Comments on: Aboriginal expert: Nicole Kidman is infertile after playing didgeridoo

By: Ernestine

Ernestine — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 13:09:07 +0000

MB, I never purported to know all about Aboriginal customs, and neither should you. Exactly the opposite: I recognize that there are literally hundreds of different Aussie Indigenous tribes, and that one group might follow an entirely separate moral code than the next. I hadn’t heard of that didgeridoo rule, either, but seeing as how Aborigines are basically shat on by white people, it seems like a pretty simple request to fill. However, I acknowledge that the rule itself is arcane as hell, and Nicole probably had no clue. I doubt she really hung with Aboriginal people before Baz Luhrmann made her do so. Let’s hope she’s a lot less racist than many of her fellow Aussies.

Are you SURE most digeridoos are still made by Aborigines? I believe it when it comes to the Northern Territory and Western Australia, but I sure saw a lot of shitty-looking cheapo ones in the souvenir shops scattered around places like Sydney and Brisbane, and it sure looked like mass-produced crap to me.

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By: DLR in Canada

DLR in Canada — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 05:38:49 +0000

fascinating. yeah, she may have offended the aboroginals in aussie, but to say they put a pox on her to make her infertile for committing a faux pas? how would she have known this? did someone actually sit her down and tell her she is not supposed to toot some horn or what?

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By: MB

MB — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 05:30:18 +0000

Ernestine, are you serious? I am an Australian native and this is the first time I have heard of this so-called custom, so why should Nicole know better?

Also, have you considered where the didgeridoo’s come from? They are primarily made and sold by Aborigines. Do you think that they issue fertility warnings with them? Do you think they refuse to sell them to women because they will be horribly offended if they were to play it? Of course not.

This Richard Green (umm..who?) is just a PC wimp who is looking for his 15 minutes.

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By: frewt

frewt — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 01:00:02 +0000

Gee, Richard Green is going to feel like a grade A fuckwit when she has her next kid isn’t he?

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By: Aspen

Aspen — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 00:24:50 +0000

Uh…yeah.

It wasn’t HER faux pas, in my opinion. In the Taliban culture, little girls are forbidden to learn how to read. I think that’s bollocks, and I think this overstuffed misogynist should keep his Aboriginal mouth shut about a woman playing an instrument.

Anyone who gets onto Nicole Kidman for this should realize that they’re ripping up their feminist card to do so. The Aboriginees have no issue taking money from tourist women, but they want to pitch a fit about Nicole Kidman on a television show. Hypocrisy to the EXTREME.

Women play the didgeridoo every day in Australia. Tourists buy them every day, and they are for sale to anyone who wants one.

If the instrument is a sacred religious thing, then perhaps the Aboriginals should’ve refrained from capitalizing on tourist interest in their culture…and kept the didgeridoos to themselves. Traditional Catholics and Muslims and other religious people who keep gender-related customs go about those customs quietly and in private. They don’t sell hijabs and head veils in public…reveling in tourist interest and tourist money…and then rip people to shreds for misusing what they were selling in the first place.

It’s beyond ridiculous to bring this up now.

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By: RCDC

RCDC — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 23:34:57 +0000

while i consider myself a feminist, i really hate a lot of the bashing of other cultures that goes on in The Name of WommynKind. In this man’s culture, it is taboo for women to play this instrument. whether it’s ok for a culture do have varied rites and rituals for men and women is up for debate. but it’s the same argument as “all Muslim women should rip off their hijabs in protest because WE think it’s wrong, even if they don’t”. there are things we do that are gendered, and relatively harmlessly so, because it is our tradition (giving away the bride? WAY worse than don’t play the didjeridoo). not to mention, as someone said earlier, the Aboriginal peoples of that area of the world have a very different relationship with the natural world than we do. maybe this man was not just angry at seeing his culture exploited for a cheap laugh, but taken aback and concerned that someone had so triflingly screwed with the natural world. but then, i’ve always been one of them wishy-washy cultural relativists. i just don’t think it’s ever that simple, i guess it what i’m trying to say.

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By: Enonymous

Enonymous — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 20:32:39 +0000

Well, when I was younger I did history lessons on the Australian Aboriginals and their traditions and this male teacher came in especially to gives lessons on this subject, he even tough us (both girls and boys) to play the didgeridoo and never ones did he say that it was forbidden to women, so me thinks that Richard Green is talking out of his ass and he should really shut his mouth because if any of this comes true then I will walk all away to Australia or where ever the hell he lives and beat him to death (using the method wonderfully described by LeoLo ) with his own precious didgeridoo. So for his own sake he better hope his premonition (or curse) better not come true.

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By: Lila

Lila — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 18:48:44 +0000

yes to Geronimo. Who has the right to curse a woman’s fertility? This would never happen to a man.

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By: IMO

IMO — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 17:44:55 +0000

Isn’t it wonderful that people still making up scary rules that are meant to oppress women and give a ridiculous “privilege to men”- such as playing an instrument- just so the men can feel more special and privileged.

Nicole can play whatever she wants.

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By: Rio

Rio — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 17:02:56 +0000

If this were true, the entire population of Santa Cruz would be sterile, while Seattle, Santa Barbara, and Portland would be experiencing ZPG. Come to think of it, entire portions of the West Coast would resemble “Children of Men”.
I have yet to see evidence of that.

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