Dishonoring the Australian flag.

Dishonoring the Australian flag.

 

 In the lead up to Australia day,  George Christensen the homophobic and child hating Liberal senator has introduced a bill into parliament in order to make burning the Australian flag illegal. It should be noted here that the bill relates to the Australian National Flag and the Australian Red Ensign flag. It does not effect the treatment of the Aboriginal flag or the LGBT flag strangely enough...

 Some claim that people fought and died for the flag, this is admittedly an 'alternative fact', which actually means its a lie. People don't fight for a flag, they fight for the ideals it symbolises. Ideals like freedom to protest, freedom of religion, our constitution, equality and a fair go for all, and sticking up for the underdog.

 As you may be aware bigots and Australian terrorists have draped themselves in the Australian flag. They have succeeded in making our flag a symbol of hate and fear. They may have desecrated the flag beyond all hope of salvation.

 Knowing that, if burning the flag is an act against hate crimes, oppression, racism, bigotry, homophobia, religious intolerance, and terrorism, is that act really a bad thing?

  Again the problem is what the flag has come to symbolise, not what is done to the flag in protest of that symbolism. If we are not going to police what the flag stands for, is it time for a new Australian flag?

  After taking a look at the bill it seems Christensen might be working against his own interests here. The bill actually includes the terms; 

  'Dishonoring the flag with intent to offend, insult or intimidate any group of people would be illegal'

 He doesn't seem like the most informed or reasoned person so he probably doesn't realise that the hate speech he and those like him spout about non-Christians, LGBT Australians and children could never be spoken anywhere near a flag again without legal repercussions. 

 The terrorists and racists who don the flag would have to be arrested on the spot.

 Pauline Hanson would have to be very careful with her many media appearances, she has a history of using the Australian flag and its difficult to find a speech where she didn't intentionally offend, or insult some group for political gain. 

 Obviously police numbers would have to be increased just to arrest and charge right wing politicians.

 While it would be good to see fear mongering, child bullying, racist, science denying, sexist, homophobic, bigots out of politics and in prison. 

 I am sure if this was not a right wing bill it would be called "political correctness" gone mad, and the alt-right would moan that people shouldn't be charged for hurting the delicate feelings of the triggered special snowflakes. But such arguments are only used by the right when they disagree with something.

 

 I honestly don't know how i feel about this bill, if it is implemented justly it could do some good, but i fear it would only be enforced when it serves the current right wing governments agenda.

 Perhaps its a little late for this bill, or perhaps the burning of the flag part should be removed.

What do you think? What does the flag symbolise to you now? What do you feel it should symbolise? Do we need a new flag? Is Christensen's bill a good idea, would you change anything in it?

http://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/search/display/display.w3p;page=0;query=BillId%3Ar5628%20Recstruct%3Abillhome

 http://www.ausflag.com.au/

 

Australia Day: inclusive or exclusive?

Australia Day: inclusive or exclusive?

 Meat and Livestock Australia (MaLA) have a long history of releasing a pro-meat consumption advertisement leading up to Australia day. These advertisements  have proclaimed anything non-mainstream to be "un-australian". 

 Some common threads include, anti vegetarian, anti-health, claims of un-australianism, anti-vegan, pro-nuclear, anti-environment, anti-fruit producers, anti-animal ethics, pro-racist, pro-sexist, anti-freedom to protest, pro-excessive force, anti-refugee, pro-assault, anti-democracy, anti-trans, anti-constitution, anti-freedom of religion, anti-science, anti-LGBT, pro-climate change, the list goes on.

 Some of the worst instances being:

* Sam Kekovich secretly feeding an obviously vegan child meat.

* Sam Kekovich directing the military to break into a home, and when the victim identify as vegan they proceed to burn him and his home with flamethrowers.

* Calling the military action in the advertisement "operation boomerang" as a slap in the fact to Aboriginal Australians.

 However after years divisiveness MaLA have released an advert that is inclusive, it tries to unite Australians in a celebration of being Australian.

 Yes, not all Australians have equal rights, we know Australians treatment of refugees is a disgrace, and Australia was invaded, but there are some things to celebrate. 

 I feel we need to encourage the Australian traits of a fair go for everyone, and sticking up for the underdog. This advertisements inclusiveness is a step in the right direction, or should that be a step from the right into the middle ground.

 Of course some like One Nation*s Pauline Hanson have spoken out against the advertisement as it undermines their reliance on the politics of derision and fear of the other. She rambled on about how allowing other Australians to feel good somehow damaged what it was to be Australian or something...

 Personally i still think its a good day to try vegetarianism, and it would be a great day for the government to grant LGBT Australians their constitutional rights, to free the refugees and bring them home, and to recognize the traditional inhabitants of Australia. 

 Please take the time on Australia day to help make Australia a better place for all Australians. 

Sources and links:

 http://www.adnews.com.au/news/a-look-through-10-years-of-mla-s-australia-day

http://www.unleashed.org.au/change_the_world/go_veg/how_to_tips.php 

http://www.news.com.au/finance/business/media/australia-day-lamb-ad-outrages-vegans/news-story/17fce56190808536afeefaa12d67a1c3

 http://www.news.com.au/finance/business/media/it-really-is-pretty-sad-pauline-hanson-slams-politically-correct-australia-day-lamb-ad/news-story/c4313cd6326d129d45acd4cd9a510f8d

 

Review: Australian Poltergeist

 Australian Poltergeist

The Stone-Throwing Spook of Humpty Doo and Many Other Cases.

Audio Review

Author:                                Tony Healy & Paul Cropper

Publisher:                            Strange Nature

Type:                                    Soft Cover

Pages:                                   292

Genre:                                  non-fiction

Published:                            2014

ISBN:                                   97819211340

 The book itself is well made, it is seven inches wide, ten inches tall and over half an inch thick. The book has a great amount of black and white photos thorough and a few newspaper clippings and sketches.

 The book delves briefly into the history of the Poltergeist starting off in 355 CE and examines cases up to 1998. I will note that the book does use the antiquated BC/AD instead of the secular BCE/CE. The difference between Poltergeists and Ghosts in examined as well as possible causes, folklore, and some very poignant observations about 'skeptics'.

 This book is at its heart a catalogue of cases. Each case is given a five star rating with the weakest accounts getting zero stars and the most documented getting five stars. Each entry is also listed by the name given to the case, the location it occurred and the year or years the Poltergeist manifested.

 Chapter one deals with the Humpty Doo Poltergeist from the title, from there each chapter deals with a particular case. 
 The second chapter in addition to detailing the Mayhap case from Western Australia, also references Min Min, UfO's and Phantom Hands. 
 Chapters three and four deal with a haunted cowshed and a haunted prostitute respectively.
 The cases in chapters five and seven are from 1935 and 1887. It is interesting to hear the language of the times used in the reports.
 Chapter eight may detail a gay ghost.
 The Dubbo poltergeist of NSW in 1891-1894 details an Australian Kobold and parallels the Bell Witch phenomenon.
 Chapter twelve is different in that it shows all fifty two cases in lesser detail. These cases come from all over Australia and manifested in1845 to 1998. 
  Chapter thirteen takes a closer look at some possible causes and some interesting scientific findings. 
 The appendix takes a close look at three Djinn cases, with some short descriptions on fish falls, ball lightning, spook lights, UFO's, cosmic prankster, Yowie, alien big cats, and astral travel among other topics.

The book has an extensive bibliography and index. Every page has footnotes where they are relevant. 

 This is an amazing book, and i can highly recommend it to anyone interested in Australian history, folklore, and of course Parapsychology.

Abbott has been deposed.

Will there be a difference?

In a move that came far too late, the Liberal party has ousted their leader Tony Abbot, with Malcolm Turnbull becoming Australia new Prime Minister.

 In my opinion Mr Turnbul needs to do four things to prove to the australian people that the rot began and ended with Abbott, and isnt spread throught the Liberal party like skidmarks on speedos.

1. Immediately support marriage equality. The law should just be changed back, as Howard's changes were unconstitutional. If that cant be done then a free vote needs to happen, now.

2. Immediately cease offshore detention of refugees, close those refuge prison camps and hold a royal commission into the atrocities that the policy and the officials in charge oversaw.

3. Make good on the election promises that Mr Abbott broke; changes to the ABC, SBS, Pensions, The NBN, Gonski, GST etc. This not only disgraced the Liberal party but undermined our system of democracy. We cant have our political parties saying anything to get voted in, with no intention of keeping to what was said. 

4. Proper funding to indigenous community, cease plans to close them.

Obviously there are other things that need to be done before taking the Liberals to an election, such as getting real counselors back into schools, stop the attacks on the poor and sick, real action on climate change, having a minister for women who is actually a woman, having a minister for science, a minister for equality?

The ministers responsible for bad Liberal policy need to go, and some should just never be given portfolios; Morrison, Hunt, Joyce, Pyne, Hockey, Abetz, Andrews, Bernardi, Fierravanti-Wells, Dutton and Truss, are ministers i think he would avoid for various reasons.

It remains to be seen if we just witnessed a bucket swap.

Yule 2015

Australian Yule

In Australia Yule falls somewhere around the 20^th to the 23^rd of June, as we are in the Southern Hemisphere. Yule is the shortest day and longest night. It marks the return of the suns warmth, and light. 

We celebrate this season with candles, fires, dressing the home with greenery and feasting. Yule logs are burned a Yule tree is placed in the home with a Pentagram at its highest tip. Gifts are exchanged and many Pagans stay up all night to welcome the return of the sun.
The Great Rite is performed with the Oak king taking the Projective, dominant role for the first time.

In actuality we have had a very odd winter so far, it’s been very hot and very cold, but hasn’t stayed one way or the other. I suppose this will get more prevalent as our climate changes, and will create whole new dilemmas for Pagans to come. Do we continue to turn the wheel as it should be in hopes of righting it, or do we try to adapt to the unseasonable and chaotic weather.

This Yule we will have a look at the Krampus.

The Krampus

 

He is a magical being a nature spirit for sure, but he may have indeed once been a powerful Pagan god. The Krampus visits children on Yule night. Adults often leave tribute out for him, usually alcohol. The Krampus will lash naughty children, and sometimes adults, with his birch rod and threaten to put them in his sack and carry them away, if they do not behave better.

The homes of adults who gave proper tribute to Krampus will be warded against evil spirits; good children were rewarded with small treats and gifts by the Krampus. 

Krampus himself is said to be a horned and hoofed goat man similar to the god Pan.  He has dark skin and his eyes glow like hot coals in the darkness. The Krampus carries a magical sack, a birch rod and sometimes even a trident or a chain.

After being demonised and ignored by the Christians, The Krampus is coming back, and he has a lot of Yules to catch up on. So when you hear that clipity clopping on the roof this Yule night, spare a cautious thought that it may not be Santa’s reindeer that you hear. You may be getting an unexpected visit from the true lord of Yule, The Krampus. Have your parents left him proper tribute? Will he reward you with a treat or lash you with his cane like branches?

 Blessed Yule

We dont need no referendum

 Lambie calls for referendum

Tasmanian Senator Jacqui Lambie formerly of the Palmer united party (PUP) has called for a referendum in Australia over marriage equality, further saying the vote would and should fail.
In the statement she admitted her homophobia saying she was opposed to equality. 
Its difficult to talk about Lambie, i think she does care and think she is trying to do what she sees as right, but she doesn't bother to actually research a topic before going off, and she seems to lack the ability to empathise. 
Though in this day, there is no excuse for ignorance, and if your in parliament you have a responsibility to know what your talking about. So i give you my opinions on  Lambie...

Lambie has been seen as bigoted and hypocritical by most Australians. Her embarrassing statements range from topics as, Aboriginals, invasion by Chinese communists, banning religious practice, using a policewoman in full 'burqa' in a meme to try to ban the burqa for security reasons, opposing equal rights, one day defending our constitution the next day opposing it, demanding forced military service, terrorists would contract Ebola to infect Australians, i cant list all her controversial statements, it would take way too long. I am sure you get the idea.

The thing is we dont need a referendum in Australia, all we need is for Politicians do do the right thing and vote for equal rights in parliament. A referendum would be expensive and utterly useless. She should know that, she is a politition, i am not.

She claimed;  "To me it’s [marriage is] a sacred religious tradition."
Thats great and all but the issue isnt how different religions (as no one religion owns marriage) view marriage, we are talking about the legal definition of marriage, so from a religious perspective, as going by our constitution, the law has to be 'neutral' to religion, we must have marriage equality. As for traditional, the christian definition (which again isnt even relevent to the discussion) is not static and has changed considerably. 
The legal definition of marriage was changed in 2004 to its current unconstitutional bigoted and homophobic state, that's not a very long tradition. 

This is the same woman who fights vehemently against another religions laws being practiced in Australia. Now i am all for separation of church and state, but all church from all state.
It can generally be said the Lambie does not represent me, or most Australians.

The current marriage laws discriminates against all those religions that accept the natural variations of human sexuality. They need to be changed, all in parliament should be demanding equality for all Australians.

As we would say back on the farm,we might say too Lambie;

Barnaby Joyce war on terriors and decency

Who let the dogs in?

Johnny Depp is currently in Australia filming the latest Pirates of the Caribbean move. It was discovered that he had brought his two little Yorkshire terriers, Pistol and Boo, in on his private plane, without proper authorisation. 

Barnaby Joyce National party minister, agriculture minister and popularly referred to as an all round asshat, commented to Australia’s media that;

“It’s time that Pistol and Boo buggered off back to the United States,”

and

“Now Mr Depp has to either take his dogs back to California or we’re going to have to euthanise them. He’s got about 50 hours left to remove the dogs.”

You might remember Barnaby Joyce from his bizarre behavior when PETA exposed cruelty in the Australian wool industry. 

He also attended another gay hate rally where he said he was opposed to marriage equality because;

“We know that the best protection for those girls (his daughters) is that they get themselves into a secure relationship with a loving husband and I want that to happen for them."

and 

"I don’t want any legislator to take that right away from me.”

No one is sure how giving equal rights to Australians would possibly prevent his daughters from marrying men. Ignoring the apparent misogyny of his comment, my best guess is that he has such a low opinion of women that he believes the majority of men will "jump ship" and stop pretending to be straight as soon as equality comes to Australia, leaving his daughters with few men to marry.  
If you have a better explanation please comment below.

 Barnaby Joyce outrageious attack on Australia tourism and its film industry has met with eye rolling and disgust within the sensible Australian community. People understand that Australia needs to keep animal diseases out, but we even today, expect our ministers to measure their words and not threaten to kill peoples pets. A few friends have suggested that Mr Joyce may be jealous of Johnny  Depp's looks as Barnaby oddly mentioned how attractive Depp was in his statement. 
Its strange behavior and bizarre behavior seems to be way to common with out politicians at the moment.

Clive Palmer billionaire and politician said;


"His actions could potentially put the movie project in jeopardy and damage our relationship with the US, costing thousands of jobs and millions of dollars in exports." 

 kyle Sandilands an Australian radio and TV personality said to Barnaby in an interview; 

 "You sound like an absolute clown telling the guy to bugger off to Hollywood or we'll kill his dogs," 

 and

 "You're a government minister, not some idiot off the street mouthing off to a news camera. Have some decency."

  

and    

“You’re an absolute joke, Barnaby ... I'm going off because you sound like an insensitive wanker. That's what you sound like, Barnaby. You're a joke, you're a disgrace and you should retract your statement and reword it properly,"

 I could not find a comment on Barnaby Joyce's continued inappropriate behavior by our Prime Minister and possible Reptilian Tony Abbot. 

While incredibly Barnaby Joyce still holds his position as agriculture minister, the story does have a happy ending as the two little dogs managed to flee his clutches and are safe from his nefarious attentions.