By Bert Hetebry

Cultures evolve, the lives we live today are different than the lives we used to live, very little remains of what used to be, but some people wish for the good old days, when we knew what was what… except of course that is illusionary.

So what is culture?

A quick Google search comes up with this definition from the Oxford Dictionary:

Culture is not fixed, but constantly changes, evolves, as communities and society change, evolve.

Last weekend Sydney hosted the Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras which started as a small group of protestors formed to contribute to the international gay celebrations in 1978. The protests continued and more and more people were arrested but by April 1979 the NSW parliament repealed the legislation which allowed the arrests. About 3,000 people marched in an incident free parade in 1979, the first officially sanctioned Mardi Gras.

In 1972 a gay academic, George Duncan was murdered, the crime was thought to have been committed by undercover police but sparked calls for reform leading to a 1975 Act in the Federal Parliament making homosexual acts between consenting adults legal.

It took more than a decade, but eventually all states followed the Federal lead.

Interestingly, the crime homosexual men were charged with was ‘buggery’. There was no law to prohibit lesbians engaging in consensual sex.

Forty-two years later a plebiscite was held which overwhelmingly determined than gay and lesbian couples could legally marry, affording those couples the legal security that marriage affords.

The gossip pages of the 1960s and into the 70s included the law courts reports in the daily newspapers. Divorces were subjected to open court hearings where a ‘matrimonial offence’ needed to be proved for a divorce to be granted. Matrimonial offences included domestic violence and adultery, so the salacious details of martial shenanigans were headlined in the daily press.

Australia was not the only jurisdiction to have a ‘fault’ based divorce system, it was common throughout the world. The Irish actor Richard Harris was accused of adultery with a named person in 1969. He pleaded innocent to that charge, claiming he had not been adulterous with the named lady, but reputedly offered the court a list, several pages long of people he had engaged with adulterously.

Christian Nationalist in the USA want to return to a fault-based divorce where adultery or domestic violence needs to be proven before a divorce cab be granted.

Literature which featured adultery or other acts of questionable morality were banned up to the 1970s, including Ulysses by James Joyce, Lady Chatterly’s Lover by D H Lawrence and Philip Roth’s Portnoy’s Complaint.

Movies too have been in the censor’s sights since as early as 1912 where the concern was about the effects of such films on female audiences. Included were All Quiet on the Western Front, and films about bush ranging. The Blonde Captive from 1931 was banned being seen as prejudicial to Aboriginal Australians. Many films depicting sexual violence and child sexual abuse continue to be banned, but the creation of an R rating made many previously banned films available since the 1990s.

The music played on radio has for years been subjected to censor oversight. The song ‘Greased Lightening’ had the line ‘it ain’t no shit’ cut from radio airplay, but from the same film the Italian curse ‘fongool’ (tamest translation is Fuck You, a less tame translation refers to an annal version of Fuck You) from Look at me I’m Sandra Dee was somehow not as offensive. Van Morrison’s Brown Eyed Girl was changed from Brown Skinned Girl. Loretta Lynn’s 1975 song The Pill was condemned for daring to discuss birth control. John Lennon’s Imagine was hated by religious groups for daring to imagine there is no heaven, The Stones’ Satisfaction was far too sexual for tender ears to hear, but 40 years after its initial release was OK to perform at the SuperBowl half time show in 2006 to rapturous applause. Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds is a drug anthem isn’t it?, so air play was banned on the BBC.

Abortions in the 1960s were illegal but available, the criminal sanctions which, dependent on the state or territory included life imprisonment. While abortion was common, before 1969:

“Women who had means could attend a skilled abortionist; otherwise they went to someone less skilled or tried to abort themselves.

The alternative was for the single young ladies to be sent away for a few months and return, without the child. A childless couple in our church had adopted a child born illegitimately. In fact the birth certificate was stamped with the designation “ILLEGITIMATE”.  There were special places for such births to occur in, one was a place called NGALA, others were majestic looking buildings set in manicured gardens, monasteries, where the unfortunate young ladies were cared for until the birthing, and sent home, as though nothing had happened, the child taken away to be sent to an adopting couple.

Despite numerous attempts at decriminalising abortion, it was not until 1998 that abortion could be legally performed in Western Australia, the first jurisdiction to allow it, but with restrictions. In September 2023 abortion was fully decriminalised for terminations up to 23 weeks’ gestation and after 23 weeks with the agreement of the patient’s primary practitioner and another practitioner.

Abortion is now legal in all states and territories, but that right was hard fought and as seen in the debate in the West Australian Parliament in 2023, very much a contested right.

Aboriginal recognition and rights, women’s rights including equal pay for equal work are targets to wind back the clock. even as recently demonstrated in the preselection for the replacement candidate in the seat of Cook. In nomination for a safe seat, women are overlooked. A woman needs to work harder to win her seat and work harder to retain it.

Across the spectrum we can define as culture, in my lifetime we have seen many changes, I have listed some, but it seems that there are many seeking political power who would like to wind back the clock a few decades or more. This is particularly apparent in the Liberal Party where far-right candidates are endorsed, candidates who will use their religion, their faith as a political weapon, with an agenda to reverse the freedoms and rights which have been won in my short lifetime.

I do believe that if a candidate is a Christian and sees that their commitment to their faith is to promote their values as policy, they should do so through a distinctly Christian political party. Their alternative, when confronted by legislation which they cannot support because of their faith but is legislation which their electorate supports, is to do what the then Premier of Western Australia did when it came to voting on the 1998 abortion bill which had the numbers to get up, he abstained. He could not in good conscious vote for the bill which was against his religious belief but could not be seen to be opposed to his electorate’s will. In some ways it was a bit of a cop out, but he found himself between a rock and a hard place and chose to absent himself at the time of the vote.

The new government in New Zealand seems to be actively winding back the clock, discriminating against the Maori population on matters of language and health provision and further for the wider population in repealing the laws which outlaw tobacco sales. Other rights will be threatened to in that case promote white supremacy. The acrimony of the Voice debate and subsequent defeat of the referendum indicates that the fear of recognising First Nations peoples and giving them a Constitutionally enshrined voice to Parliament is a bridge too far. Constantly the race card was thrown in that debate, not so much publicly but in private conversations there was repeated reference to their unsuitability to know how to be a good citizen. (I cannot quote the words but will stay on the polite see of criticism.)

The last bill Prime Minister Morrison brought before the house before the last election was a religious discrimination bill to protect Christians from discrimination where there is no religious discrimination except that which is perceived by the self-righteous, to allow them the right to vilify those who do not uphold the standards they find hard to uphold.

A recent discussion regarding the fear of sharing the female toilet with a trans person was interesting. The complainant was very vocal until asked how many trans people she knew. The number was none, so the fear was totally concocted, made up. as so many of the fears that are promoted to wind the clock back.

Culture evolves, it changes over time, but that change can go forward or backward, no gains made can be considered permanent, we need to be constantly vigilant to ensure that the rights we have in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights are not threatened. These include civil and political rights, the right to life, liberty, free speech and privacy. It also includes economic, social and cultural rights. In other words, to be who we are, to believe what we believe, to not be vilified for who we may be, but to not vilify those we disagree with. The rights and freedoms we have, need to be the rights and freedoms we accord to others.

By Bert Hetebry  

A term I had not come across before but can cover a multitude of sins: Cognitive Bias.

Reading an article in the Guardian this morning, there was a report on an inquest into the death of a man who had died from perforated stomach ulcers a day after being sent home from a hospital visit. The reason a man died from perforated stomach ulcers was because he was misdiagnosed with cannaboid hyperemesis syndrome, in other words, he was thought to be high as a kite from smoking some quality hash. He was an Aboriginal man, and the doctor, explaining his misdiagnosis based his diagnosis on the first impression he had formed because “There is a lot of marijuana use in the community. It’s just pattern recognition.”

The seemingly never ending saga of the killing of young Aboriginal man, Kumanjayi Walker, now with the inquest into his death in its eighteenth month, probing yet again the cultural issues which led to the death of this troubled young man, shot by a police officer who was acquitted of murdering him, who now fronts the coronial inquest questioning the inherent racism which appeared to have been part of the police culture in Alice Springs at the time of the shooting. Some of the text messages presented to the court indicate that Aboriginal people were not respected by the police, racist slurs and crude descriptions were normal discourse it seemed, reducing First Nations people to be seen as less than human. A perception which then normalises physically violent and verbally abusive behaviour.

The incarceration rate of First Nations people is outrageous. At 30 June, 2023 Aboriginal and Torres Strait islander prisoners accounted for 33% of all prisoners throughout Australia but are less than 4% of the population. Does that mean that First Nations people are more criminal than the immigrants who have taken their land?

I cannot remember where I was when I heard this, I think I was in the car on my way to work several years ago, but the former Premier of Western Australia mentioned that when comparing traffic infringements, those detected remotely through speed cameras, First Nations drivers were less likely to be caught speeding on the various cameras spread throughout the road network, but were far more likely to be charged for some offence or other through a traffic stop. I mentioned this at the time to a young Aboriginal work mate who told me that when he removed the Aboriginal flag from his car he was not pulled over for a random breath test or a licence check just for being on the road as happened frequently when the flag was on display. Each time the car was checked over. tyres, lights, seat belts, everything was checked and too often some small thing was found which resulted in a fine and a compulsory vehicle check.

Police presence in areas with a high Aboriginal population is more visible than in the quiet parts of suburbia, leading to a sense of intimidation, that there is a constant surveillance that is not evident in other parts of the suburbs.

First Nations people are as a group, the most disadvantaged in Australia. A lack of opportunity for employment, too much time and not enough money entrench a sense of ‘not good enough’, and the depression which flows from that sense of worthlessness, a sense of helplessness and hopelessness.

Drug and alcohol abuse are endemic in such environments, not just within First Nations communities, but in all places where the ‘Shit Life Syndrome’ is evident. (The term was coined to describe post-industrial communities in Britain where the good, well-paying jobs had gone and the people who remained were left in a post-industrial wasteland with few job prospects and very little money besides government relief payments.)

None of this is new, in fact it has been going on for over 236 years. Cognitive Bias toward Aboriginal people has been the defining attitude, a looking down the nose at those who are deemed to be lesser beings than the immigrants who have taken over the land. And last year we missed an opportunity to correct some of the misconceptions that have so marked our attitude and behaviour toward Aboriginals. It seems that ‘we have all the answers… but they just don’t get it’.

Time after time, study after study, the answers are the same, build more jails, heavier policing, ban alcohol, take the kids away from dysfunctional communities, one suggestion was to ‘just stop them from breeding’.

But it seems that those who know it all are not really good at listening. At understanding the anger which intergenerational grief and dispossession has allowed to fester as another set of edicts is thrown down to settle the lawlessness of kids running riot and men inflicting violence against women in alcohol fueled rages, just bring in more police, heavily armed with tasers and guns to take care of it.

But can we find hope in this apparent hopelessness?

It seems that there are some optimistic voices, if those at the top of the tree will come down and really listen, engage in active listening, as Judy Atkinson outlined in a TED talk in 2017, ‘The value of deep listening – The Aboriginal gift to the nation.’

“There is an anger across this nation that we choose not to acknowledge.

It is an anger fuelled by racism, prejudice, discrimination and poverty. A distressed discontent that is growing, not just here but around the world. But under anger is always grief…

There is a truth in this country we must confront as we move into maturity. The grief of separation and loss, of shame, of pain, deep and unresolved. A woundedness that is much more more than the commemoration of the Anzacs and much more than the celebration partying and boozing that we have on Australia Day. This country is more than that. It has to be. It holds the trauma of many people across many generations. The Indigenous. The invaders. The immigrants. All seeking refuge from pained disorder that we humans are so good at creating in this world.

“It is time we started the work of deep listening. We, all together, the ‘I’s coming to ‘we’. Working with each other for transformation. Listening. Listening deeply to one another in contemplative reciprocal relationships, a mindfulness to the multiple stories in the lands we call home… Miriam-Rose (Ungunmerr-Baumann) said ‘Dadirri is the Aboriginal gift to this nation, a gift that we all have been waiting for. it is the gift of listening.’

“If you accept this gift, as a nation we can all grow together.”

(Julianne Shultz. The Idea of Australia Page 89.)

Gaza. Palestinians. Israel. Genocide. Taylor Swift? This odd cobbling of words is the extent celebrities make a mockery of serious conversation, even in such middle-brow outlets as Australia’s Radio National. Admittedly, it was breakfast, and the presenter a seasoned impressionist of journalism, but surely listeners did not have to know that Swift’s private jet had just arrived in Melbourne, making it an occasion of national significance?

Ground had already been tilled, and seeds scattered, by desperate academics keen to draw gold dust from the Swift worship machine at Melbourne’s Swiftposium 2024. Seriousness was not the order of the day and papers such as “Taylor Swift and the Nuremberg Effect on Teenage Girls” were never going to feature on any panels. Instead, it was an event to give academic circuitry – and sophistry – its deservedly bad name. “We thought we’d be having a small conference with 50 researchers in two rooms in our Faculty,” remarked Eloise Faichney, chair of the Swiftposium Steering Committee. “Then, when we ended up in publications like Rolling Stone and The Guardian, demand from the academic community to take part was like nothing I’ve ever seen before for an academic conference.” Faichney evidently knows little about the bandwagon effect of the academic scavenger, always engaged in a futile quest to find false novelty among the same bones of an argument.

And they were not the only ones. Members of the fourth estate, and many offshoots of that once revered profession, have fallen for the Swiftian rhetoric, be it in terms of the harmony effect or economic stimulus. Forget monetary or fiscal policy; get Swift to do a tour and she will add tens of millions of dollars to the country’s cash registers. Take, for instance, the following, near shameful selection of predicted returns, which the Australian historian, Humphrey McQueen, valuably gathers for us: the Australian Financial Review, A$140 million; the Daily Telegraph, A$130 million to New South Wales; the Herald-Sun, a staggering, fanciful A$1.2 billion for the state of Victoria alone.

A less noted fact is that the Swift phenomenon is costly, inflationary and exploitative. As The Daily Telegraph reported in January, airlines such as Virgin, Qantas and Jetstar were all cashing in on spiked prices, hoping to squeeze every little bit of cash from passengers, Swifties or otherwise. A one-way flight from Brisbane to Sydney with Jetstar would cost anywhere between A$399 to A$460 on the planned Sydney tour date on February 23, as compared to A$92 to A$123 the week prior. Hotels were hardly going to miss out either on the lucrative bonanza: the Marriott Sydney Harbour’s prices, for instance, rising from the pre-Swift level of $A589 to an unforgivable $A1039.

All of this served as the teaser for Swift’s mid-February arrival. Bulletins, even of such self-professed, serious news hounds as those at the twenty-four-hour ABC network, would furnish updates on the songstress’s movements. Every banal detail became significant, the fans worthy of top billing as interviewees.

Political maturity and cultivated disinterestedness also went out the window, expelled with glee. Here was a chance to get close to the phenomenon and cultivate voters – current and future – and Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was not going to miss out. In an interview with Hit WA FM, he professed his delight and anticipation in attending one of Swift’s shows. “I am going to Tay Tay,” he sighed. In cringingly shallow fashion and for pure effect, he even suggested that opposition leader Peter Dutton might have a preference for the Canadian rock band Nickelback, a truly wicked contrast. “Or, the angry death metal stuff.” 

Newspapers such as The Guardian Australia even urged the PM to get with the Swift program, as her “ubiquity in a fragmented world might carry some broader lessons for a man with a more modest megaphone at his disposal.” She offers, for instance, lessons in collaboration. She had “used her fame to build a network of grassroots support that has its own power, energy and agency.” And, in case you were not listening, Mr Albanese, she offered a “sense of shared joy” instead of privileging conflict.

On the other side of this gushing sludge, the Swift phenomenon manifests as a brooding presence for reactionaries worried that her influence is clandestine and planned by a politburo central committee. Or, perhaps, the Pentagon. Steady yourself, warn the likes of Jesse Watters of Fox: he has evidence that “the Pentagon psychological-operations unit floated turning Taylor Swift into an asset.” In some GOP circles, the singer is a deeply embedded psyop with collusion from the NFL. The lunacy comes full circle and Swift is very happy to tease it, telling The Washington Post in 2022 that she, and her legion of fans, have “descended into color coding, numerology, word searches, elaborate hints, and Easter eggs.” Threatening stuff.

This Styrofoam performer, this master of magisterial vacuity, who is all machine, promotion and blare, has perfected the insubstantial, promoted a competent formula and boosted it. In some ways, she has the hallmarks of Tony Blair and the New Labour experiment: start solidly, proclaim a genre, an ideology – then subvert it, discarding most of it on the way. Sincerity evaporates in the heat of its confection. Her success lies in her ability – and that of the Swift dissemination army – to mobilise the image of Swift. Everything else is just costumery, flying private jets, victimising people who monitor her flight paths, and being given stock market advice by Daddy.

By Bert Hetebry  

A group of South Asian men arrived on our doorstep seeking shelter, seeking a place to be made welcome, seeking safety and security. We don’t know why they left their homelands, but they undertook a dangerous journey, finding their way from Bangladesh, Pakistan and India to Indonesia to board small, overcrowded boats and sail across to the northwest of Western Australia.

We don’t know what drove those men to leave their homelands, but to leave is never easy, the decisions usually are to escape one sort of tyranny or another, whether it be religious persecution or some other form of intolerance which is life threatening, racial difference, sexual orientation, or the consequences of natural disasters, but whatever the reason, they now find themselves on Nauru effectively imprisoned for an indeterminate period of time while various checks are made to determine who they are and whether their claim to seek asylum is legitimate, but are promised that they will never be settled in Australia.

They join a multitude of other stateless people, adrift in the uncertainty of having no home to go back to and no place for them to go to. According to the documentary film Human Flow made in 2017 by the Chinese artist and activist Ai WeiWei, about 68million people in search of a home, somewhere, anywhere as they have fled wars, famine, persecution and a life that the only certainty appeared to be death either through starvation or violence or imprisonment for daring to speak out on political differences. According to UNHCR that number has grown to over 110 million in 2023. That is about 1.375% of the world’s population are displaced for any number of reasons. (To make that number seem more real, that is more than 13 people out of every thousand, worldwide.)

Included in that number are internally displaced people who are not defined as refugees but have fled their homelands because of desertification due to climate change, flooding of regions to build dams to gain water security, rising sea levels or other environmental issues which have made the homelands uninhabitable.

These people, seeking somewhere to live are not criminal, they are not illegal, terms which seem to be flung around when defining refugees or asylum seekers, whether they arrive here by plane or boat. Many, according to the Australian Red Cross arrive here with a valid visa, as visitors, and then make claims for asylum. Neither is it illegal to enter a foreign country without visa, passport or other papers when seeking asylum. So the treatment of asylum seekers in Australia, effectively as criminals is not in accordance with the UN Declaration of Human Rights, to which we as a nation are signatories to. Article 14 affords the right to asylum in other countries from persecution.

We have politicised and effectively criminalised those who are some of the most desperate and disadvantaged people in the world and deny them the basic human rights as defined by that declaration which we are obliged to uphold.

And yes, we do have the right, in fact the obligation to confirm that the asylum seeker has a legitimate claim to asylum, and we can restrict their movements during the period of validating that claim. The wording of Article 14 stipulates that the right to seek and enjoy other countries asylum from persecution “may be invoked in the case of prosecutions genuinely arising from non-political crimes or acts contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.” That does acknowledge that not all claims are legitimate and that at times criminals do try to get in ‘through the back door’, but the safeguards are there to ensure that those who are not legitimate refugees can be sanctioned, deported, returned to face justice from the place they have fled.

Listening to the political debate on refugees and asylum seekers, one could be forgiven for thinking that we have a severe problem.

We don’t.

The nations hosting the most refugees are Iran, Turkey, Germany, Pakistan, Uganda, Russian Federation, Poland, Bangladesh, Sudan, Ethiopia, Lebanon… and Australia does not even appear on that listing from stastista.com. Iran according to UNHCR for over 40 years has been host “to the largest and most protracted urban refugees in the world and has provided asylum to refugees for over four decades.” Iran currently hosts over 3.4million refugees and asylum seekers. The small nation of Lebanon, almost half a million refugees, many dating back to the 1948 ethnic cleansing of Palestine/Israel.

Why are we afraid of showing some humanity? Fear of these strange, desperate people drives the political argument, but when I look at our history as a nation, we are an immigrant nation. Starting 236 years ago were undesirables from Britain, prisoners and their guards, followed by wave after wave of settlers and more convicts, after both world wars more immigrants seeking a new life away from wore torn Europe settled here, developing this nation to be at that time an essentially European nation but that changed in the 1970s when we welcomed people from all over the globe. After the Vietnam war we welcomed more boat people, Vietnamese escaping from the re-education camps of the winners of that conflict or the repression of those who had sided with the losing side, and with each successive wave of immigrants we saw new economies flourish, rather than being a burden on this country, these immigrants all have made great contributions to Australia, cultural diversity, new businesses, each wave adding to the economic and cultural development of Australia.

The reality is that each of us who does not claim First Nations status is an immigrant or can trace their ancestry to another country at the most ten generations ago, each of us have either arrived  as immigrants, leaving our birth countries, or our parents, grandparents or great grand parents did, for reasons not dissimilar to those who arrive here, whether through the airport carrying a visitor’s visa or through unofficial channels, arriving by boat at great risk to escape whatever the threats and dangers of their homelands.

Diane Armstrong in her book The Voyage of Their Life, records the lives of over five hundred people who arrived in Australia in 1948 on a poorly prepared, dangerously inadequate ship, the SS Derna, and interviewed many of them fifty years later, recording the lives they have created in their new country, many are success stories, business people who have made significant economic contributions, others in the social and political spheres, from people who settled in all parts of Australia, from Western Australia to Far North Queensland, in other words like any other immigrant, arriving, seeking a better life for themselves and the families they formed.

Why do we continue to look to newcomers with such fear, instead of going through the validation of their claims for asylum as refugees and welcoming them so they too can start a new life and contribute as so many have before them.

By Bert Hetebry  

How sad to see the image of Barnaby Joyce on the pavement, cursing at himself as he talks to his wife on the phone.

Dear Barnaby is not the first politician to find himself in an embarrassing situation after having enjoyed one or two too many drinks, in fact the list is long of politicians who seem not to be in full control while enjoying the company of a few drinking buddies, or perhaps leaning lonely on a bar after every one else has retired for the night. In fact, the list is a long one including Prime Ministers and dating back to the very first Federal Parliament and the first Prime Minister, Edmund Barton.

Adam Brereton wrote in The Guardian of 29 December 2015 of Jamie Briggs who resigned from the Turnbull ministry over “an error of professional judgement” in a Hong Kong bar.

Listed in the article are former Prime Ministers Malcolm Fraser, discovered wearing a towel instead of trousers and missing a very expensive Rolex watch and a wallet with $600 spare change.

Apparently drugged.

And a memorable story about John Gorton who on boarding a VIP jet in Melbourne to take him to Canberra, fell asleep and was woken by the noise of engines and vomited… apparently airsick but the plane was still on the tarmac.

Who can forget the confession Kevin Rudd made of visiting a strip club in New York but being too drunk to remember the details.

And John Barton, and Tony Abbott… the list goes on.

But drunken shenanigans are not restricted to politicians in Canberra when we look at the sad case of Brittany Higgins on a fateful night drifting from pub to club with a work colleague.

The wheels of power it seems need the lubrication of the odd drink now and again, from kids just out of their teens seconded to helpful roles assisting the parliamentarians to the most senior members within the ranks of government and opposition.

Politics can be a brutal game, where the image and trustworthiness of the politicians are grist for the campaign mill, and yet we see that alcohol and the subsequent lapses of demeanour are all too frequently used to undermine the credibility of politicians. Or as with Christian Porter allegedly behaving inappropriately while drinking with young female staffer. The incident had been photographed by another staffer but fortunately Alan Tudge was on hand to delete the photograph from the phone, so the story goes.

Interestingly, despite the allegations, Malcolm Turnbull considered Porter of enough upright character to appoint him as Attorney General a couple of weeks later.

Simmering in the background had been stories of misogyny, alleged rapes and a group of senior male members who proudly proclaimed themselves to be members of the ‘Big Swinging Dick’ club.

The drinking culture within Parliament House was addressed in a review the workplace environment within Parliament House by Sex Discrimination Commissioner Kate Jenkins in 2021, and while the review focussed very much on workplace bullying, sexual harassment and sexual assault, it was noted that the significance of drinking and a drinking culture were risk factors in the prevalence of the issues addressed in the report.

But alcohol is still available in Parliament House, in the dining room and at very reasonable prices.

It would be difficult to actually ban people who work in Parliament House from drinking, but it surely would be a good idea to limit drinking, ban it completely within Parliament House. Parliamentarians would doubtless say that would be impossible since there are many official functions held which may well include meals with toasts and so forth, so limit the alcohol to those functions but ban alcohol at all other times.

A most noteworthy book on the topic of drunkenness and the inevitable lapses in demeanour is the aptly titled ‘The Psychology of Stupidity’ in which, through various contributors it is pointed out that even the most gifted, talented, intelligent people do stupid things, and to see a drunken politician berating himself while talking on the phone to his wife and admitting that he should not have been drinking because of his prescribed medication is an absolute act of stupidity. The other qualifiers mentioned above, gifted, talented, intelligent, I will leave to the reader’s judgement, but one would be forgiven for thinking that the lessons of previous alcohol fuelled indiscretions appear to have not been well learned, at least by some.

By Bert Hetebry 

In the Bible book of Exodus, chapter 20 gives the people of Israel the Ten Commandments, the sixth says “Thou shalt not kill” and the eighth says “Thou shalt not steal”.

Through the rise of Christendom in Europe these commandments were well known and became part of the legal structure in all European kingdoms and later nation states.

The Ten Commandments also form the basis of laws in Judaism and Islam.

But to whom do the laws apply? Who is protected by those laws?

It is interesting to place them on a timeline of sorts, starting with the story of Moses meeting with God on Mount Sinai shortly after the Israelites had escaped from slavery in Egypt where God inscribed those laws on rock tablets for the people to learn what God’s will was for them.

40 years later, the next generation of Israelites are near the city of Jericho and a command is given that the city be sacked and all living things in it be killed except for Rahab and her family because she had sheltered the spies sent to case the city. The silver and gold and articles of bronze and iron were placed into the treasury.

Reading this account of the destruction of Jericho and reflecting on the acquisition of the ‘New World’ by the European Colonists from the time of Columbus in 1495 or there about, it seems that the law applied only to those considered to be ‘God’s people’.

Early explorers commented how they were experienced hospitality and kindness from the Indigenous peoples they came across, especially those who had not encountered the explorers previously. There is a story from the early days of settlement in Western Australia where an explorer in need of water had befriended a couple of Aboriginal boys, fed them salted meat and tied them down in the evening, setting them loose in the morning so they could be followed as they sought to quench their thirst. The explorers were greeted in a friendly manner, but the boys were abused to satisfy the explorers’ need for water. They were probably more fearful of the strangers after that encounter.

There is the amazing story by Robert Macklin, Castaway, the story of a French cabin boy who is abandoned in 1858 and is taken in by the local Aboriginal people, adopted and initiated into the tribe, and is eventually ‘rescued’ and returned home to France. The story tells of the protocols of living in tribal territories and the punishments for not following those protocols, the respect afforded to territorial rites and customs. The story is set in the Daintree region of Far North Queensland, and the young man’s ‘rescue’ in 1875 was at the time of the colonial land grab which ignored the Indigenous protocols and wrested the land and spiritual connections from the Aboriginal inhabitants.

Much the same in Australia’s early exploration. When the Batavia ran aground at the Abrolhos islands in 1628 several teenaged boys who were involved in the mutiny on that ill-fated journey were put ashore on the main land, and when 200 years later settlers arrived in the Geraldton region it was noted that the were blue eyed, blonde Aboriginals and a rock painting inland near Mullewa depicted a skeleton of a sailing ship swell as more permanent structures that found elsewhere in region, following a European building style, rock walls and beams used for a roof.

As with most Indigenous peoples, strangers were initially greeted in more or less friendly manners but that changed when bullets were fired from guns or the visitors seems to want to stay, taking land. Ironically, the flag raising ceremony at Sydney cove 236 years ago included a worship service thanking God for the safe passage and asking for His blessing on the newly founded settlement. The land was effectively being stolen and the Aboriginal people who resisted were killed, a pattern which was repeated time and again as the settlement expanded… well maybe not with calls for God’s blessing, but murder and land theft were the principle means of acquiring the land, followed soon after by missionaries to preach the gospel of grace to replace the spiritual connections the Indigenous had with the land, the cycle of life, everything coming from Mother Earth and returning to Mother Earth.

Essentially, Aboriginal people were not considered to be God’s People, and so the laws did not apply, killing those who resisted the theft of their land could be killed.

That is a pattern which was repeated throughout the period of colonisation, Indigenous people were not God’s People and could be taken to be enslaved on the sugar plantations of the Caribbean, or displaced in the quest for farmlands rather than the wasteful hunter gatherer means of sourcing sustenance.

Likewise, Alexis de Tocqueville wrote in 1835 of the condition of the American Indians that “By dispersing their families, by obscuring their traditions, by disrupting their chain of memories… European tyrannies made them more unruly and less civilised than they were before.” (Joe Keohane: The Power of Strangers. P60)

The impact of the loss of identity, the arrogance of colonisers not respecting the cultures of Indigenous peoples, the replacement of cultures through removing people from their lands and placing them in missions to learn about a foreign God and to prepare the people for subservient roles in the invading society. In essence, a ‘lesser minds’ situation, where the Indigenous peoples are considered less than the invader, less to the extent that they may be considered sub-human, dumb, not like ‘us’. Or to take them from their lands in chains to be slaves in the new agricultural industries, whether sold as slaves in faraway places or forced labour on what used to be their land.

We cannot turn the clock back, and I am not suggesting that we should, however when we look at the ‘Closing the Gap’ failures we see that the paternalism of ‘in-group favoritism’ is applied, where lip service is paid to the very obvious needs of the Indigenous population but the money and structures used to deal with them are controlled by politicians and bureaucrats, well-intentioned but essentially self-serving and falling short of respecting the real needs and real cultural imperatives which are denied because they are seen as ‘lesser minds’.

It is interesting to note that the problems addressed in the ‘Closing the Gap’ initiative are similar to most colonised peoples, high rates of imprisonment, drug and alcohol abuse, family violence, lower life expectancy and so on, and are linked very closely to the denial of original cultures, the stripping away of language and the spiritual elements which formed so much of Indigenous way of life, whether Australian First Nations people, North American Indians, Inuit people or any other we could name. Their lands were stolen, dissenters were killed, identity disparaged, people dehumanised and missionaries took over the role of educators and culture replacers which without any sense of irony taught the Ten Commandments as the basis for the new laws of the land.

It seems that not a lot has been learned when we view the ongoing crisis in Palestine/Israel, where since the late 19th Century Zionists have sought to colonise, take back the land promised to Abraham by God in the book of Genesis. Since 1948 the explosion of the Palestinian peoples has been an ongoing activity, culminating in what we currently see, the devastation of Gaza and the perpetual dehumanisation of those living on the West Bank, with the rhetoric from the Israeli Prime Minister quoting Biblical calls to destroy the Amalekites (Exodus 17:8-15) for the annihilation of Palestinians. 

It really does seem that the laws, you shall not kill, you shall not steal only apply to those who are ‘God’s People.’

I wish that God would give me an answer to that deep conundrum.

By Loz Lawrey

In late 2021 Afghanistan’s capital Kabul fell to the Taliban. These religious zealots had swept through the country following the withdrawal of American forces from the country.

At the time I, along with other Australian citizens, assisted Afghans whose very existence was threatened by the new regime to complete and lodge applications for humanitarian rescue visas to Australia.

It can be hard for Australians, cocooned as we are in a democratic first world nation where our freedoms and human rights are taken for granted, to fully comprehend the stress, anxiety and fear which rules the lives of minorities living in societies controlled by toxic regimes, particularly religious ones such as that of the Taliban in Afghanistan and the Islamic republican government in Iran.

The very concept of religious extremists holding the levers of government power in any nation is abhorrent to all of us who favour science, critical thinking and reason over blind belief in whatever the high priests of religious dogma dish up.

Blind Freddie knows that government should always be secular and separate from the mythologies and doctrines of religion and belief.

Whilst those who label themselves “people of faith” tend to claim the moral high ground on all issues, there can be no doubt that most religions create deep division in societies around the world.

Once any religious group is allowed to take power and govern any nation there will always be ”non-believers” who will suffer at their hands. Inquisitions would become a constant evil once again.

During the Spanish Inquisition (1478-1834… nearly 400 years!), those who refused to follow and champion the often-absurd dictates of the high priests of Catholicism were labelled “heretics” and hunted down and often tortured and executed.

In theocracies, as in fascist/authoritarian regimes, minorities are often targeted for repression, and ultimately genocide and elimination.

Under Hitler’s Fascist regime in Germany communists, unionists, gypsies and Jews as well as the disabled were “othered” and cast aside, targeted for repression and abuse.

Under the Taliban regime in Afghanistan, women and Afghans of Hazara ethnicity as well as secular non-religious citizens are also demonised and hunted down.

Religion? Let’s face it. Religion ruins the world.

These (usually patriarchal) organisations that claim to offer “salvation” and “redemption” offer nothing more to humanity than fear, corruption, confusion, doubt, hatred, division and warmongering.

The world has witnessed the religious repression of women in Iran, where the “Morality Police” patrol the streets and harass women for not wearing bags on their heads.

One has to wonder: what drives men (and let’s face it, it’s always men) to inflict such suffering upon others?

Globally, we are witnessing thousands of desperate people annually fleeing impossible situations in their countries of birth in search of a better life – all they want is a chance to live, to learn and grow, to work, support their families and raise their children in safety and decency.

All they seek is the normalcy we here in Australia take for granted.

Sadly, so many nations around the world seem unable to meet the basic humanitarian needs of their own citizens.

The few bad apples always ruin things for the many…

And yet, once desperate people respond to their own situations by attempting to relocate to more humane societies, whether by paying “people smugglers” exorbitant prices for a place on overcrowded and often leaky boats or by crossing borders illegally to seek refuge as aliens in neighbouring nations with slightly less repressive governments, they find further demonisation and rejection.

Sometimes I myself, as an Australian who has enjoyed all the benefits of living in the “lucky country”, the “land of the fair go”, find myself cringing in disgust at the attitudes of some of my fellow citizens towards those of different cultural backgrounds and ethnicities. Ewe can be so selfish.

Are we not, in this Lucky Nation, well positioned to assist those in need?

We are world leaders in the establishment and maintenance of multiculturalism, and we continue, daily, to learn more as a people about inclusion and acceptance.

It hasn’t been easy and there remains much fear and bigotry to overcome, but our Australian melting pot of ethnicities and cultures is truly a wonder to behold.

People praise to the so-called “American Experiment” of democracy (which is sadly in great danger of foundering upon the rocks of right wing lies and propaganda) but the Australian Experiment of multiculturalism and inclusion is something to be proud of. It’s still a work in progress, but I believe we’re making headway.

And let’s be clear: desperate people all around the world see hope and opportunity here in our nation and look to us for refuge.

Yet how do we respond?

I write this piece in an attempt to put a human face to the suffering our own Australian government inflicts upon so many of those who approach us asking for our assistance.

In October 2021, within months of the Taliban takeover, I lodged a humanitarian visa application for a young Hazara woman and her family of nine.

I do not wish to endanger her, so I won’t name her, and I won’t disclose her family’s current location. Suffice to say, she is a sportsperson whose promising career ended when the misogynists of the Taliban took over the government of her nation.

To the Taliban she is a threat: a woman of Hazara ethnicity doing well in her chosen occupation. A woman who was set to thrive in the new emerging Afghan state which was destroyed overnight by U.S. President Joe Biden’s clumsy withdrawal of American forces and the subsequent Taliban takeover.

I have great admiration for this young woman because most members of her team are now resident here in Australia.

She had the opportunity to relocate with them but chose instead to remain in Afghanistan to support her family of nine.

Now they have relocated to another country where that must try to subsist as refugees in a society that does not welcome them.

I also lodged an application at the same time for a young Hazara man living in Kabul. His life and future were destroyed by the Taliban’s accession to power.

I shall keep his current location confidential as well.

He also lives in hiding as an illegal refugee in a nation which does not want him and whose authorities would repatriate him if he came to their attention, effectively sentencing him to likely death at Taliban hands.

Prior to fleeing his country of birth he was twice detained and tortured by Taliban members in Kabul. Other members of his family had been previously murdered in the regions during the Taliban’s march on Kabul in August 2021.

His crime? Simply being of Hazara ethnicity, being a 27-year-old non-religious graduate of Kabul University, holding progressive non-Islamist views, with a track record of championing women’s rights and the importance of voting and actively participating in democracy.

This young man, whom I have come to know quite well, would make a fine Australian citizen. Of this I have no doubt. I know that he already shares our values and humanitarian aspirations.

So, these young people, whose lives are currently on hold due to the circumstances in which they find themselves, waited over a year to learn that their applications had been accepted as valid.

Both were allocated case/file numbers. This meant that their applications were now in the queue for assessment and further action…

But WHEN???

Let’s remember that we are talking about humanitarian rescue visas here… how long should a “rescue” take?

The application form is 34 pages long! It’s labelled “humanitarian” but the process it engenders is totally cruel and inhumane.

Over two years have passed since these visa applications were lodged but under the current Home Affairs regime these desperate people can wait years to learn whether their visa applications have been successful.

The Department refuses all requests for updates and information from applicants. Letters and emails are left unanswered and all those who attempt to contact Home Affairs are effectively showered with contempt.

I do try very hard to maintain my faith in the basic goodness in the heart of our nation…

I must admit though… as a lifelong Labor voter I am disgusted to see our current government treating asylum seekers as cruelly as the previous one.

By Bert Hetebry  

Headlines repeated the line endlessly, the cost-of-living crisis, again, again and again, ad infinitum.

So real action is taken to address the cost-of-living crisis on a number of fronts, but the main measure was to make amendments to the stage 3 tax cuts which were to come into effect on 1 July.

Need we go through it again?

All people who earn money will pay less tax from 1 July 2024.

Easy. Good, fantastic.

Apparently not.

The Australian Industry Group has asked the fair Work Commission to include the effect of the tax cuts when considering the size of the next wage decision.

How grossly unfair that a person struggling to pay rent and buy essentials should not only pay less tax, but should the fair work commission deem that because of the impact on inflation, they should also get a pay increase. HOLY MOLEY!

At the same time those earning around $190,000 per year are still going to pay less tax and get the CPI increases or whatever protection they enjoy in their employment contract, and we are told by the National’s leader, David Littleproud that the tax cuts are nothing less than class warfare.

Try telling someone struggling on the minimum wage that an income of $190.000 a year is not a lot. The minimum wage is $23.23 per hour, $882.80 per week, $45,905.60 a year, less than a quarter of $190,000. According to Mr Littleproud his constituents earning around $180,000 to $190,000 are doing it tough and should get the tax cuts under the original stage 3 legislation. He does fail to point out that they will be getting a slightly reduced tax cut, about four time in dollar terms that of a person on the minimum wage. besides, the lower income earners got tax cuts under stages 1 and 2 of the tax system and should be happy and stop bleating about the rent increases, mortgage increases, price of groceries and the cost of a beer.

Class warfare!

That’s what it is! Nothing but class warfare!

Again we see that politics is being played with empty rhetoric, slogans that imply something good is really something bad.

Oxfam Australia Media Release

In reaction to today’s statement by the International Court of Justice order to South Africa’s court case, which requests Israel to take all measures within its power to prevent and punish the commission of all acts in relation to the articles of the Genocide Convention, Sally Abi-Khalil, Oxfam Regional Director for the Middle East said:

“Oxfam welcomes the ICJ’s order and provisional measures as a crucial step towards recognising the ongoing atrocities in Gaza and stopping the bloodshed and unimaginable horrors that 2.3 million Palestinians have already endured.

“After more than 100 days of indiscriminate bombing in which it has killed more than 25,000 people, sparked a horrific mass displacement of civilians, weaponized starvation and systemically denied them adequate aid, the Israeli government must immediately abide by the court ruling.

“All States – particularly those supporting Israel with military weapons in spite of the clear risk of them being used to commit war crimes – must equally respect the court’s ruling and refrain from any actions that undermine it.

“Palestinians should not have to endure another day of this suffering. We urge all countries to do all in their power to ensure an immediate ceasefire, ensuring those responsible for violations on both sides are held accountable, and to end Israel’s decades-long occupation of Palestinian territory.”

By Bert Hetebry  

Sometimes we are proud to be Australian. We cheer on our cricket teams, we carry high hopes for our tennis players, cheer on the Matildas and their home-grown stars.

But what really defines us as a nation?

We are essentially a nation of immigrants, even those who can trace their lineage to the First Fleet, whether as convict or guard, can only claim about ten generations as Australian. According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, First Nations people represent 3.8% of the population at 30 June, 2021. The rest, 96.2% are either immigrant or descendants of immigrants coming from over 190 different countries.

With the exception of students arriving after 1950 from Asian and Pacific nations, immigration from the time of Federation until 1973 was ‘white’, essentially European. People deemed to be ‘non-white’ were subjected to a language test and in the first 8 years after Federation only 52 people passed the test from 1359 tests, after 1909 no one passed the tests. Immigrants did arrive from number of European countries, but the ideal immigrant was of Anglo-Celtic origin.

After World War II immigration was open to non-British Europeans as many left war-ravaged Europe to settle in the ‘New World’. That Australia was a large land mass with a very small population that was threatened by Japan during the way, the cry was ‘Populate or perish’ and incentives were introduced to attract immigrants, the ten-pound pom, but the ten-pound price for coming here was offered to many more than just the British.

The Whitlam government passed the Racial Discrimination Act in 1973, ending the White Australia Policy and opening the door to all comers, leading to the diversity of ethnicity we have in 21st Century Australia. Today the proportion of Australia’s population born overseas is 29.5% (ABS).

Leaving a homeland is difficult. To leave behind the family and ethnic connections, even though the homeland may have been war ravaged, leaving is not an easy decision, understanding that there may not be a chance to return. And so, the ties to whatever cultural roots that can be brought to the new land are important, sporting clubs to encourage the playing of sports such as soccer, sorry real football, national clubs, a meeting place for fellow expatriates, churches and so forth, vestiges of home to keep cultures alive, albeit as remembered from the time of leaving.

The idea of a nation implies a common cultural identity, yet Australia, as an immigrant nation is culturally one of the most diverse nations on earth, so perhaps that cultural diversity is what draws us together as a nation, perhaps that we claim our citizenship without needing to shrug off the other bits of our identities makes us uniquely Australian. That by and large we accept difference in our midst, we accept that people are of different origins, dress differently, believe differently, that we have Muslims, Sikhs, Hindu, Buddhist, Judaism and all branches of Christianity living largely in peaceful coexistence is in part what makes us who we are, a largely tolerant community where despite our differences we call ourselves Australian.

And yet we see the elements of fear, the differences which divide, especially when faced with new arrivals who try to come in through the back door so to speak, people who are leaving countries where their lives are threatened for whatever reason, be it leaving war torn Syria where cities have been razed to the ground, or Afghanistan where the Taliban is making life difficult for those who do not comply with the orthodoxy which is strictly enforced, or from Somali where warlords fight for control over a country already in the grips of severe drought, worsening the plight of a starving population, and so it goes, these people are not welcome because they do not arrive through the formal channels, probably because they could not access Australian embassy officials to make formal application requiring proof of identity which is buried somewhere in a bombed out city or burned along with the rest of their belongings.

(We are not alone in not wanting to accept refugees. The film Human Tide by Ai WeiWei documents the plight of refugees vividly. At the time the film was made, 2017, there were almost 70 million refugees searching for somewhere safe to live. The problem has got worse since then.)

This Australia Day, as we pull out the flags and thongs we bought last year, and head out to enjoy the fireworks and homegrown Aussie music, we could probably think about our origins, what brought us here, us or our parents or grandparents, or for some, remembering those who came as convicts, banished from Britain because their forebear stole a rabbit from the King’s forest so he could feed his starving family.

Or for some, who look at the immigrants and see what they have lost, and yet are Australians too, remember that despite the best efforts of the immigrants that culture which dates back over 60,000 years survives still, and makes up another chapter in what it means to be Australian.

By Maria Millers  

Once again, it’s that time of the year when public discussion erupts on whether we should hold our day of national celebration on that vexed date: January 26^th or move it to another date.

Australians, above all, love a holiday and more so if it should fall on a Monday or a Friday, giving them that hallowed of all institutions, The Long Weekend. And particularly one in January that stretches that summer holiday vibe even longer.

Undoubtedly, most Australians are looking forward to next weekend, but not necessarily with the fervour that accompanies national celebrations elsewhere. And coming after a spell of winter like weather, the fact that Friday is Australia Day, appears to be of secondary concern to a growing number of people. More likely it is a chance to catch up with all those outstanding chores, to start getting the kids ready for school or to relax on a beach (weather permitting) or watch the tennis or cricket.

And while we are becoming, in a way, less attached to January 26, for many Indigenous Australians this has always been a difficult and traumatic day: Many regard this as Invasion Day, a day of mourning.

Many countries around the world do observe a national day. National days are special events that celebrate national identity and bring its citizens together as a nation, usually around some event of significance in its history. But while the US, for instance on the 4^th July, celebrates its independence from Britain, Australia celebrates the founding of a British penal colony. And a brutal one at that.

Some would agree with Professor Bronwyn Carlson, an expert in indigenous affairs at Macquarie University:

“This day does not reflect a day that is worthy of celebration even for those on board the First Fleet who were either British military or prisoners of the crown.”

For national holidays to be successful there must be agreement among citizens on what we are celebrating and whether the chosen date is the appropriate one. Regrettably, some politicians instead of leading a national debate about an alternative date persist in making comments that don’t necessarily reflect a growing public sentiment.

The unedifying outrage against supermarkets, and Woolworth in particular, by Peter Dutton is almost ludicrous. The fact that they will not be stocking Australia Day themed merchandise must surely mean there is little demand for it and maybe we are just not a flag waving nation, especially a flag made in China. Tellingly, the management at K Mart made the point that even if the date of Australia Day was changed, they would still not be stocking such merchandise.

Moreover, though the concept dates from July 15th, 1915, as a war fund raiser for the Red Cross and was adopted on different days in different states, it was only in 1994 that January 26^th was agreed on. Many Local Councils across the country have shifted citizenship ceremonies to other dates and even more significantly a growing number of employers are honouring workers’ requests to not take a holiday on Australia Day and allowing them an alternate day off.

It seems that the date has evolved and undoubtedly can evolve more. And, moreover, should we not look at other less divisive dates. For instance, the day that the colonies became the Commonwealth of Australia on 1 January 1901 or the sitting of the first Parliament in Melbourne on 9 May 1901. And another date worthy of considering is 13 February 2008, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s Apology to the Stolen Generations for the injustices and mistreatment of the past.

Recent polls have shown an overall decline in those supporting the retention of January 26^th as Australia Day, but most significant is the decline in support among the young.

Today Australia is a very different country, slowly but surely facing up to its geographic reality. Immigration has brought changes to the population and significant and growing numbers of Australians have ancestry from Europe, Asia, The Middle East and other regions.

While Australia has a lot to be proud of it has also avoided facing up to the wrongs of the past. There has been a reluctance to face up to these wrongs in a ‘a conspiracy of silence’ or as anthropologist William Stanner put it: a cult of forgetfulness.

And it’s not just about the treatment and attitudes to our Indigenous First Nation people but also to recent treatment of vulnerable refugees. The often-inhumane treatment of refugees on Manus and other detention centres was brought to our attention by Behrouz Boochani’s harrowing but lyrical account of his years of illegal detention in:

“No Friend but the Mountains: I take a few deep breaths, trying to breathe some dignity back into my spirit” he wrote.

Indigenous poets, in particular, have played a crucial role in expressing the complex emotions surrounding Australia Day. Their poetry often explores themes of identity, cultural resilience, and the impact of colonization on their communities.

For most indigenous Australians the date is a reminder of what led to the destruction of their way of life, their culture and their natural environment. As the late Oodgeroo Nunnacal expressed the losses felt:

We are the shadow-ghosts creeping back as the camp fires burn low.
We are nature and the past, all the old ways
Gone now and scattered.
The scrubs are gone, the hunting and the laughter.
The eagle is gone, the emu and the kangaroo are gone from this place.
The bora ring is gone.
The corroboree is gone.
And we are going.

For many of us Dorothea MacKellar’s patriotic poem, My Country, written out of homesickness while travelling in Europe still resonates, even though many prefer visiting overseas destinations to their own backyard. Mackellar’s poem paints Australia and Australians in an extremely positive light. The verse below is not the usually quoted one but captures the extremities of our climate.

Core of my heart, my country!
Her pitiless blue sky,
When sick at heart, around us,
We see the cattle die
But then the grey clouds gather,
And we can bless again
The drumming of an army,
The steady, soaking rain.

On the other hand, AD Hop in his poem Australia insinuates the spiritual poverty of Australia:

And her five cities, like five teeming sores,
Each drains her: a vast parasite robber-state
Where second hand Europeans pullulate
Timidly on the edge of alien shores.

Indigenous poet Jack Davis writes forcibly about what he believes to be the ‘true’ meaning of what people have done to the country with exploitation of natural resources and indiscriminate land use.

You have turned our land into a desolate place.
We stumble along with a half-white mind.
Where are we?
What are we?
Not a recognized race…
There is desert ahead and desert behind.

There is however a growing awareness that this fragile continent needs to be cared for and that the past has to be acknowledged and owned. So whatever date we eventually settle as our national day we should not ignore the less than proud moments of our history and rather than flag waving and jingoistic utterances we could look at the bountiful land we are all lucky enough to share and call home, and celebrate it in all its contradictory beauty.

By Bert Hetebry  

Government members were called to Canberra to get stuck into some work before the parliamentary week started, basically to consider how life could be made a little better for those who are struggling with the cost of living exacerbated by rent increases and what looks like the supermarket duopoly taking its customers for a bit of a ride so shareholders can look forward to increased dividends.

With the constant reminders of the cost-of-living crisis hitting headlines every day and an implication that it is all able to be blamed on the government, particularly ‘Albo’, what does a senior member of the opposition do?

Why, pour scorn on the idea that calling the Labor caucus in early to work on precisely those issues, somehow, all those white commonwealth cars waiting at the airport to pick up the members arriving is an expensive waste of money.

Senator Michaelia Cash on the news yesterday somehow implied that it is more expensive for the Labor team to arrive two weeks earlier than planned and the cars were somehow a waste of money to do the job they would otherwise be doing in two weeks’ time. Or could it be that somehow it is wasting money that the salaries these government members will not cost a cent more but the personal cost for the members is that they are away from home two weeks earlier than expected, to do the work they were elected to do.

My maths may be wrong, Ms Cash, but I think the cost of those cars driving members to their Canberra homes will cost approximately $00.00 more than it will in two weeks’ time.

Members are on salary so the additional cost for them arriving two weeks early to work on some pretty important stuff will cost an extra $00.00.

And I did so love the confected anger as it was implied that somehow the early start was somehow a dreadful thing, irresponsible even. Perhaps if the opposition had been called in early it would have been dreadful, dreadful to actually have to do some constructive work.

By Bert Hetebry

In the book Pathogenesis, the author Jonathan Kennedy refers to the phrase ‘Shit Life Syndrome’ being coined by local doctors in Blackpool, one of the poorest areas in the UK. the health conditions they see most frequently are the cause of destitution and hopelessness.

The cause for the destitution and hopelessness cited by Jonathan Kennedy is deindustrialisation where the well-paying jobs in manufacturing and mining have gone and nothing has replaced those employment opportunities manifest in health outcomes which include unhealthy eating and obesity, drug overdoses, alcohol abuse and suicide.

Using just about any means of calculating, Australia is one of the wealthiest nations on earth, having about 138 billionaires and over 2 million millionaires, or about 11.2% of the population, measured in US dollars. and yet we see a rising number of people homeless, we see all the symptoms of a Shit Life Syndrome.

While we here in Australia do not have a Blackpool, we do have a health crisis brought about through destitution and hopelessness. We have areas of deindustrialisation, we have a population who live well below the ‘poverty line’, where it is impossible to scrape together a healthy meal let alone a safe place to sleep. Many in this wealthy country suffer a shit life syndrome, and we do not need to travel far to see it with our own eyes.

There is a small art gallery and local meeting place in a beachside suburb north of Perth where I attend a weekly gathering, and over several months I noticed a Land Cruiser with roof top sleeper parked there, and New Year’s Eve, a number of friends met at the picnic area there to see the sunset, enjoy some tasty snacks and see the new year in when we saw a young couple by that vehicle. We invited them to join us, but they declined, and when asked admitted to being homeless and fearful of the ranger who asks them to move on. Body language and a reluctance to engage were indicators that this couple were not in a good place. This couple is not alone, up and down the coast car parks are occupied most nights with people sleeping in cars, using the beachside amenities for their ablutions but forever fearful of their vulnerability.

Homelessness and the sense of isolation and insecurity is just one manifestation of Shit Life Syndrome. The need to find a sense of feel good somewhere, anywhere leads to drug and alcohol abuse, dare I call it addiction?

Visit the emergency department in any public hospital and there will more often than not be not only security personnel, but also police officers as drug and alcohol fuelled violence threatens the wellbeing of those dedicated to helping the people suffering from their overdoses, facing at times the real prospect of not surviving the crisis they find themselves in. Too many don’t make it, the deaths reported as a result of suicide, drug and alcohol abuse are staggeringly high among adults, with the highest in the latest figures from the National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre reported for aged 25 to 34 year. the greatest proportion of deaths for people aged 25 to 84 occurred in the most disadvantaged areas, interestingly, deaths for those aged 15 to 24 tended to be from more advantaged areas, possibly indicating a willingness to experiment with drug taking and binge drinking rather than as a dependency to deal with the sense of destitution and hopelessness.

The most common drug of concern is alcohol with drug related ambulance attendance, 59% were for alcohol intoxication. (Australian Institute of Health and Welfare.)

Another factor in Shit Life Syndrome is the prevalence of obesity and the various health issues related to inadequate diets. The proportion of overweight or obese adults in Australian 2022 was 65.8%, an increase from 62.8% in 2011-12 with the category defined as obese rising from 27.5% to 31.7%. The rate of overweight and obesity among children and adolescents is about 25%, higher among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders, the principle cause is an imbalance between energy consumed through food and drink and activity to burn off that energy. The addictive nature of high sugar and fatty foods and high sugar content drinks combined with a lack of physical activity combine to create a serious health crisis. Those foods and drinks are also the most affordable quick hunger fixes from the local kid friendly fast-food outlet.

Poverty plays a significant role in the Shit Life Syndrome. The frustrations of not having enough for food and clothing let alone accommodation leads to anger and domestic violence, children suffer abuse and neglect as parenting skills are clouded in the haze of a sense of uselessness.

The Shit Life Syndrome is evident all around us but probably most reported on when it deals with aboriginal issues such as in Alice Springs or Broome and occasionally reports about remote communities where the cost of fresh produce is exorbitant, housing inadequate but the problem is so remote that it flies under the radar, seems to go unchecked until there is some kind of trouble, like a young man being shot by a police officer.

But what can be done to ease the crisis of the Shit Life Syndrome?

In remote communities, the cost of providing basic essentials, like fresh produce for the general store can be subsidised, where the freight component of cost is borne by the government. so that a healthy diet is actually affordable, and yes, I have travelled through some remote parts of western Australia and am shocked by the supermarket prices of basic food items, but I am privileged enough to be able to afford them while on holiday but would find it difficult if that were everyday prices.

The continued refusal to increase the Job Seeker allowance to reflect something like addressing the cost of living to provide help and dignity for those who really are the forgotten ones in our communities. Get over the dole bludger mentality, I really don’t believe anyone enjoys being unemployed and poor to the extent that they cannot even afford a decent shirt to go to a job interview let alone the cost of the train or bus fare to get there.

So much of the syndrome is marked by a sense of inadequacy, and with it a seeking of solace or some degree of feel good through substance abuse.

We are a wealthy nation, but too much wealth is concentrated on those who already have more than enough, and we should surely be moving to a more equal society instead of continuing with the stage 3 tax cuts which will increase the gap between the haves and have nots, look to using that tax take to level out the peaks and troughs increasing inequality bring about. That the cost of living crisis we hear so much about is to some extent redressed through a more equitable income tax regime, and pay for the freight to remote communities for food and other essential supplies so that the tyranny of distance is not a barrier to affordable healthy living, to increase the Jobseeker payments so that those recipients too can enjoy a decent meal and have the self-confidence to look and dress appropriately for the job interview so they too can have the dignity of a job. Increase funding for Medicare so that bulk billing is more readily available, so the adequate health care is available even for the most disadvantaged.

Reduce the ability for those with the most to avoid paying taxes, measures like income sharing, tax deductibility for car use and so many other loopholes which exist to minimise paying taxes.

By Bert Hetebry  

Repeat again and again, we are living in a cost of living crisis.

And the government really urgently right now ought to be doing something about it, right now. What’s wrong with you, Albo!!!!

Isn’t it somehow serendipitous that just as the government announces an enquiry into the pricing policies of the major supermarkets, a loud noise erupts over the un-Australian decision by Woolworths not to sell Chinese made Australia Day merchandise because demand for those products has fallen away?

Suddenly action the government is taking to address the cost of living crisis is drowned out by a concocted scandal.

Add a bit of noise that the price of electricity is way too high, that nothing is being done to get prices down to the levels promised during the last election campaign to completely deny the actions taken by both Federal and State governments to address those costs through rebates and other measures with the media happily headlining the dog whistle, seemingly ignoring what actions have been taken to address that aspect of the (repeat loudly) the COST OF LIVING CRISIS.

Yes, cost of living is a problem for many today, but I am reminded of the biblical statement that the poor will always be with us, and that for many of those suffering in poverty of one kind or another, government action is not going to solve the problem. For them, a cost of living crisis is normal day to day life.

In New Year’s Eve a group of friends and I met at a beach-side picnic spot to watch the sun sink into the ocean and partake of snacks and drinks to see the New Year in. Nearby in the carpark was a Land Cruiser with a roof top camper and a young couple sitting by the vehicle having their evening meal. I visit that site often and have noticed that vehicle there over the past few months, so I went down to invite them to join us to see the New Year in, but the offer was graciously declined. In conversation, the young man said they were homeless and had been living in the car for several months. They were ever aware of the rangers who come by and ask them to move on, but to where? So they say they are there to get an early morning surf in… a couple of boards are beside the vehicle. What was most evident in the brief conversation was that these people were not in a good place and they did not really want to spend time with a bunch of happy old people to see in the New Year. I guess you could call it depression of sorts.

On this morning’s beach walk I met up with James, a man close to my age, and like me, a renter, not a home owner, but also like me admitting that he actually has more than he needs. He volunteers with the Salvos, picking up produce from local supermarkets to distribute to needy families. He usually has some little somethings for kids who happen to come to his car as he is making deliveries, chewing gum, which is received with a broad smile. The mothers receiving the bags of food are most appreciative that small action by James, his partner and the other volunteers solve on a daily basis the cost of living crisis experienced by those most in need.

As James is telling me this, I reflect on the couple of occasions I have witnessed people trying to buy things and falling short… the young lady in a car parts store buying a $40 item to repair her car so she could get to work, but the payment on the credit card failed. Mine worked fine and the young lady’s problem was solved. Or the time at Aldi when a mother is going through the shopping she had done and looking at what was the least necessary items because she could not afford the basketful she needed. Again, small change, less than $100 for me, but it solved her cost of living crisis. Or on the odd occasion I actually have cash that it can help a person who is destitute. When we really think about it, most of us are doing OK. I am a pensioner, but have more than I need; it costs so little to do a good deed which means so much to those who are genuinely struggling. And by taking personal action we tend not to repeat loudly that there is a cost of living crisis.

I tire of those who repeat that line time and again, cost of living crisis, cost of living crisis from their well paid jobs in the media, if on the TV dressed fashionably, expensively. or the politician who as a backbencher takes home of $250,000 a year, frontbenchers a whole heap more, and that is without considering the electorate allowances and travel perks they enjoy. The cost of living crisis for them is just another term to hit the government with while they sit on their hands dreaming up the next populist slogan to deflect from good things the government may do.

And yes, I do concede that costs have risen. My own rent has gone up considerably, so yes, I understand that it has become more expensive for me to live but can still afford to go on my trips to places I want to visit, still active and well enough to look at Bluff Knoll and decide that it needs me to sit at the top again as I make may way to Bremer Bay to see the pod of orcas that visit near there. I can still plan a trip to drive around Tasmania; a bucket list dream. So, despite the cost of living crisis, I can live a life of comfort and adventure.

I live a life of gratitude, and as such when I see a need I am privileged enough to be able to help at a personal level. I expect that those in power do the same, but at a level which they have signed up for, not to be a loud destructive voice in opposition but to scrutinise the actions of government and make amendments and suggestions to improve what is being done instead of the political point scoring through populist sloganeering.

And while we are on rent and rent increases, how many politicians have rental properties and are enjoying the increased return through the rent increases which have exploded in the past year? There appears to be no cost of living crisis for those… and they are on both sides of the aisle.

Empty slogans from people who have more than they need, from people who live in a comfort that would be the envy of most loudly repeating cost of living crisis as their bank accounts and superannuation accounts grow day by day. To refresh memories, when the super contribution was 9.5%, federal politicians and their staff were being paid 15.4% and the vote to increase the rate for the ordinary punter, the yous and mes of the world, there was a reluctance to vote for the increase.

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