I listened to an interesting if depressing discussion of child sex abuse on the wireless this morning. Some of the key points:
One in four children experience sexual abuse.
One in ten adult men admit to having sexual feelings about children.
While most abused children don’t go on to commit sex crimes, the rate of sex crime offending was 11% higher among confirmed abused children than a control group without sexual abuse.
Programs to raise awareness of child sexual abuse are being condemned as “woke” by some politicians.
Only a relatively small percentage of child sex abuse occurs in institutions; most is committed within families or by close friends. While working with children checks may help to reduce institutional child sex abuse, they do nothing to prevent the vast majority of cases.
That typifies the problem, and is relevant to other crime; there’s a limited bucket of money with competing demands, and governments often choose the more obvious but less effective options.
Obviously, the justice system can’t deal with one in ten adult males, so how do we ensure that they don’t go on to offend?
Two men found guilty of murdering three men after a fight outside the Salt nightclub in South Yarra in Melbourne three years ago, have each been sentenced to 30 years in jail.
Five other men will serve lesser sentences for the murder of one of the men in the fight.
The seven men were found guilty of murdering 19-year-old James Huynh, who died after being attacked with samurai swords and machetes.
Cuong Quoc Lam, 26 and Hung Tu Van, 29, were also found guilty of the murders of Mr Huynh's two cousins, who drowned after jumping into the Yarra River to escape that attack.
They have been sentenced to 30 years in jail with a 23-year non-parole period.
Be interested to see what makes up those stats. "The number of criminal incidents recorded by Victoria Police in the year to 31 March 2026 was 468,711, down 1.0% from 473,518 incidents recorded in the same period last year."
June 2025: 15,909 police officers (Total workforce: 21,332) June 2024: 16,059 police officers (Total workforce: 21,715) June 2023: 15,842 police officers (Total workforce: 21,326)
I found estimates of 15,600 police this year.
Those numbers are 'whats recorded'. The number of police officers available to record these crimes are going the opposite way to the number of crimes. I suspect that a large part of the 'drop in crime' is simply things are not being recorded.
I suspect if there was 0 police officers around to record things, crimes recorded would magically disappear too.
My son has the office next to the head of the Crime Statistics Agency but I'm not sure that he'd be willing to ask her for clarification. He has told me about in-house presentations she's given and she does appear on the wireless from time to time.
Only those crimes that are the subject of formal reports by victims or incidents attended by VicPol are included in the stats so yes, fewer police = less reports logged. However, back in the day you were more likely to get a crack with a baton or a punch in the guts than be charged. Topless "waitresses" definitely wouldn't have reported sexual assault by VFL footballers back then either.
One of the big differences between the "good old days" and now is that we only had the Truth newspaper to tell us how bad things were. Now we have the Murdoch papers, Sky News, shock jocks and influencers all banging on about how bad things are.
Coincidentally, I have just finished a long phone call with an author who is researching a book on violence in Coburg and surrounding suburbs during the 1960s-80s. It's surprising when you realise how many schoolmates (and I use "mates" advisedly) came to violent ends. The number of thugs who joined VicPol is also surprising.
We were genuinely scared of the cops back then; they'd beat the crap out of you just because they felt like it
A couple of months before my 15th birthday, my 23 year policeman brother and I were stabbed multiple times by a random 28 year old about 30 metres from our home in Coburg.
That was around the time of the Vic Market murders and the Ustaše terror attacks but before the likes of the Crevally Street Boys had us scared crapless.
Yes, but that was before we lost four talls and got only one back. However, my position has always been that there's no point adding talls if they can't play.
I'm a firm believer in the "a good big man will always beat a good little man" adage but with "good" being the operative word.
Thats the point, the past....not now.
I think you've misread something somewhere.
LP was stating fans were sayong we were top heavy in the past....when we had lemmey etc.
You were the only one i ever heard suggesting anything of the sort.
In short.....LP is talking BS again.
Just like the afl screwed up by playing the game on a friday night.....just a mere 96k there for a sellout crowd.
Again, I don’t believe that I ever suggested that we were top heavy. I did point out that our ratio of talls to smalls in 2025 was similar to most other clubs.
For the record, I’m a two ruckmen kind of guy … provided that the two ruckmen can both have an impact when they’re not rucking.
I think your recall may be faulty, Kruddler. I'd prefer a top heavy team over a vertically-challenged team, provided that the big lads can play footy.
Was it not you who was saying we didn't need anymore talls because the number on our list was the same as the number on other lists??
Yes, but that was before we lost four talls and got only one back. However, my position has always been that there's no point adding talls if they can't play.
I'm a firm believer in the "a good big man will always beat a good little man" adage but with "good" being the operative word.
I wonder if the club has thought of getting Poppy Scholz to work with Brodie Kemp on his kicking for goal. She has a relaxed, no nonsense routine and kicks through the ball really well.
In fact, the field and goal kicking in the AFLW seems to have gone up a notch this season, particularly with the distance the girls are now kicking.
It's not lost on me, that only a short while ago when we had Lemmey and a couple of others, a lot of fans complained the list was top heavy. At the time fans were content with Harry and Charlie with Pitto on hand and TDK coming into contention, and most were busy screaming for more midfield depth.
Now we have a midfield bonanza, at least at the moment, TDK and Charlie have buggered off, and all of a sudden it's list mismanagement!
Some navigate list management like Captain Jack Sparrow's crazy compass, always pointing to what you desire without showing you a direction!
Who was those fans that were complaining it was top heavy?
As best as i can recall, there was only 1 person who suggested as much and it was based purely on heights rather than ability to play the positions, and that was DJC.
Don't recall anyone else saying that.
I think your recall may be faulty, Kruddler. I'd prefer a top heavy team over a vertically-challenged team, provided that the big lads can play footy.
Good win by the girls and the six goal margin probably reflects the state of both teams.
Yasmin Duursma is really starting to realise her potential and did some nice things. I'm glad that we persevered with her.
The commentators mentioned that was our ninth consecutive win at Princes Park so we may be building a decent home ground advantage. I guess that means the AFL will shift the finals to another venue
Was Austins greatest failing that he couldn't find a couple of understudy KPF's and the reason why he was shown the door?
No, because as we know, our list management is determined by committee with the coach, head of football and CEO all involved and sharing responsibility for direction and decisions. Another couple of KPPs would be nice, but not if they're like Harry Lemmey or Josh Schache.
