The PR Blog

What does it take to deserve a place at the table?

How a little imaginary town can remind us what the real world is missing.

Why sometimes the most human things happen in a place that doesn't exist.

There is a rather curious little corner of the internet where a top-hatted duck wearing a monocle can hold public office, a grey wallaby can walk around on gold-plated titanium knees, and a rat wearing a fedora considers himself an investigative journalist of considerable standing.

There are also five cats with a questionable attitude towards authority, an emu plumber, a camel, assorted townsfolk and enough extraordinary machinery to keep a small industrial nation occupied.

Welcome to Dusty Gulch.

No, it isn't a real place. There is no Google Maps entry, no local council office to complain to and certainly no guarantee that the water, diesel and WDP power supply will remain operational for more than five minutes.

Yet, rather strangely, there is something very real about it.

And that got me thinking.

What exactly are we looking for when we visit a blog? Some comments yesterday made me think. 

These days, we are hardly short of information. We can read the latest headlines, follow breaking news, watch political commentators argue, and receive an almost continuous stream of information from every corner of the planet.

One website reports something. Another repeats it. A third adds a little commentary, and before long fifty different outlets are telling us pretty much the same thing.

There is nothing necessarily wrong with that. Knowing what is happening in the world matters.

But surely there is more to a blog than being another stop along the news conveyor belt?

If all we do is regurgitate what has already been reported elsewhere, what exactly are we adding?

Perhaps the answer lies in something rather less complicated.

People.

Not statistics, demographics, page impressions or engagement figures. Actual people. The characters behind the keyboards, the readers who return, the familiar names who leave a comment, the occasional newcomer who offers an observation that sends the whole conversation off in an unexpected direction.

A blog can become something rather like an online pub. People drop in, have a yarn, disagree about something, share a laugh and occasionally discover that someone on the other side of the world sees things rather differently.

It doesn't have to be profound every day. Sometimes a little humour is worth more than another thousand words of outrage.

And this is where Dusty Gulch comes into the picture.

It is an imaginary town populated by decidedly improbable characters. Yet the things that happen there are often reflections of the real world.

There is loyalty, friendship, ingenuity, courage, occasional stupidity and the eternal struggle to keep the machinery running while somebody else is busy making a complete dog's breakfast of the arrangements.

Sound familiar?

Dusty McFookit has responsibilities. And he takes them seriously. Trevor might be a wallaby, but he knows the value of hard work and a decent spanner. Roderick (Whiskers) McNibble might be a rat, but he takes his journalism seriously, even when the facts become decidedly uncomfortable.

And the Feline Force Five? Well, every community needs a little mischief, although perhaps not quite that much.

The point is that these characters give us a way of exploring ideas without having to turn every conversation into a political argument or a lecture about the state of civilisation. Hell, who can argue with a vampire cape wearing emu who is a master plumber with a sink spanner? 

They allow us to laugh at absurdity, recognise human weaknesses and occasionally celebrate the better qualities we would all like to see more often.

A story doesn't always need to name a politician, identify a party or point a finger at somebody. Sometimes a duck, a wallaby and a rat can make a point rather more effectively than a dozen opinion pieces.

And perhaps that is because we become involved in the characters.

We remember them. We look forward to seeing what happens next. We notice when somebody new arrives. We become invested in their little corner of the world.

We live in a world that seems increasingly determined to divide people into categories. Left and right. Us and them. Correct and incorrect. Approved and disapproved.

Even a simple difference of opinion can become an invitation to hostility.

But in a make-believe town, a rat, an emu, a camel, five cats and a wallaby can work together towards a common purpose.

They don't have to agree on everything. They simply have to recognise that they belong to the same community.

Perhaps there is a lesson in that. Our differences are not what matters. It is our sameness that counts. 

I am not suggesting that Dusty Gulch is a blueprint for rebuilding civilisation. Heaven forbid. The local infrastructure would collapse before morning tea. And the cats would get distracted by a hair tie and forget they were on a very important mission. 

But it does remind us that a better world isn't necessarily built through grand declarations, political manifestos or another round of international conferences.

Sometimes it starts with people looking out for one another.

A little loyalty. A little humour. A willingness to lend a hand. The ability to disagree without falling out, and the good sense to recognise that we are all a little ridiculous from time to time.

And if a fictional wallaby can manage that, surely there is hope for the rest of us.

Perhaps this is what a blog should aspire to be.

Not simply a place where news is repeated, but somewhere people can meet, think, laugh, argue, learn and occasionally escape the madness outside.

A place with a little personality. A little imagination. And, above all, a sense of belonging.

Because the internet may connect billions of people, but connection and community are not necessarily the same thing.

One requires a signal. The other requires a little heart.

And if you happen to find both in a place populated by a grumpy lisping monocled duck, a titanium-kneed wallaby and a rat with a press pass, I would suggest you have found something rather special.

So, if you happen to be passing through Dusty Gulch, pull up a chair.

The kettle is probably on, although nobody can guarantee what is coming out of the tap.

And Roderick is always looking for a story.

After all, the world has quite enough serious business. Perhaps it could do with a little more humanity, even if it has to borrow it from a few imaginary characters.