Ok, all you patriotic sons of Australia (And daughters, just to be inclusive, even though we know that you can’t be really that helpful) today I am issuing a fatwah on Richard Flanagan.

I think the word is fatwah, I’m doing this from memory and just speaking without reference to anything, which seems to be what we value in Australia these days. As Joe Hockey said, “Australia, a big polluter, what nonsense, we have some of the cleanest coal in the world. We wash it so many times that you wouldn’t even know it was coal. Clean, you’ll get no ebola from our coal, mate.”

Or something like that, like I said, this is all from memory. I’m proud of the fact that I’m not referring to sources.

So… A fatwah, which is Muslim for a really, really nasty shirtfront. I thought of this today when Richard Flanagan won the Booker Prize and said that he was ashamed to be Australian. I mean why doesn’t he go back to where he came from – Tasmania, which is technically part of Australia, but only in name because we could stop Tasmaniacs coming by boat if they’re all as ungrateful as Flanagan and don’t want to automatically join Team Australia, so they best be careful and assure us all that they are proud and free and girt by the same sea as the rest of us.

I remember the word “fatwah” from when those nasty Middle-Eastern types in Iran issued one on Salman Rushdie – who also won a Booker Prize. Which may have been what triggered my memory.

That’s the thing about memory. It gets triggered from time to time, but then we remember that it’s the final episode of “The Bachelor” and we forget that we should be really, really angry at Mr Flanagan for criticising Australia. (Although, I know that he only won the Bookthing Prize today and the Bachelor final episode was a couple of weeks ago and by now that bachelor guy will be happily getting to know his fiancee at this very moment! It’s just a hypothetical type example, people, don’t hold me to what I say unless it’s written down and this isn’t written down…)

Didn’t the diggers fight and die so it’d be compulsory for us all to love Australia and anybody reporting on anything that the government deemed a “special operation” could be jailed for ten years?

Yep, that’s the thing. When foreigners can issue fatwahs on people for just being artists and writing things they don’t like, it’s terrible. I mean they didn’t even get a 457 visa so that means that we can be racist and disgusting to them and Rupert won’t bother to tweet about it.

Still, I can’t help but wonder how Salman Rushdie has managed to survive all these years.

Ah never mind, we’ve got more important things to worry about…

Like beheadings with a plastic sword.

Whoops, was that part of a “special operation”?

Ah well, ten years jail for me!