‘Why We Still Love the Windsors

‘Why We Still Love the Windsors' by Jane Connors in the Weekend Australian 21-22 is a sad lament by a Republican who appears to know our Australian Monarchy is not going to collapse soon, and even recognises the inevitable succession of the Prince of Wales, but still keeps this endlessly failing initiative alive, to divide our nation and prevent the rest of us from fully enjoying our Monarchy.

She quotes Miles Franklin, an expatriate like Germaine Greer who pops back here from living elsewhere to tell us how we should be.  She is ‘confounded and annoyed’ like the ‘radicals of the 1890s’ who ‘did not consider it possible to sensibly reconcile the independent spirit driving Australian Federation with the fawning servility of the colonial past.’

So, if as M Connors says, the Australian Crown endures despite everything, why can she not just accept it and learn to live with it and enjoy it.  She suggests the reasons are patriotism, race and our distances, and adds the ‘images endlessly reproduced’ that enforce ‘the appeal of pageantry, celebrity, glamour and fun’. 

While she mentions ‘continuity’ she totally ignores the principle reasons for retaining the Crown: Constitutional stabililty and not risking something that works, and ensuring that Absolute Power, represented by the ghostly ‘reserve powers’ can never ‘corrupt absolutely, or removing checks and balances from the already powerful politicians.

 In true Republican fashion, the on-line version that is the link above has the headline:  'Why Australia still loves the British royal family' because they choke on calling Her Majesty our Australian Queen.

Peace in Jerusalem

Peace in Jerusalem is possible with a few adjustments in ideas.  Perception is everything.

By whatever name, there must be some form of Palestinian autonomy.  The present disputes are between limited, extreme forms of power devolvement, or are ways of denying any such autonomy or making it total and absolute with Israel’s destruction.   Centrist positions based on a peaceful co-existence are rarely considered.   We must not be satisfied with a compromise that binds everyone into an unsatisfactory stale-mate indefinitely.  Political autonomy can belong to a sub-set of a society without needing territorial divisions.  Palestinian autonomy could be developed as Palestinian Statehood within a Greater Israel – a State within a State.  

Remaining un-divided, Jerusalem can also act as the Palestinian Capital, because it will be a shared capital, not a split city.  There are advantages of shared embassies and Israel is in control of security.  But it will take good will. The only way to achieve real Peace in Jerusalem is for the mutual denial of each other’s declaration of Divine Unity to end.  There must be genuine mutual religious acknowledgement.  It is time that Jewish Rabbis accepted that the Prophet of Islam pbuh is a true Prophet to the Gentiles while not a Jewish Prophet.  Islam is equivalent to Judaism, as for example, in the way that Halal and Kosher are one system within another.  

Our two religions should be in harmony with each other.  It could start anywhere.  It would be most excellent if a Yeshiva joined up with a college for the training of Imams, and in doing so the two religions would work together to find the deep similarity between them.  There is no end to the level of co-operation that might be achieved in centuries to come, once the process has begun.  It is possible to imagine Judea as a Theocracy, where everyone complies with Jewish Law or Sharia Law depending on their faith, and the two co-exist like fraternal siblings who love each other.  

Even though Judaism is much older, in a way Islam is more universal, so it is possible to see Judaism as another strand within Islam like Sunni and Shia; while they dispute the lineage of the Caliphate after the Prophet pbuh, Jews deny there was any such lineage at all, which is quite different from denying the Prophet phuh.  

If Jerusalem were to become a Palestinian Capital, it would be logical to extend that to any re-established Caliphate, which is a consideration that might frighten people more than a mere Palestinian State with its own little Capital within a walled ghetto of a split city.  It frightens me, I am stopping thinking of this now.

Angry White Male

I am an “angry white male”.  For those who don’t know, Senator Leyonhjelm has complained to the Human Rights Commission about Fairfax Media calling him something that did not actually offend him, but under Section 18C some other people could be offended.  The Senator’s proposal is to illustrate the absurd extremes that this legislation could be taken to arguing that therefore it should be repealed totally, even though in all legitimate cases people are genuinely offended by untrue and horrific accusations.  

In Philosophy, a single counter-example will disprove a proposition, and a chain is only as strong as its weakest link, but these are examples where something fails in total if it has a single discrepancy.  However the worth of legislation such as 18C that prevents genuine suffering to people from gratuitous insults does not cease to have value for them because it can be also be used in a frivolous way when the insult is mild and truthful for the sole purpose of providing a supposed ‘counter example’ to invalidate the principle on which the legislation is based.

The Australian newspape has taken up the cudgels, saying, ‘Angry white male case ‘ludicrous’ and promoting their claim that the holy democratic right of ‘free speech’ must be kept untarnished by any compromise, including banning the right to offend. 

 It is naïve to think that racism is not a privately held belief of many if not a majority of Australians.  It rarely surfaces publicly, and when it does the only apology is for being caught.  The oldest and most enduring form of racism is anti-Semitism, which is even espoused in Parliament by Greens who pretend that singling Israel out of all the world’s countries for endless criticism and oppression and endorsing the Islamist terrorists of Hamas somehow has nothing to do with anything Jewish.

The free speech that might be restored with the repeal of 18C would save journalists like Andrew Bolt who make ignorant and insulting generalisations about Aboriginal people or other groups they disparage from being brought to account.  Once again, the Criminal Justice System poorly delivers beneficial social solution, and typically fails to re-educate them and further polarises them and stiffens their socially un-acceptable, private opinions by meeting out a Legal penalty that they believe is not deserved and only results from unwanted legislation.  

Stand-Up Comedians, late night television hosts and ABC journalists would be no less hampered in genuine social criticism that leads people to a greater understanding of the feelings of others.  Their extreme ridicule would continue to be tolerated because it was done in context as it generally is now to an appropriate audience.  However, the people who would benefit are those whose sole aim is to insult and hurt people, often crudely in the most in-appropriate circumstances.  Such people are currently kept within like-minded, closed social groups, that regrettably still survive.  Perhaps without 18C, more people would speak out publicly so that they can be identified and re-educated.  Most Racism springs from ignorance and superstition.

Punishing people for having wrong ideas is counterproductive, but we still need legislation to stop the people, though breaches should lead to changes, not an eye for an eye.