Keywords: South Africa
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ARTS AND CULTURE
- Tim Kroenert
- 15 August 2013
2 Comments
As social commentary Elysium clearly has in mind any country that receives 'unwanted' arrivals of refugees. But it seems particularly timely in Australia, where the political response to asylum seekers who arrive by boat is simply to stop them. The response by the fictional bureaucrat Delacourt, to blow the smugglers' ships out of the air before they reach Elysium, certainly takes the 'stop the boats' mentality to its extreme.
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AUSTRALIA
- Frank Brennan
- 13 August 2013
1 Comment
'Like many Australians, I had hoped that the dastardly plan announced on 19 July would stop the boats in the short term, as a stop-gap measure. It is dismaying to learn that appropriate consultations had not occurred with Indonesia with the result that the very people who were to receive the shock and awe message are yet to receive it. There’s only one thing worse than shock and awe; that’s shock and awe that doesn’t work because you haven’t done your homework.' 43rd Barry Marshall Memorial Lecture, Trinity College Theological School, 14 August 2013.
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AUSTRALIA
The PNG solution includes permanent exclusion from Australia in a small, poor and violent country already unable to accommodate the refugees from West Papua whom it hosts. Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus claims it complies with international law. A quick glance at the much put-upon Refugee Convention suggests this is may be a rather optimistic assessment.
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AUSTRALIA
- Duncan MacLaren
- 16 April 2013
9 Comments
We seem to think it is okay to publish pictures of Kim Jong-un with Mickey Mouse ears or refer to his late father Kim Jong-il as a 'pygmy'. Insulting a proud people, no matter how weird we think the regime is, does not win friends. The west would do well to remember this if it is to engage the regime in meaningful dialogue.
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ENVIRONMENT
- Justin Glyn
- 12 February 2013
15 Comments
While mining is a source of great wealth for Australia, its socio-ecological benefits are mixed. Yet the sheer power of the industry means a balanced conversation on these issues is yet to start. Both major parties are beholden to the industry and fear the advertising power its money can buy. Two examples demonstrate the problem.
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AUSTRALIA
- Catherine Marshall
- 17 December 2012
13 Comments
Our gun was not some inanimate piece of metal; it was an object designed with malignant intent, one swiftly transformed into an instrument of violence. The day we handed it in was one of the happiest of my life. It takes a mature society to handle weapons responsibly, and a truly liberated one to relinquish them altogether.
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INTERNATIONAL
- Duncan MacLaren
- 27 November 2012
3 Comments
To say, as Aung San Suu Kyi did, that both the Muslim Rohingya and the Buddhist Arakanese had breached human rights laws in the current conflict is akin to saying that whites as well as blacks violated human rights in apartheid South Africa. The Australian Government, in its treatment of asylum seekers, has lost the moral legitimacy to speak up for oppressed groups such as the Rohingya.
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RELIGION
- Frank Brennan
- 29 October 2012
'Though land rights and self-determination provide no utopia for the contemporary indigenous Australian community, they have belatedly put right an ancient wrong. The cost and inconvenience are unavoidable. Terra nullius is no longer an option.' Full text is from Fr Frank Brennan's keynote speech at the Central Queensland Law Association Conference, Mercure Capricorn Resort, Yeppoon, 27 October 2012.
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