The bogan does not cope well with the ageing process. Gradually increasing feelings of insecurity resulting from expanding waistlines, sagging skin, crows’ feet and receding hairlines has led to burgeoning industries selling solutions to worried bogans past their primes. Some are long-standing, such as skin care. However, there has been constant development, the most prominent being explosive growth in hair regeneration technology. With that came the exorbitant charges associated with regular visits to the ‘clinician’ by paunchy men, approaching their forties, yet still bearing the pastel t-shirts and oversized, yet formless biceps of their youth. These men can be easily identified, incidentally, by their still-vertical hair failing to conceal the increasing bare acreage on their scone.
However, there are few markets left for these mid-90s hope-peddlers to crack. So new feel-good products have risen to prominence. While some have been more successful, none are as bile-inducingly horrid as glamour photography. Today, in a world where celebrities are photographed relentlessly, it stands to reason to the bogan that they, too deserve to be photographed. Semi nude. In their forties. Then hang the results in the entrance hall to their house. Where their children’s friends can see.
Even better, the bogan can experience a small slice of the sheer, face-melting awesomeness of celebrity; the photo can be taken in soft, caressing light. The outfit can be revealing – but not TOO revealing. And the end result can be airbrushed to within an inch of its life. Like the young lady on the cover of their partner’s issue of Ralph, of whom the bogan is furiously jealous, blemishes and signs of any actual ageing can be removed. The picture can then be placed, at superhuman speed, as the bogan’s new Facebook profile pic.
The photo can then be hung in a highly public place – not only the entrance hall, but above the bed, or in the kitchen. Because the bogan knows there is nothing that guests want to see more during dinner than their 45 year-old hostess leaning seductively over their plate of beef and black bean.
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A subset of this is now the wedding photos, which have grown from being a photographic record and momento of the big day, to something akin to a ‘fashion’ shoot for the edification of the ego of the lady bogan.
Not just content now with the typical photos of the couple, friends and family in classic groupings, it now extends to multiple locations, and even whole other days where the couple gets redressed to star in thier own photos.
As with everything else, it’s meant to elicit the response from other female bogans ‘Darls, you look like a model!’, preferably on facebook, which has now become the clearing house for bogan oanism.
Before the trolls jump- typo, meant Onanism
Those typo trolls WILL jump…
pk you are gay
While I don’t have a problem with glamour photography per se, being confronted with the results in the foyer of someone’s house is not good.
Great post. My recent experience of this came about when a mate (admittedly, a pretty bogan mate) somehow convinced me to have a beer with a friend of hers – a cute & dumb 19 year old bogan. On entering the apartment of this chick I was confronted with a giant semi-nude ‘arty’ B&W framed photo of the householder herself on the living room wall. Couldn’t help but steal nervous glances at it, while she and her overweight, aggressive bogan boyfriend ranted about the latest outrage to common decency and law and order (you know, “jail is too good for them” fare – “them”, of course, meaning paedophiles).
Later, the girl from the home-made soft pr0n tried to flirt with me in front of the BF (“do you need a housemate?”), while he fumed. It was clearly a volatile relationship, and I got out fast.
I think it also has to be mentioned that in every single one of these sets of glamour photos that people have, there seems to always be a trademark shot of the person in question leaning against a tin shed. Just something I found amusing
Pk you are so right!
I’m expecting Pixi Foto to crop up in a future edition of TBL – bogans LOVE getting shitloads of pictures of Braydynn, Jaydynn, Maddysin and Haighleigh taken whenever the Pixi Foto juggernaut rolls into the front foyer of their local Kmart. They’re not happy until at least 2 walls of their loungeroom are plastered with 6×4″ and 10×8″ pictures of little Jaydynn clinging onto a manky old teddy bear that has been slobbered and urinated on by at least 100 other preservative-fuelled crotch droppings from the various other outer suburban cesspits that Pixi Foto tours on a regular basis – usually to co-incide with the time of the fortnight when Family Tax Benefit is paid.
Tone, whilst I agree that there is a bogan fascination with having their kids photos plastered all over the place, I think your rant against Pixi Fotos is somewhat misplaced.
Pixi Fotos were around long before the new breed of bogan began to latch on to the concept of baby-photo-wallpaper. They’ve been around since the 1970s, and I think you’d be hard-pressed to find a family in Australia that doesn’t have Pixi Fotos of at least one generation of chidlren. Popularity doesn’t automatically make something bogan.
What is quite boganesque, though, is the newer trend of having glamour photography shots of your kids on display all over your house. I once knew a family who had a glamour photo of the mum and two pre-teen daughters, completely nude, and posing “artistically”, hanging above the bed in the master bedroom… which is really quite creepy if you think about it too much.
Thanks for the feedback.
I’m afraid that Pixi Foto was hijacked by bogans a long time ago. I was born into a highly boganised environment, and have fought long and hard to become the wanker than I am today. As such, I spent my formative years immersed in Bogan Culture (how’s that for an oxymoron, kids?). I also have indelible memories of my first ever job; working at a large discount department store with a ‘W’ in its name smack bang in the middle of South Australia’s largest Bogan colony.
Every 4 weeks, Pixi Foto would come in and you’d have the little Joshuas and Mariahs, along with some slightly older Joshuas and Tennilles (this was the early 90s, after all) and the bogan parents would just about lose their shit. Really. Because, as we all know, little Joshua or Mariah looked so much different now than they did 4 weeks ago.
Now that I’ve dragged myself out of the gutter and am well on my way to being a wanker, I’ve moved to a locale commensurate with my perceived station in life. Not once have I seen a Pixi Foto stand out the front of my local supermarket since moving to a Good Area, nor has my spawn ever been photographed by said Pixi Foto. Hell, even in the previous area I was in (which was unique in being one of the few places in Australia where there was a Kmart yet virtually zero bogans), I never saw Pixi Foto. Ever.
However, I suspect if I stray too far North or too far South of the city I call home, they’ll be hundreds of the things. They’re like triffids out there in the McMansion Belt.
I assume everyone has made it to this American site?
http://awkwardfamilyphotos.com/
The only surprise is the lack of glamour shots.
Yeah, I bookmarked that site a little while ago. It’s the gift that keeps on giving.
It almost makes me glad that my parents never gave enough of a shit about us kids to ever pay for one of those atrocities.
The pregnancy shots!
My favourites are the ones where the people are in generally normal poses, but just happen to be holding guns. So… odd.
Compund bows?
At least you are honest and know you’re a wanker! Well put.
HAHAHAHAHA! Sounds like a scene out of ‘Family Guy’- Quagmire goes back to some woman’s place and above the bed in her room is a nude pic of her and her two pre-teen daughters. Quagmire looks up and goes “Heh-heh- lay-by! AAAAALLLLLLRIIIIIIIIGHT!”
Babies sitting in pot plant holders dressed in tiny overalls, sitting on mini motorbikes wearing mini leather jackets… so classy.
Anne Geddes kicked this whole thing off in the early 90’s and has a lot to answer for.
It the poverty of the imagination that’s so sad. Pouring yourself into some pre-determined mould of ‘eroticism’ or raunch rather than stopping to think about what is actually attractive about you as a person. As for what is says about your imagined audience . . . The picture is unintentionally humourous, or am I missing out on the top hat as a standard issue for bogan women? Yes, yes, the Joe Cocker soundtrack.
Indi,
as a guy in this culture, it’s amazing how there’s an almost pavlovian response expected when presented with pictures of this type. Raunch culture has reduced sexual response down to a series of standard poses, gestures and clothing, regardless of the subject. It’s very depressing.
Raunch seem to be all strip, and no tease, and forget about any idea of flirtatiousness or individual character. The pornographic imagination can be humourless grim and stereotypical. The glamour photo thing is odder in that the person is usually known to you, but the private nature of the intimacy between partners is turned into something for public display. Yet another social and cultural boundary ruptured in the service of bogan pride.
Pixi Fotos of the baby with angel wings is the first step to glamour photos. I’m sorry people, but your baby isn’t a little angel.
All bogan children are angels or princesses!!!
Or an effing fairy. The only amusement in this is that inevitably messages get mixed, and occasionally Tyson will want Montana’s wings and tutu. I’ve witnessed that particular tantrum on two occasions. Bogan shame- not at the tantrum, but the implied lifestyle choice.
But the parents were so sure if they named their son after a boxer or motorcycle, or something butch, that they safeguarded their child from becoming a fag.
Whilst bogans will go to Mardi Gras and watch Queer Eye and or Queer as Folks, ultimately they are homophobic at heart. A fag is good for a laugh or to go shopping with, but not much more in their eyes.
Things Bogans Like #33 – Homophobia
But . . . some of my best friends . . .
Bogans will entertain a gay friend for sometime until they partner up and do bogan things with other bogan couples / parents (BBQs, fairy parties, et al).
They just end up sounding like they’re porn stars with those silly names. Now there’s an aspiration. Heredity, environment, all outfoxed by the gay gene.
Now don’t forget the musical theatre – bogans love a good show, and you can’t have shows without fags. But maybe you’re right- Lloyd-Webber’s ongoing success is proof bogans don’t know shit about musicals, and what happens when straight men write shows. But the compendium show- that’s nice. Freddy Mercury wasn’t really gay, was he?
I’m with you Paul and Indi.
The “standard” of what is sexy has become so uniformly defined that it’s become predictable, boring, and a little bit pathetic.
The porn industry (including soft port magazines ralph, FHM etc) are the worst for this. Without any thought or imaginiation they cast women into the same boring mold week after week, to the thunderous applause of their moronic bogan audiences.
Hah!! The boganette’s desire to look like a former girlfriend of Peter Foster…
The bogan can take glamour shots at home with his own professional set up! With the price of entry level DSLR dropping dramatically since 2005 the bogan has bought up BIG..with one exception, they don’t bother with optics and just use the “kit lens” which is just about as good as Point and Shoot.
The bogan also leaves it on auto while instructing his model to pose.
After all is down the boganette goes to a kodak print station and sits there for 2 hours printing the 4 gig of photos at 5 cents each!
Photography has never been so umm overexposed?
They can be posted on Red Hot Pie too, in the ‘couples looking for couples’ section.
Bogan vanity is now available at a few cents a print.
Great, now I have the Exclusive Photography jingle stuck in my head.
really youre all fucking wankers coming on here making fun of things other people enjoy to do.. why not just go live your own lives and not worry about what other people do?
What an adorably amusing hypocrite you are! TBL
Pilf,
Bogans such as yourself like to think they set the cutural agenda, and in fact for 11 years during Howard’s terrible time in office you were pandered to, your opinions, predjudices were the only thing that mattered. This meant as well that anything that the bogan found confusing or went over their heads was ridiculed, had no value and was shot down.
So, yes, we’re carving out a small space to discuss this with some humour. It’s high time that someone took a stand to say that Australian culture is more than the low brow, low rent priorities of Howard’s cashed up bogans.
As you’re all so fond of saying- like it or leave, little buddy.
There was a photographer doing a burlesque/pinup version of glamour photography, but unfortunately she is no longer taking photos.
Ha ha – this made me laugh. I went to a house just like this recently. To the letter. It is actually a bit confronting. Big glamour shots in nearly every room. Look, they were nice photos and she looked great, but there really is something kind of desperate about it, no matter how lovely.
I will compliment the the boguette in the article. Fabulous body that has stood the test of not only time – but probably four kids, 18000 woodstock cans and takeaway every second night.
And significant amounts of attention from Photoshop, no doubt… – TBL
There’s a business taking glamour photos of children called … unposedkids.com
Try entering that in your browser without looking over your shoulder.
TBL- ## XY Hating Pedophiles
The flip side of Sexualising Their Kids
Worst Iv’e seen is a middle aged woman, not so attractive, glamour shot and pising with a finger in mouth & backward glance.I tried not to stare at it in shock.
pising=posing
lol typo
My cousin is definitely a bogan.
I knew it for the first time when I went to her new house for her baby shower and there was no art on the walls… only glamour photographs of her and her husband.
There was even one over the baby’s crib.
Yes, on the ceiling.
It was really creepy.
It’s all about taste, isn’t it? All that time, effort and no doubt money, to do that.
The spooky historical connection is with various Renaissance genre paintings. It is really only a difference of degree to get Bronzino to paint your squeeze as an Allegory of Profane Love, rather than The Private Eye of Dingley to do some noice shots of the missus straddling the bedpost. But the matter of taste remains.
The Boganette would be the one suggesting it while the Bogan would think it’s ‘farkin’ gay’.
Eventually however, the Bogan would be very excited by the fact that the Boganette’s hot friends from work would get to see him semi-naked in a photo which will obviously lead to (in the Bogan’s mind at least) future potential threesomes…
You’d hit it though…
One of the good things about Bogan Classic was that he or she didn’t care how they fell apart in older years. They happily let their tummies spread and their faces wrinkle and brown with UV baking. They laugh about it with mates around the BBQ, poking fun at their own old fart status with a self-deprecation far too rare among the modern bogan, who would rather bash poofs than themselves.
True. The modern day bogan is just not able to shit-stir in the same way as the classic bogan.
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