Dogs
are Barking
by
Mark Taylor
Synopsis of
the book from the Author:
The story is
set in the Royal Military College in Canberra, Australia
(the nation's capital), and is about an officer cadet who
doesn't fit in because of the prevailing culture at the premier
officer training establishment (one of extreme bullying of
all newcomers based on "traditions of torture" picked
up from overseas officer training establishments). As
a result, junior cadet, John Foster, a sixteen year old straight
out of high school, struggles through daily life at the College,
miserable and constantly fearful of reprisal. When Foster
alerts the newspapers to the systematic abuse rife within
the college, life becomes intolerable.
The story is
not some trashy tell-all, nor is it some dry, tedious treatise
on the subject of bullying in the Australian armed forces.
Based on research, personal experience and stories re-told
to me by army officers (all of which have been cross-referenced
and checked for their veracity), the book looks seriously
at an issue not typically made available by mainstream publishers.
Dogs are Barking simultaneously challenges military values
such as loyalty to your mates above all else, including differentiating
between right and wrong.
I wrote the
book with the express aim of exposing this kind of behaviour
(which is prevalent but hidden from public view on the whole)
and make people question why a professional military needs
to do and perpetrate this sort of behaviour. That they
do probably explains why human rights abuses occur in war.
Officers and soldiers have been socialised and conditioned
to horror from the moment they began to prepare for war -
in their training days.
If you're
interested in the book or if you think there's any way, any
way at all that you could help get this important message
out, please let me know. I look forward to hearing from you.
Review
by Murray Waldren, Other Voices
column,
The Weekend Australian, 4/5 September 1999
The word initiation
has a deceptive innocence about it, bastardisation none.
Mark Taylor's
Dogs are Barking (Irrepressible Press, 205 pp, $15.95) strips
bare the malice and brutality within military college culture,
and exposes the group dynamics behind ensuring adherence to
it. That it has been tacitly condoned and covered up
by higher ranks is even more shameful. (This year's A Current
Affair expose is not new - the press has been reporting such
incidents since 1913, albeit bowdlerised as recruiting or
hazing.)
A retired army
officer, Taylor begins his novel at full tilt, then accelerates.
His writing is workmanlike, his story relentless as it unwinds
with inevitable consequences. Not Pulitzer Prize material
but passionate and readable, and a clarion call for change.
Review in
Issue Number 9 of Woroni (an ANU student newspaper).
Dogs are Barking
receives a four out of five star rating from Michael Cook,
Co-Editor. His review appeared on page 26 and is reproduced
below:
Bastardisation is not often the topic of polite dinner table
conversation. In fact, the subject is not raised in
much conversation at all. The Australian Defence Force
denies it ever occurs, or dismisses it as a 'series of isolated
incidents'. And as long as the military does its job,
the public just doesn't want to know.
This silence
is, partly, the reason Mark Taylor's novel Dogs are Barking
is so compelling. Taylor takes us deep inside the
Royal Military College (Duntroon) and exposes the viciousness
that lurks under its veneer of respectability. Dogs
are Barking is not, however, a trashy 'tell-all' book.
Nor is it simply a treatise on the trauma such bastardry
inflicts on young men. Rather, it is a meticulously
researched piece of work - a work of fiction, yet with a
ring of truth that marks every word. This enables
Taylor to pull no punches, yet saves him, I presume, from
a large defamation bill.
In the novel
First Year Cadet John Foster is singled out as unsuitable
for military leadership. He is subjected to a rang
of degrading, violent attacks, and this systematic abuse
intensifies when Foster 'squeals' to the press about his
treatment.
More chilling,
however, is the sinister Morals Officer, Rob Steel.
In his unofficial role as the guardian of College traditions,
Cadet Steel casts a menacing shadow as he ferrets out every
flaw and insecurity. It is he, with the active support
of the College hierarchy, who instigates the sadistic 'games'
which make such disturbing reading - the 'playful' re-enactment
of Nazi gas chambers being amongst the more extreme.
Taylor superbly
maintains the fear and tension, evident from the first page,
over the entire novel. He writes in a style that invites
you into this different world, and then shocks you with
the horror that is an inherent component of it. Another
impressive aspect of the book is Taylor's capture of Canberra
itself (watch out for mention of 'The Bin', now lamentably
closed.)
It is currently
an appropriate moment to examine the training undertaken
by our Defence Force leaders. And this point touches
upon the most worrying aspect of the text: the calculated,
vicious attempt to remove a man from military service who
would serve his country with distinction. Ultimately, therefore,
I can't blithely say that I enjoyed this book - but it is
a powerful work I recommend you read. - Michael Cook
Brief Overview
of the Story
Harassment,
initiation, bullying, hazing, recruiting, bastardisation -
whatever the word used, wherever it happens, it means only
one thing.
Set in the 1980's,
'Dogs are Barking' takes you inside, behind the shiney brass,
spit-polished leather and white-washed facades, into one of
Australia's oldest public institutions. Through the
eyes of John Foster, an officer cadet who doesn't fit-in,
you're introduced to a world not shown in the recruiting brochures
- to what college life is really like, when nothing and everything
happens. And for much of this century, it's happened
in Australia's capital, at the Royal Military College, Duntroon.
Every cadet
in the college knows who is in charge when academic and military
instruction is over for the day... and that's the Morals Officer.
It's up to him to put an electric fence around the scandal
and root-out the squealers. He's got a week.
Dogs are Barking
is a chilling illustration of the pressure to conform and
how obedience can be destructive.
Excerpt
from Dogs Are Barking by Mark Taylor (Copyright, 1999)
Chapter
One.
WOKKA WOKKA
They weren't soldiers anymore - they were barking dogs.
Spit flew from their mouths as they demanded punishment.
They hated Rod, they wanted him to suffer, to pay for being
who and what he was.
A failure, struggling
with the training syllabus, dragging them down. Not
the best marcher, the best rugby player, the best lover
or hater, nor the fastest eater, the best dresser, the loudest
farter, the richest cadet or the one with the least morals.
Rod didn't fit.
Junior
officer cadets, dressed in form-fitting polyester khaki
uniforms, their collars starched flat to their developing
chests, chanted "Wokka, Wokka", while clapping
their hands raw. Their eyes were manic, expectant;
they craved excitement, they demanded entertainment.
Impatient, they waited for the Morals Officer. Only
he could start the game.
Dogs are Barking
can be obtained from a number of large Australian online book
stores including:
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