Thats Beautiful

Personal taste is a funny thing. To one person, removing the barbed fishing hook from the squirming, bleeding flesh of a live fish is beautiful. To another the sight of a flying bird being splattered by shotgun pellets and hurtling mortally wounded to the ground is beautiful. TO some the sight of a new-born chicken or kitten is beautiful. To others the radiance of a pregnant woman, their mother’s smile, their lover’s eyes, Elle and Tom Cruise, are beautiful. A try by Manly in the last minute of play. A win by number three at Randwick. There is an unending list of the things and people we find beautiful… here is my list of what’s beautiful, and why…

List, give reasons, pictures? Guests.

Beauty is tough thing to explain because it kind of speaks for itself. People can argue till the cows come home about whether one thing or another is beautiful, but as they say, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, so basically if you find something beautiful, then it’s beautiful – full stop. WHAT you find beautiful is probably more to the point, and can tell us a lot about you. Later on in this program, we’ll be asking a few guests what they find beautiful, so we may discover something about them, but before we do let me tell you what I find beautiful.

To me, there are different kinds of beauty and most definitely different degrees of beauty. There is natural beauty, man-made beauty, beautiful action and beautiful thought. Some beautiful things are a combination of two or more of these, like a piece of woodwork, which is man-made, yet its beauty comes from the timber with which it was made. When you think about it, this universe is brimming with beauty. Flowers, animals, the beach, forests, waterfalls, mountains, snow, clouds, birds, rivers, sandhills, lakes – the list just goes on and on. Look up in the night sky and you’ll see the moon in all it’s silent beauty, a billion stars twinkling – and the daytime is lit up with the glorious bright sunshine – the sun is a beautiful, if not totally awe-inspiring celestial body.

People are beautiful. Not only the classic or media-acceptable beauties, but anyone who projects their humanity with love and integrity to the outside world. And people create beautiful things. Architects and designers fill our world with some amazing forms. Sure not all buildings and things are beautiful, but when you look at the Opera House, or a painting, some designer furniture, even some mega hi-fi gear or a surfboard, hot air balloon or sports car, you have to realise that beauty is all around us.

Now I can hear the pessimists in the audience tonight saying “what about war, disease, dirt, sewerage treatment plants, garbage?” and to them I say, shut the *&^%*&^% up this show is about beauty, you morons. But now that you mention it, all those things are beautiful – in some way, as they are part of this great big beautiful thing called life and without the things you may think are ugly, the beautiful things would never exist, so even the ugly things are beautiful just because they are ugly.

Take my testicles, for example – not literally of course, that would cause me excrutiating agony. No testicles are probably the ugliest little dangly bits of the human body, yet from them springs forth half the genetic code of each successive generation of human being. How beautiful is it that a man and a woman can produce the two totally different but equally vital ingredients to create an entire new person? Not only that, but they can have a damn good time doing it?? Some beautiful champagne, beautiful music, beautiful bed linen (or car seat covers) and you’ve got yourself a new human.

Other things I find beautiful are the simplicity and elegance of the Business Activity Statement. Kim Beazley’s dramatic election year weight loss. A well executed strip tease by a nimble and fit young table dancer. The glorious deep rich red colour of sheeps blood when you slit their throats in religious sacrifice. The decisiveness and moral exactitude with which Judge Judy settles her court cases. The way that heterosexual male prisoners are able to find deep affection and sexual fulfilment in the total absence of any females. There is so much beauty in this world to marvel at I could go on all night, so instead I will take a break and return with some guests to discuss their ideas of beauty in this special TV 3 programme – THAT’S BEAUTIFUL!

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There you saw Brad Pitt and some chick having a shag. Hollywood’s version of a 10 on the beauty richter scale. I’m not so sure myself, perhaps I should ask my guests and get a better idea of what this beauty thing is all about…

GUESTS….

And so there you have it - a deeper understanding of my perception of beauty, and that of my guests. Do any of them match up with yours? See you for a “back to the basics” in Lesson number thirty-seven!! You little beauty! Good night!