Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's new campaign against teenage binge drinking in Australia revived questions last week about his own drunken escapade in a New York strip club.
Reports of the night he spent at "Scores" in 2003 surfaced while he campaigned ahead of last November's election. The bookish and church-going Rudd apologized, and most Australians believed him when he said it was the second time in his life that he was drunk.
Still, the incident resurfaced last week when Rudd launched a 53 million Australian dollar (NT$1.5 billion) campaign to combat excessive drinking among Australians teens.
"It's a bit rich for a man who got famously stonkered at a lap-dancing club in New York five years ago to be lecturing the rest of us on binge drinking," columnist Miranda Devine wrote in the Sydney Morning Herald.
Rudd admitted last Friday that he was no "paragon of moral virtue."
"I'll take any incoming flak about yours truly, but I've got one target in mind and that is to get that number down," he told Melbourne radio 3AW, referring to the 168,000 Australian teenagers under the legal drinking age of 18 who abuse alcohol.
The campaign includes television, radio and Internet spots to shock young people on the consequences of binge drinking, as well as grants to clubs and community groups to help change the drinking culture. Some sports stars have agreed to appear in the ads.
Australians are relatively tolerant of excessive drinking. Former prime minister Bob Hawke held a Guinness World Record for speed beer drinking during his days as a Rhodes Scholar.(AP)
上週，澳洲總理陸克文為改善青少年狂飲問題而推行的新計畫，讓他曾在紐約一間脫衣酒吧酒醉荒唐的事再度成為民眾質疑的話題。
他去年十一月參選澳洲總理前，曾被媒體揭露他二ＯＯ三年某夜光顧「Scores」脫衣舞俱樂部的往事；當時有書卷氣息且總是按時上教堂的陸克文就道歉說，那是他生平第二次喝醉酒，這說法說服了大部份澳洲民眾。
儘管如此，當上週陸克文提出一個五千三百萬澳幣（新台幣十五億元）的計畫，以導正澳洲青少年過量飲酒問題時，該事件又再度被拿來炒作。
專欄作家米蘭達．戴凡在《雪梨晨鋒報》中寫道：「被一個五年前在紐約脫衣舞夜總會喝得酩酊爛醉的人教訓『狂飲』，實在是讓我們感到有一點荒唐。」
陸克文上週五承認他自己「在道德上並非完人」。
他對墨爾本3AW廣播電台表示：「對於大眾的抨擊我都虛心接受，但是我心中有一個目標，就是要減少狂飲的青少年人數。」他提到，澳洲未達十八歲法定年齡就酗酒的青少年約有十六萬八千人。
這項計畫包括在電視、廣播和網路上安插廣告，以可能的後果來嚇阻年輕人酗酒，並補助俱樂部和社區團體，以期改善飲酒文化；已有若干體育明星同意參與廣告拍攝。
相對而言，澳洲人對過量飲酒相當寬容；前總理霍克在當「羅德學人」期間，還曾是金氏世界紀錄極速狂飲啤酒項目的紀錄保持人。（美聯社�翻譯：袁星塵）
Warning: Excessive consumption
of alcohol can damage your health.
警告：飲酒過量有害健康。
As bee populations around the world continue to decline at an alarming rate, scientists are developing an innovative solution: robotic bees. Recent advances at research institutions like Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the US have produced tiny flying robots capable of performing pollination tasks similar to those of real bees. These tiny machines represent an impressive technological achievement. MIT’s latest models can hover in the air for over 1,000 seconds and perform complex movements, demonstrating the agility needed for successful pollination. The robots are designed to mimic the flight patterns of natural bees, offering potential support to agriculture
A: Taiwan legalized same-sex marriage on May 24, 2019, so this week marks the seventh anniversary of that milestone. By the end of 2024, a total of 32,126 LGBT couples had tied the knot. B: How many of them got married to foreign partners? A: In 2024, there were 504 cross-border same-sex marriages. By the end of that year, there were 130 cross-strait same-sex marriages between Taiwanese and Chinese — accounting for only about 0.4 percent of the total. B: I’ve heard that a seven-year marriage brings the “seven-year itch.” I bet some couples regret their decisions now. A:
A: While Taiwan is celebrating the 7th anniversary of legalizing same-sex marriage, a poll shows that the support rate for same-sex marriage rose sharply from 37.4 percent seven years ago to 69.9 percent last year. B: Actually, I’m a bit curious about the size of Taiwan’s LGBT population. A: I’m not sure. But if we take a Gallup poll in the US as an example, 9.3 percent of American adults identified as LGBT in 2024. B: Wow, is it because the Americans are relatively open? In many other countries, the figures hover around 5 percent. A: Based on this,
As climate change and urbanization push city temperatures higher, walking outdoors is becoming increasingly uncomfortable in many parts of the world, especially when prolonged time spent in sunlight is involved. As a result, outdoor lovers are now seeking cooler, shaded walking routes. However, most mainstream map apps still do not __1__ shaded footpaths. Enter routing.osm.ch — a Swiss web-based route planner that introduces a novel solution to this problem. Its “Vampire mode,” named after the legendary creatures’ fear of being __2__ natural light, was developed by a Swiss research team led by Professor Stefan Keller. The platform combines open data from
RSS