A personal message to AFL tipping

In the time I've lived in Oz I've grown to quite like Aussie Rules football, even if after a few years' watching - and to my in-laws' annoyance - I've still not nailed my colours to any particular club's mast and really watch mainly in the hope of seeing a good game rather than this team beating that team. One part of the game that I've got into is weekly tipping, which at its simplest is no more than predicting which games will result in a win for which teams. There are more complex variations on this theme and obviously it can involve betting on your predictions, but many tipping competitions run by newspapers etc. are completely free to enter and any prizes are put up by sponsors. Not being a betting man by nature and also being a total footy virgin when I arrived in Oz I'm only in a friendly tipping tournament where it's just a bit of fun and the AFL's own tipping competition in the vague hope of becoming good enough or more likely lucky enough to win a few bob.

And now I'm going to stop. Not the fun, friendly weekly tipping where the only prize is bragging rights, but the official AFL tipping competition for sending me this via email:

Click for embiggerfication and nannying brain damage

And as a non-smoker here is my reply:

Fuck off and fuck you, and especially to Quitline, fuck you right in the lungs. Do you really have to inject this killjoy fanaticism into fucking everything? Does the AFL really need to get into bed with these Strength Through Joy wowsers who feed off of people's backs in the same fucking way they accuse the fucking tobacco industry of doing, except by being tax funded they do it to everyone, smoker and non-smoker alike? Well, that's up to you but don't expect me to join in. I'm all for the grounds banning smoking if that's what they wish since it's their property and they'd have to sweep up afterwards, though after a game I've never seen either the MCG or Docklands stadium looking like anything other than an explosion in a fast food factory that someone has attempted to extinguish with a million plastic glasses of beer. Still, their property, their rules, and the hordes of smokers who rush to the exits at the end of each quarter for a quick smoke in the free zone beyond the doors must accept it. Or spend their money on a Foxtel subscription so they can smoke in front of their own TV instead. And I'm all for the AFL to accept whoever it likes as sponsors for its competitions, but just as we don't have to watch the games in the grounds we don't have to play a competition sponsored by the worst kind of paternalist, nanny-state arseholes. I'll be tipping locally only or in one of the other big competitions from next week on.

My unkindest disregards to your buddies, the health fascists,
AE