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The Sydney Morning Herald

Breaking news from Sydney, Australia and the world. Features the latest business, sport, entertainment, travel, lifestyle, and technology news.

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Featured Writers

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Kurt Johnson

Literary Critic/Historical TravelEastern Bloc, Post-Soviet Sphere The Red Wake (2016: Random House)

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Isabelle Comber

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Meg Kanofski

Meg Kanofski is social media editor at the Sydney Morning Herald.

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Melissa Fine | Copywriter

I craft compelling copy for a diverse range of industries to drive brand awareness, engagement, and conversions. BA - English Literature (Creative Writing + Media Writing) Adv Dip Nutritional Medicine

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Jane Gardner

I am an award-winning journalist, with 15 years of experience in media relations, journalism, ambassador recruitment and management, communications strategy, social media strategy, and multimedia content production, as well as …

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Alan Hartstein

Hi there, my specialty is words that have an impact. I have over 20 years' experience as a content manager, writer and editor in the publishing and corporate writing sectors …

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Latest Articles

We’re becoming dumb and dumber – welcome to the idiocracy

In news that won’t shock anyone who engages with comments on social media or Married at First Sight, human intelligence is declining. The Financial Times reported the downward trend of literacy and numeracy in both kids and adults, as found by the OECD. It appears to be “a broader erosion …
By Cherie Gilmour
• The Sydney Morning Herald

Snappy dialogue and unlucky-in-love protagonist? It must be chick lit

ROMCOMBest, First and LastAmy MatthewsSimon & Schuster, $32.99Amy Matthew’s Best, First and Last has all the ingredients for a good chick lit: exotic location (Peru), a grieving granny who carries around (and chats to) her dead husband’s ashes, uses the words “sexting” and “catching feeling”, snappy dialogue that would put …
By Cherie Gilmour
• The Sydney Morning Herald

Here’s my truth: I’m sick of other people’s ‘truths’

If you’re playing Married at First Sight bingo this year, by which, every time an inane word or phrase is spouted by a participant, such as “gaslighting”, “walls up” or “being on the show for the right reasons”, it’s time to yell, “bingo”.But I’d like to propose a new addition …
By Cherie Gilmour
• The Sydney Morning Herald

According to Oprah, it’s life-altering. So what is the ‘let them’ theory?

From looksmaxxing to gross girls, TikTok has introduced us to many new ideas, many of them questionable. However, more recently, it’s given us the “let them” theory, and I’m as surprised as anyone to say it’s actually taught me something of significance.
By Emily McGrorey
• The Sydney Morning Herald

Closing the gender gap’s a real pain. Period

At the chemist the other day, I noticed a large display for Nurofen; a stand packed with painkillers, announcing they are “Committed to closing the gender pain gap”. I paused, wondering what this “pain gap” is. Are they lobbying for men to experience period pain by having their lower torso …
By Cherie Gilmour
• The Sydney Morning Herald

Banning G-strings at public pools is a bummer for some, but it’s the right move

While strolling through sunny markets with my five-year-old daughter last week, we encountered a bare bum. Bare bums aren’t an anomaly in my kids’ lives; quite the opposite. They’re an endless source of fascination, whether it’s your brother’s plump cheeks ripe for whacking, improving your flatuosity or de-panting to run …
By Cherie Gilmour
• The Sydney Morning Herald

No, you can’t have my number. We’re not in a relationship

I’m waiting in line at JB Hi-Fi Albury to buy a cord to connect my phone to the car so we can listen to podcasts on our road trip. “I’ll just grab your phone number so we can send you a digital receipt,” the cashier says. “Um, no thanks,” I …
By Cherie Gilmour
• The Sydney Morning Herald

On our next road trip, Bluey can babysit the kids for the whole 900km

Travelling interstate in a car with small children over the summer holidays is not for the faint-hearted, but some of us rise to the challenge. Sure, you could fly the 90-minute trip in an air-conditioned plane, but who wants to be stuck with a bunch of strangers giving the passive-aggressive …
By Cherie Gilmour
• The Sydney Morning Herald

Sex merchants have hijacked Christmas. Does Santa really need to be ‘weirdly hot’?

As Mariah Carey once again defrosts to bring All I Want for Christmas is You into every shopping centre, there’s something else that’s warming up. Netflix is trying to bring sexy back to Christmas with not one but two Hallmark-style films featuring shirtless, buff men, including one snowman and a …
By Cherie Gilmour
• The Sydney Morning Herald

They topped the HSC over the past 40 years. Where are they now?

Unlike her fellow school-leavers in 1984, Cindy Pan did not learn of her HSC mark through the post.It was her headmistress who broke the news, sharing that her final exam score of 475 out of a possible 500 marks was the best among her Abbotsleigh cohort, and that she would …
By Daniel Lo Surdo
• The Sydney Morning Herald

Is our language going down the toilet? My word!

I’m no linguistic purist. My brother and I exclaim “YOLO!” (you only live once) to each other, as in, “I backed into our neighbour’s car, and we didn’t realise our insurance had expired, YOLO!” Or: “Modern life is exhausting. My brain feels like a lab rat owned by sadistic scientists …
By Cherie Gilmour
• The Sydney Morning Herald

Alexei Navalny’s memoir is a reminder of literature’s true purpose

The West’s Alexei Navalny is a sketch joining three data points: his miraculous survival from poisoning, his return to Russia and his death in prison. To Putin, he was another Rasputin who bewitched Russia with the promise of democracy and survived the Kremlin’s attempts to poison, smear and assassinate. Until …
By Kurt Johnson
• The Sydney Morning Herald

In a silently uploaded document, a major Sydney intersection lost its upgrade

Two senior ministers were told that plans to slash promised upgrades to road, cycling and pedestrian infrastructure at a key Sydney intersection would have “minimal impact” on transport in the inner city, despite the now-abandoned proposal erasing 85 per cent of planned improvements.
By Daniel Lo Surdo
• The Sydney Morning Herald

From brunch to living in a war zone: how war upended a writer’s life

In an article in the German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Oleksandr Mykhed frames the Russian invasion of Ukraine not as belligerent power play or geopolitical stunt but an outright assault on Ukraine’s very existence.The passage begins with a dream Mykhed has one night, a “whimsical homage” to Catcher in the …
By Kurt Johnson
• The Sydney Morning Herald

Steely Dan and Taxi Driver: Meet the 21-year-olds obsessed with the 1970s

Jose Da Costa and Shankari Kathirgamalingam were discussing their favourite Steely Dan tunes when they had an idea: they should start a club for young people like them to celebrate the music, fashion and literature of the 1970s in all their glory.
By Daniel Lo Surdo
• The Sydney Morning Herald

At school, they advised me to become a vet. They were so wrong

In year 12, my exasperated careers adviser tried to cobble together ideas for me based on my stated interest, “animals” (because “the Mars vending machine” and “Orlando Bloom” were apparently unhelpful). He suggested I could be a vet.After a dismal work placement emptying bloodied syringes and cleaning up dog poo …
By Cherie Gilmour
• The Sydney Morning Herald

The Mount Druitt club behind South Sudan’s Olympic stars

Diing Deng’s face lights up when he’s asked about South Sudan’s first Olympic basketball appearance.The 15-year-old’s family home in western Sydney was the place to be when the East African country’s national side, which played its first international game seven years ago, took to the court in...
By Daniel Lo Surdo
• The Sydney Morning Herald

Trump may be unhinged, but not because of the bad boogie

I’m no fan of Donald Trump, but questioning his mental health on the grounds of dancing is a low blow. Kamala Harris threw shade at Trump this week for his “bizarre” dance party moves at a rally in Pennsylvania. On social media, Harris wrote “Hope he’s OK”, alongside footage of …
By Cherie Gilmour
• The Sydney Morning Herald

We haven’t reinvented the wheel, so why the toilet flusher?

I’m madly waving my hand up and down over a sensor-operated toilet flush panel, which isn’t registering my existence. I switch up the motion, maybe a swipe to the right, Tinder-style? Nothing.Does the job, presses no buttons: an old-fashioned, pull-chain cistern. Credit: Golding/Fairfax MediaAfter a few minutes, my mind goes …
By Cherie Gilmour
• The Sydney Morning Herald

I’ve never sent a naked selfie. There’s no shame in a little shame

Yes, I see you looking at me in the change room at the pool, your mammaries doing the cha-cha as you dry what would be your short-and-curlies if you hadn’t lasered them off. I’m so pleased you’re immune to shame while displaying your naked flesh, a relief map of the …
By Cherie Gilmour
• The Sydney Morning Herald

A Very Hungry Caterpillar costume won’t mean a bookworm

Book Week rolls around again, and with it comes the predictable chorus of strung-out parents who have no time to read books themselves but are tasked with “inspiring a love of literature” in their kids. How? By dressing them up as characters from children’s books. For an entire week! Why? …
By Cherie Gilmour
• The Sydney Morning Herald