Australia’s richest “person” Gina Rinehart has taken a quick break from being a mining magnate to publish a humorous book of jokes and quotes. And by humorous, we mean it’s literally just a book of boomer memes that Rinehart has apparently found on Facebook, or whatever.
Sky News reports that Rinehart put the book together from jokes and stories she gathered herself, which is all the confirmation we needed that she spends all day scrolling through pixelated boomer memes on her iPad Pro.
“These little bits of, um, you know, humour to hopefully bring some smile to faces,” Rinehart said of her book, Jokes and Joys.
Go on, have a gander. Does it not remind you of the shit your uncle shares on Facebook?
The book launch spanned 12 different locations, all connected via the magic of Zoom, and it really was an event to behold. A who’s who of all the wrong people were in attendance to give praise to Rinehart and her new book.
Even a bunch of current and former politicians were in attendance, like Bronwyn Bishop (choppergate) and Matt Canavan (coal boy), as well as the grandson of former Queensland Premier Joh Bjelkie-Peterson, the so-called “Hillbilly dictator”.
Now let’s talk about timing. Despite the launch happening on April 1, nothing about this seems like an April Fool’s Day joke.
Sure it is hilariously cursed, but nobody in their right mind would rope in high-profile politicians and and the nine Cambodian orphans she supports if the whole thing was just a prank.
A more tangible clue to the timing perhaps lies in the other happenings in Gina Rinehart’s life.
Just a day before the book launch, WAToday and The West Australian both reported that Rinehart planned on delivering a “knockout blow” in a legal battle to cut off two of her own children, John Hancock and Bianca Rinehart, from a stake in her mining empire.
The upside of this whole distraction is that profits from the book will go to the Cambodian Children’s Fund, the Shine Awards, the Royal Flying Doctor Service, and the Country Women’s Association. All very worthy causes.
The downside is that nobody’s going to buy this book and Rinehart could probably just donate more to these organisations from her own fortune anyway.
