Bloody hard

Australia is a rugged country, most people who live elsewhere get this. Perhaps we who live here find it a bit curious, and find that we are not so much rugged or tough, but laid back.
We often say that we are the land of the ‘fair go’. But like so many such statements, the ones who get ‘the fair go’ are those who are doing pretty well already, thank you very much.

One of the things that has saddened me in the more than half a century I have lived here, is that our hearts seem to have become increasingly hardened.
Not rugged but HARD.
We are no longer saying,”If you want to live here then you have to work hard, and pull your weight.”
We are saying stupid stuff like
“We are full!”
“Go back to where you came from.”
“If you come by boat you will never settle here!”
Now, I came here by boat in 1967.But then I am white, I was born in the UK…and though I may have some non-Aryan ancestry…yet of course I speak English ( and a smattering of other languages…looking forward to retiring to brush up on Bahasa Indonesia !)
Curiously we moved into a South Australian industrial town, Whyalla, as did hundreds of other UK citizens in the late 60s. There was a real sense of ‘ghetto’.

I went to the central High School ….I had never experienced ethnic discrimination before …but I did there. I was a Pom!
People laughed at my accent (NW England) as if they some how had the key as to how English should be spoken.
Let me tell you that Maroon …is pronounced MAH ROO N
Not MA RAWN!!!
That it’s perfectly OK to say DANCE with a hard ‘a’ and you can say DARNCE if you want to…but who cares?
To provincial South Australians these seemed like linguistic baseball bats.
We tended to retreat to our ethnic homelands…so my four close friends were from Liverpool, Tyneside, Luton and North Wales.
By the time I graduated with education degrees and became a teacher in the third High School the tables had reversed.
In that school 85% of the students were not born in Australia. Most came from the UK with about 10% a mix of Greeks, Italians, French and others.
While I realise I was subjected to the pejorative “Pom”…in the Eastern school, the Aussies were “Skips” in the Western school …and thought to be as thick as two planks.
This is how prejudice works, not with logic but with the prejudice of the majority mocking the minority.
All of this is of course nonsense.
I was fortunate to have teachers who realised that when I was a minority “Pom”, I had actually probably had better schooling in Maths, Physics and Chemistry before I came to school in Australia than they had been able to deliver. John Lyon my Chemistry teacher was one of the first to spot this.
He gave me an A in my first series of reports even though I had been taught under an ‘old fashioned’ way. He took time help me translate this, and I accelerated with his help.
Five years later, inspired by him I guess, I went to be a teacher in school of which he was Head (Stuart High School). I understand now that he had not only an educational vision, but also a spiritual, philosophical and theological vision of what a school might be. I liked that.
Deeply influenced by liberal Protestant theology. He promoted such epithets as “Freedom to choose!” and “Acceptance of consequence” deeply seated in the theology of Tillich, Bonhoeffer and others.
Made sense to me.

More language of marriage

Marriage doesn't need adjectival qualification.

Indeed the only qualification that I have any sympathy with is "underage"; and indeed that is already covered by the law. Like namely it is NOT a marriage under law.

And we wouldn't for a moment  think of qualifying marriage of two people in their 70s as "Pensioner Marriage"---I have incidentally conducted such a wedding. The Bride's mother was also there (aged 95), and her daughter, and her granddaughter who was with child ...so there is an excellent photo of 5 generations even if the youngest is ion her mother's womb....

I myself was once party to a marriage of people born in two different countries....it has never-ever been referred to as "interracial", or even "international" or "cross national"..we were just married.

I likewise have married people of different races...it would be offensive to call this "interracial".

I have married quite a number of interfaith couples; and indeed couples of no faith (an expression, I suspect, which is devoid of meaning...yet full of import)

I have never enquired about people's sexual predilections; so I have no idea whether anyone of the 400+ people  I have married are same-sex attracted, racially attracted, religiously biassed (I have discovered latterly...and surprisingly...that a few are some of these things).

To my mind everyone should have opportunity to marry... this is not about sex, race, nationality...

#marriageequality THIS IS OUTRAGEOUS

A letter appeared through Sydney's (Roman) Catholic Diocese this week
(Offensive letter see here)
I take some exception to its purporting ( or seeking to purport) to speak on behalf of all religious people about marriage equality.

Please note it uses the pejorative terminology "same-sex marriage" ( see a previous blog) rather than the eirenic  term 'marriage equality'

This letter should at least begin " Dear Mr Abbot: As leaders IN (sic) some religious groups...." 

This is a partisan, incomplete and non-representative group of individual religious leaders! (It could not be otherwise!)
To tackle the presumption in my particular denomination for example:
The Anglican Archbishop of Sydney,  is NOT the "leader" of Australian Anglicans.  It is quite clear that though he may speak for a number, particularly Conservative Evangelicals, he does not ( and cannot presume to) speak for all / most Anglicans. 

He is NOT the Primate. And Evangelical Anglicanism does not typify the views of many, if not most Australian Anglicans in the 21st Century

I am interested to note that a number of mainstream Christian Churches  have obviously chosen to not identify with this . Equally well, moderate Jewish and Islamic traditions are not represented.  The Buddhist and Hindu traditions are not there. Where are the indigenous voices, and the Maori and South Pacific traditions
It will be the case (unfortunately) that we will continue to struggle with this in Churches, long after the rest of the world has got over it!

Unhealthy democracy

Writing in The Advertiser , Alexander Downer is no doubt correct that this next election will be interesting because it will give the voters a black and white choice. He is wrong in suggesting that this is ideological.
What it would seem is happening is that, once again, we are being subjected to fear mongering . As Downer himself elucidates, refugees arriving by boat will once again be the
political weapon of the Liberals.
But equally well we might note that Labor will invite us to lash out at the rich mining magnates.
This is not ideology. This is prejudice. This is not healthy democracy it is cynicism at its worst.

They just don't get it.

I am one (apparently of the few) who thought that the attempt to resurrect "Hey Hey It's Saturday" was a big mistake. It just seemed to me as I looked at it that it was like going back a decade (or more).

I was not surprised in the five minutes I watched of it to see the now-infamous Jackson Jibe.
Half a dozen white guys all 'blacked up' like minstrels taking off the Jackson famil. It reminded us that what might be Ok for six medical students to do in 1989 was not Ok in 2009.

Although the news.com.au machine has been at odds to malign H. Connick Jr (for having blacked up, too, a decade ago) the reality is that we have (PTL) moved on. Connick has moved on. The world has moved on.

This is what is wrong with trying to resurrect HHYIS...we have all moved on!

Agreeing with Alex

No one will be more surprised about my agreeing with him than the former Foreign Minister, but writing in yesterdays Tiser he berates the press, for its incessant whining on behalf of idiots who flaunt the laws of foreign countries and then expect to be bailed out by our Government.

The latest example of a woman who spent days in a Thai jail because she allegedly tried to pocket a "beer mat" (or had it put in her bag!!) is the case in point.

Downer notes that: "After about 10 minutes as foreign minister I was a little surprised to learn I was "responsible" for miscreant Australians who got into trouble in foreign countries."  

And  his heart went out to the current minister over the case in point.

He notes, and I can but agree with him, that we need to take responsibility for ourselves if and when we travel overseas.

There is a worse side to all this. The way the press beats up the legal system of Asian countries as if all are by definition corrupt and well.....just wrong!

Despite the fact that a crime for which a person may well have been jailed in Australia had allegedly taken place...stealing and/or abusing and/or attacking the constabulary; some how we are to believe that because it happens to an Australian in Thailand it is wrong.

There is more than just a little anti-Asian prejudice here!

No, I agree with me old mate Alex.....(I am trying not to gag)...we need to be some what more responsible if we are to be taken seriously as travellers overseas.

Atheists can be pretty dumb!

I don't decry anyone's right to be an atheist what I often find extraordinary is their critique of the "religious" as being narrow and bigoted when they often appear to be incredibly prejudiced against the faintest whiff of faith. Hence a letter I penned to the Advertiser yesterday

I never failed to be amazed by the contradictory nature of the comments of the many dogmatic atheists who declare all religious belief to be irrational, without any substantial analysis or argument. Their comments are so often based on sweeping generalisations such as "the religious ....can't distinguish between reality and fantasy" and "the world would be better off without them" (The Advertiser 29th October).

When we start declaring who we would be better off without we are in the realm of something quite sinister.

They would seem to know little of the disciplines of theology and textual criticism. If they did they would realise that religious thinkers are meticulous in their scrutiny of discipline, argument and theory and are not in the least inclined to live in the world of fantasy. They are at the very least trying to recognise that the world is complex and profound, it is spiritual as well as material.

In a world where universal tolerance is a declared value, it seems the atheists' dogma (and I use that term advisedly) is that we should tolerate everything except religion. Doesn't seem particularly rational to me

Very sad

The very sad case of Michael Gugliemucci, pastor of a leading Pentecostal Church, pretending to have cancer and reaping a degree of financial reward from that begs all sorts of questions.
Not the least of which is the venom that is spewed out by correspondents to the local rag. Today, for example , all letters are very anti-Christian and anti-religion. They are, of course also pretty shallow.
But it needs to be observed that in a pluralist society the wholesale ridiculing of people's sincerely held religious beliefs is to be deplored. The sad failure of one person does not give others the right to make blanket accusations about other Christians which are shallow and untrue.
Comments such as "self deception.. is the core business of all religions"and "religion is superstition" are wild and open to question.
More than that they are insulting to those whose religious commitment is genuine, sincere and good. And whose works are charitable, generous and kind.
I think there are all sorts of serious questions about this case that need to be asked. By and large they are not being addressed. The serious questions are being ignored (in my opinion) in favour of sensationalism...but why should we be surprised by that
One of the questions is why a young man who was obviously very seriously disturbed from the age of 12 onwards (all admitted in the press) allowed to exercise such power and control any way.

What gives you the right?

I don't know why people think they have the right to dismiss people on grounds of sexuality.
A perfectly normal conversation with a person about a pastoral situation...they then said "Oh I don't really like that N, you know the gay one!" and then flopped their wrist as if that some how clinched the argument "He's a bit emotional!"
The fact that his father had just died seemed to have escaped the commenators limited critical faculties, the fact that his (perfectly heterosexual) brother had also been crying remained unnoticed.
I mean if the comments had gone
"Oh I don't really like that N, you know the black one"...then the prejudice would not have gone unnoticed...or if it had been a comment made about a woman or a Jew, or a handicapped person, or a tall person.
Am I just getting too sensitive about gay issues?

In the midst of life we seek death

Have we been seduced into a phoney discussion about the death penalty in Australia in  this pre-election insanity?

I always feared that in a period of chaos or unclear decision making, where leaders are more intent on getting re-elected than leading, that we would get some opportunist who would lead us back to the unthinkable position of reintroducing the death penalty.

So here are ten early-morning reasons why the death penalty is wrong

1. What if you get the wrong person?  This is the most obvious and yet most easily overlooked reason. But the stories about this are legendary. Our legal system is not based on certainty it is based on probablility...beyond reasonable doubt. It may be OK in some people's mind to send people to jail when you are 90% sure of their guilt, and accept the risk that in one out of ten cases you may be wrong, at least the innocent can be set free. The dead cannot be brought back to life.
2. It diminishes the State Most of us understand that the State should try to be exemplary, it should respond to our aspirations rather than our fear or anger. This is a difficult enough path to tread at the best of times. We do know that we should be careful and respectful of human life. The State should be at the forefront of that particular aspiration, not the principal player in reaking vengeance. I think that if we look at States that have the death penalty, the US, China...we see that these great nations are not improved but that they are diminished by such poverty of policy.
3. It is playing God.  This is not a particularly religious argument. It is about deciding that in our society that the chief safeguard on human life is the presumption that no one person or institution will act to take away the life of another. Even in the face of guilt, we say that the sanctity of life is such that we do not validate another person's guilt, or the general poor application of the law by doing what that person has done (taking a life). We remove from individuals the presumption that this decision can be made without reference to higher moral authority, and with the inability to be able to certainly discern that with any absolute certainty...ie we do not know that we have the right to do this,  we don't do it. Wherever you get your moral authority from (we call it 'God' in this example) this argument is still cogent
4. It is a poor and selective reading of the Bible. This again may not be particularly religious. It is about the sort of narrow reading of authoritative sources to only back up our case. So we will tire of hearing "An eye for an eye", as Ghandi is oft (mis)quoted as saying "An eye for eye leads to a world of blind people".  The truth is that the appeal to these sorts of external authorities like the Bible is so often the desire to paint in black and white what is clearly in all shades of grey. We could equally well cite "vengeance is mine says the Lord, I  will repay" or "I desire  mercy not sacrifice". Let alone as we begin to unfold that we are not a Judaeo society alone, but that a Judaeo-Christian society is not stuck in the brutal land of the "lex talionis" but is one which seeks 'a more excellent way'. This begs the question that, in Australia at least, there are a myriad of other cultural, religious and moral influences that need to be weighed
5. It confuses the notion of what sentencing and punishment is about Again it is easy to think that we sentence people to punsh them for their crimes, but in a civilised society we also seek to rehabilitate. It is a civilised thing to do to work with those who have wronged even when we are angered by their guilt, and offended by their crimes (indeed particularly when this is so) to seek their rehabilitation. It is a big and presumptuous call to say that anyone is beyond rehabilitation. To often the temptation to do this is this simplistic response to see this as black and white. 
6. It is an expensive option Necessarily the death penalty must be subject to the highest level of appeal. The American system shows that this can be lengthy and expensive.
7. It may actually exacerbate the problem of terrorism rather than ease it For the life of me I cannot see how martyrs are actually deterred by the death penalty
8. It is socially and racially abusive and prejudicial Given the undeniable reality that aboriginal and poor people are over-represented in our prison systems, we must begin with the assumption that these people will also be more in danger of the death penalty than others. It is not that these people are more guilty (a ludicrously simplistic solution) but that there are other social reasons which need to be addressed. To throw the death penalty into this complex mix is to further compound the idea of injustice.
9. It is brutal, not civilised Not all will agree but in a world where Western Judaeo-Christian society so often takes the moral high ground, at some point we must acknowledge that the taking of life is a brutish act. Even if we allow another to deliver the injection, or pull the lever or fire the shot; we are promoting lack of compassion rather than mercy. Indignation, however righteous or not, does not justify such brutishness
10. It simply is not logical. In the end taking another person's life will do nothing. Nothing! to bring back a dead person. It will not ease the pain. It will not make any grieving person feel better. It may actually make matters worse

Death wish

What is most disturbing about the PM's reported comments that 'broadcaster' Alan Jones would never voice prejudice, is the sense of "death wish" about it.
Howards comments are all the more extraordinary in the face of a finding of The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) that Jones had promoted violence by encouraging a biker gang to go to Cronulla and deal with "Lebanese thugs" and "scum" as a prelude to the Cronulla riots.
The PM says that Jones says what a lot of Australians think, and offeres this as a justification. It is no doubt true. But hardly a justification in a temperate society.
Aah, I forgot, we put the language of temperance aside as we tend towards the infinity of an election.
So, maybe it is not Johnnie's death wish we are witnessing but my own.
I think I am saying what a lot of people are thinking.!