create in it?’ In Australia for the Sydney Festival, Canadian writer and performer Ivan Coyote asks why transgender artists are required to be activists and educators too.
Gomeroi poet Alison Whittaker has written a powerful piece arguing that if non-Indigenous Australians really give a shit about Indigenous Australia, shut up and listen. (And change the date.)
‘It’s fantastic that art can attempt to transform people’s politics or way of seeing the world, but turning people from sad, anxious, lonely jerks into joyful, happy jerks is also a transformation worth talking about.’ A timely reminder that it’s OK to like something just because it brings you joy.
‘Alternative Facts / sounds like the name of one of those early 90s Britpop bands…’ – A poem by Allison Joseph.
Finally, this mind-bendingly good mashup album will set you up for the weekend:
