musclejocks.blogspot.com

FULL STORY HERE, BUT LOVED THIS PART.

There is a certain depth of sincerity to Pocock which people gravitate to, and also characteristics that probably set him apart from the pack, or at least the stereotypical pack.

For starters, there is his dedication to gay rights and other social and political issues. When he and partner Emma, an Australian, married last December, they used the opportunity to support their gay-marriage beliefs.

Pocock says: “I don’t see what the big deal is with the whole gay marriage debate in Australia.

“Being brought up in a Christian home and still identifying as Christian, I get pretty annoyed with the Christian lobbies around the world who say gay marriage destroys the family and all that kind of rubbish.

“They claim to follow someone who always stood up for the oppressed and marginalised.

“I guess it is a fear of the unknown – if you talk to someone who doesn’t like gay people you can almost guarantee that they don’t know too many.

“These are the prejudices that you have to challenge and break down. Emma and I decided not to get legally married until our gay friends could do the same.”

He is also dedicated to the fair trade movement.

“I’m really passionate about challenging people in the First World to think more about the way they consume things,” he says.

“For example, kids working in the Ivory Coast rather than going to school, and being sold to slavery, seem like very distant things to us when we pick up a chocolate bar. Few people make the connection.

“We need to buy products produced in a way that everyone involved gets a fair share.”

He helped start a project named Eightytwenty Vision, which funds and promotes self-help and solutions in Nkayi, a town in Zimbabwe. On a website where Pocock was asked about his favourite books, he extols “Jungian thought”.

This single mindedness is among the traits that will one day make him a Wallaby captain, and a very interesting one, you suspect. His journey from the madness of Zimbabwe to gladness in Australia might drive these passions for justice.

“Knowing how a vast majority of the world live, I have a real appreciation of how good things are in Australia, New Zealand and the rest of the developed nations around the world,” he says.