It probably hasn’t escaped folks’ attention that Julia Gillard has expanded the scope of her rhetoric about being consultative beyond the issues of governance, cabinet processes and caucus decision making. In all the statements she’s made since becoming PM, she’s emphasised the need to build consensus and to take the community along with her. That’s particularly been the case with the three hot potatoes she’s inherited – the former RSPT, asylum seekers and climate change.
It’s pretty clear that there’s a rebranding exercise underway. Gillard, it’s suggested, has the common touch, has authenticity and will, in her first election as leader, be to 2010 what Bob Hawke was to 1983.
When he won the 1983 election, Bob Hawke ran on a platform of “Recovery, Reconstruction and Reconciliation”.
Malcolm Fraser’s tenure had been divisive, and a resources boom had collapsed into recession, with an ineffectual wages freeze part of the remedy.
Hawke sought to capitalise on a desire to move away from contention by constructing the biggest tent possible. But, beyond the Economic Summit, and the institutionalisation of a number of corporatist advisory bodies and mechanisms, the experiment didn’t last all that long. From the 1984 election at the earliest, politics as usual was back, and the 1985 Tax Summit demonstrated the limitations of his consensus approach.
What’s different now?
We haven’t seen the sort of class-based and partisan division which characterised the Fraser years.
There are certainly social cleavages, but based around a fundamental orientation to questions which our politics has difficulty handling – on one hand, those who are oriented to a sustainable, green and just future and on the other, those who want to see continued brown growth and those who fear social change and want to retreat to a Fortress Australia (or a “sanctuary”, to quote the Prime Minister).
Kevin Rudd, it must not be forgotten, tried to create a big tent as well, bringing those Liberals with him who would go down the Apology and ETS routes, and holding a pseudo-corporatist talkfest in the Australia 2020 summmit. ‘Evidence-based policy’, in many areas, was supposed to defang political conflict.
While it worked, it worked well.
But it couldn’t last.
To take one example, can Julia Gillard square the circle on climate change between deniers, those who accept climate change but want business as usual for brown growth, and those whose priorities are altogether different? So far, she’s studiously avoided mentioning an ETS, and Penny Wong is said to be working on a ‘Direct Action’ plan, with a carbon price somewhere off in the future.
This can work, in the short term, as a political strategy, leaving the Opposition out on a limb as with the MRRT.
But can it produce good policy, and survive an election campaign where Gillard will need to outline an agenda for 3 years, not for 3 weeks or 3 months?
We shall see.
Hawke kept the wages agreement going for a useful length of time, as I recall. They called it the “Accord” I think.
I hope the PM has the background to understand the climate problem and its ramifications, and puts an effort into changing perceptions. That is a job for a politician, but unfortunately very few of them have any scientific understanding.
Hawke kept the wages agreement going for a useful length of time, as I recall. They called it the “Accord” I think.
I hope the PM has the background to understand the climate problem and its ramifications, and puts an effort into changing perceptions. That is a job for a politician, but unfortunately very few of them have any scientific understanding.
I felt considerable unease when Gillard used the word ‘sanctuary’ in the context of understanding those who felt a fear of boat people. More so when she didn’t go on to the use the word in its more appropriate sense about also understanding those who felt that Australia should be offering sanctuary to refugees. I think she missed a chance there to start somehow to work her famed conciliation skills on this very contentious and emotive issue.
I felt considerable unease when Gillard used the word ‘sanctuary’ in the context of understanding those who felt a fear of boat people. More so when she didn’t go on to the use the word in its more appropriate sense about also understanding those who felt that Australia should be offering sanctuary to refugees. I think she missed a chance there to start somehow to work her famed conciliation skills on this very contentious and emotive issue.
@1 – Yes, the Accord proved a flexible policy instrument.
But it didn’t keep employers in the tent for the whole period, as pressure built up from the right to smash “the Industrial Relations Club”.
And in the opinion of most subsequent researchers, the centralisation of power between the ACTU and the Labor Cabinet contributed a lot to the huge loss in union membership that began in the 1990s.
@1 – Yes, the Accord proved a flexible policy instrument.
But it didn’t keep employers in the tent for the whole period, as pressure built up from the right to smash “the Industrial Relations Club”.
And in the opinion of most subsequent researchers, the centralisation of power between the ACTU and the Labor Cabinet contributed a lot to the huge loss in union membership that began in the 1990s.
I think it’s a bit early days yet, Kim! Her soundbites are clearly constructed in response to her method of ascension and popular media discourse. I’m not saying it won’t grow beyond that, but let’s not get all David Marr or Rundle about this, and start seeing vast portents of the future in the way her teacup stains the coaster!
I think it’s a bit early days yet, Kim! Her soundbites are clearly constructed in response to her method of ascension and popular media discourse. I’m not saying it won’t grow beyond that, but let’s not get all David Marr or Rundle about this, and start seeing vast portents of the future in the way her teacup stains the coaster!
@4 – sure, it’s early days, patrickg.
But a shift in political strategy is discernible.
We can discuss whether it’s likely that it will be effective. And I don’t think we’ve ever been reticent around here about forecasting how policy might turn out, and how it might be received electorally!
@4 – sure, it’s early days, patrickg.
But a shift in political strategy is discernible.
We can discuss whether it’s likely that it will be effective. And I don’t think we’ve ever been reticent around here about forecasting how policy might turn out, and how it might be received electorally!
Ps – and I think it will still be early days when we have the election!
Ps – and I think it will still be early days when we have the election!
When Gillard becomes a world champion drinker and womaniser, then she’ll be the next Bob Hawke.
When Gillard becomes a world champion drinker and womaniser, then she’ll be the next Bob Hawke.
I’m stumped: what does “brown growth” mean?
In her interview with Laurie Oakes on 9 last Sunday I thought she sounded equivocal on the asylum seeker issue and was choosing her words carefully. She talked about the need to address “people’s fears/concerns”, not about addressing the asylum seekers themselves as a problem. I’m optimistic that she has a genuine, humane attitude and will try to shift public perception. Whether that could stay afloat on the flaming river of shit that is the Australian Mainstream Media is questionable.
Anyway, I might just be projecting some of my hopeful fantasies onto her. I guess we’ll know by the end of next week.
I’m stumped: what does “brown growth” mean?
In her interview with Laurie Oakes on 9 last Sunday I thought she sounded equivocal on the asylum seeker issue and was choosing her words carefully. She talked about the need to address “people’s fears/concerns”, not about addressing the asylum seekers themselves as a problem. I’m optimistic that she has a genuine, humane attitude and will try to shift public perception. Whether that could stay afloat on the flaming river of shit that is the Australian Mainstream Media is questionable.
Anyway, I might just be projecting some of my hopeful fantasies onto her. I guess we’ll know by the end of next week.
One difference Kim is that Hawke had a long public record as ACTU President in which role he was not only a strong advocate for working people but also a very skilful and successful settler of seemingly intractable disputes. It’s no disrespect to Gillard to say her public track record in any capacity is pretty negligible.
By the time he went into parliament, Hawke had strong personal relationships with a host of people in business, the unions and all kinds of other institutions. His Economic Summit was boycotted by most of the employer associations but numerous CEOs attended in their own right, revealing in public how poorly the associations represented actual businesses and how easily Hawke could bypass them.
His relationships meant he could personally intervene to fix problems (he called me a few days after his election in 1983 to discuss the then-current proceedings to deregister the Builders’ Labourers’ Federation. A friendly 10 minute phone call sorted out a difficult situation that might otherwise have taken months of formal correspondence and meetings). To the best of my knowledge Gillard has no comparable network.
One difference Kim is that Hawke had a long public record as ACTU President in which role he was not only a strong advocate for working people but also a very skilful and successful settler of seemingly intractable disputes. It’s no disrespect to Gillard to say her public track record in any capacity is pretty negligible.
By the time he went into parliament, Hawke had strong personal relationships with a host of people in business, the unions and all kinds of other institutions. His Economic Summit was boycotted by most of the employer associations but numerous CEOs attended in their own right, revealing in public how poorly the associations represented actual businesses and how easily Hawke could bypass them.
His relationships meant he could personally intervene to fix problems (he called me a few days after his election in 1983 to discuss the then-current proceedings to deregister the Builders’ Labourers’ Federation. A friendly 10 minute phone call sorted out a difficult situation that might otherwise have taken months of formal correspondence and meetings). To the best of my knowledge Gillard has no comparable network.
Ahem: I call bullshit.
Neither David Marr nor Guy Rundle habitually does anything of the kind, and moreover they are two of the best journalists in Australia. Personally I wish more of the commenters here were capable of coming within a bull’s roar of the quality of either of them, particularly at the moment.
Ahem: I call bullshit.
Neither David Marr nor Guy Rundle habitually does anything of the kind, and moreover they are two of the best journalists in Australia. Personally I wish more of the commenters here were capable of coming within a bull’s roar of the quality of either of them, particularly at the moment.
I have tapped out parts of 5 different posts to this thread, but deleted them all. Each of those posts responded to characters mentioned by Kim’s OP and subsequent posts. But for some reason, nowadays I am really loathe to post about real human beings unless they are very powerful public figures. Basically, I fear I might be committing some illegal act in the process, of which I was completely ignorant.
Does anybody else experience this?
Even better, does anybody just say “fuck ‘em” and blast away regardless?
I have tapped out parts of 5 different posts to this thread, but deleted them all. Each of those posts responded to characters mentioned by Kim’s OP and subsequent posts. But for some reason, nowadays I am really loathe to post about real human beings unless they are very powerful public figures. Basically, I fear I might be committing some illegal act in the process, of which I was completely ignorant.
Does anybody else experience this?
Even better, does anybody just say “fuck ‘em” and blast away regardless?
Is Julia Gillard the new Bob Hawke?
One can only hope. But as KL has pointed out, Bob had actual credentials.
Is Julia Gillard the new Bob Hawke?
One can only hope. But as KL has pointed out, Bob had actual credentials.
I think her style is more capitulation than consensus. They can look the same for a while, but when she hits an issue where there is more than one strong opinion the difference will be clear. I think this explains some of the reluctance to talk about refugees or climate… just who do they capitulate to?
Of course, they could just be trying for a smooth transition to ne new pair of jackboots, but I’m inclined to think not. My guess is that the ALP bosses agree that hard decisions make for poor polls, and will do everything they can to avoid even mentioning said hard decisions. The current
puppetleader will stride valiantly at the front (until sadly cut down by friendly fire).I think her style is more capitulation than consensus. They can look the same for a while, but when she hits an issue where there is more than one strong opinion the difference will be clear. I think this explains some of the reluctance to talk about refugees or climate… just who do they capitulate to?
Of course, they could just be trying for a smooth transition to ne new pair of jackboots, but I’m inclined to think not. My guess is that the ALP bosses agree that hard decisions make for poor polls, and will do everything they can to avoid even mentioning said hard decisions. The current
puppetleader will stride valiantly at the front (until sadly cut down by friendly fire).@8 – Brown, that is polluting, unsustainable, often extractive industries.
@10 – Dr Cat, agree about the quality of Rundle and Marr’s writing.
To the degree that (I’m assuming) patrickg was being critical of their supposed tendency to psychologise public figures, and without commenting on that, I’d point out that’s very far from what I’m trying do with Julia Gillard.
@8 – Brown, that is polluting, unsustainable, often extractive industries.
@10 – Dr Cat, agree about the quality of Rundle and Marr’s writing.
To the degree that (I’m assuming) patrickg was being critical of their supposed tendency to psychologise public figures, and without commenting on that, I’d point out that’s very far from what I’m trying do with Julia Gillard.
PC, the reference to Marr was clearly a reference to his recent essay, and the reference to Rundle was him writing rubbish like this, which in my opinion – contra your suggestion – he does with enough regularity to be called on it. I agree more broadly with your assessment of Marr, and will be more circumspect in the future.
Comparing commenters on a blog to professional writers & journalists, and their long form pieces is a bit unfair, I think – though if you have a problem with what someone says in a post, you should keep the criticism there, imho.
PC, the reference to Marr was clearly a reference to his recent essay, and the reference to Rundle was him writing rubbish like this, which in my opinion – contra your suggestion – he does with enough regularity to be called on it. I agree more broadly with your assessment of Marr, and will be more circumspect in the future.
Comparing commenters on a blog to professional writers & journalists, and their long form pieces is a bit unfair, I think – though if you have a problem with what someone says in a post, you should keep the criticism there, imho.
@15 – Thanks for clarifying, patrickg.
But a discussion of the merits of Guy Rundle and David Marr as writers is a bit off topic for this thread. If you want to comment on it further, please do so on the Saturday Salon thread.
@15 – Thanks for clarifying, patrickg.
But a discussion of the merits of Guy Rundle and David Marr as writers is a bit off topic for this thread. If you want to comment on it further, please do so on the Saturday Salon thread.
Post #16 validates post #11. But for once I will be brave.
Kim
Why?
Post #16 validates post #11. But for once I will be brave.
Kim
Why?
Kim, sorry for the derail. Patrickg, alas, I can’t really engage without derailing further, but briefly, I’m glad that Gillard is PM and I thought Marr’s essay was interesting and good, so I’m unsympathetic to many of the more extreme comments hereabouts lately.
Suffice it to say that actually I agree with you about it being very early days, and I’m looking forward to a couple of weeks hence when all the outrage has died down a bit and we have a better idea of what Gillard is actually going to do on the fronts that Kim identifies.
Kim, sorry for the derail. Patrickg, alas, I can’t really engage without derailing further, but briefly, I’m glad that Gillard is PM and I thought Marr’s essay was interesting and good, so I’m unsympathetic to many of the more extreme comments hereabouts lately.
Suffice it to say that actually I agree with you about it being very early days, and I’m looking forward to a couple of weeks hence when all the outrage has died down a bit and we have a better idea of what Gillard is actually going to do on the fronts that Kim identifies.
To me Gillard has already given the game plan away.Similar to Obama.What you say and what is legislation are entirely and distinctly different.Learn the lesson now, so disillusionment can be overcome by the discipline of being powerless by vote and miscomprehension by listening and watching statements that don’t mean much at all until votes in Parliament proceed.
To me Gillard has already given the game plan away.Similar to Obama.What you say and what is legislation are entirely and distinctly different.Learn the lesson now, so disillusionment can be overcome by the discipline of being powerless by vote and miscomprehension by listening and watching statements that don’t mean much at all until votes in Parliament proceed.
Kim, do you know it’s Laurie Oakes who was the first MSM figure to go with the Gillard=/=Hawke formula?
For that reason alone I’m very leery of the comparision.
Hawke was an extraordinary figure, but you strip back the policy objectives and you’ll find he was all about neutering the power of the 20th century Left in the Australian Labor Movement. And depending on one’s point of view he either finished off the power of the industrial wing of that movement or he downsized it, reformed it so it could deal properly with the new challenges of life in the era of the Washington Consensus (the most important, yet often unspoken, form of consensus in the world of Hawkie consensualism).
I don’t know what great organisational or ideological challenge Gillard is supposed to ‘fix’ with a grand agenda (though the backdown in front of the miners tells me what problems she should refrain from creating).
I know she faces great challenges, but exactly why she is the best suited to tackle these challenges, moreso than any generic Labor leader, stumps me.
Every ALP leader gets to stand on the shoulders of every past Labor PM. Those were the people who had real fights on their hands just to stay in the job.
Right now I’m looking at Keating’s accomplishment in creating a new public persona for himself when he became leader. I really think that’s what the new PM has to do.
Kim, do you know it’s Laurie Oakes who was the first MSM figure to go with the Gillard=/=Hawke formula?
For that reason alone I’m very leery of the comparision.
Hawke was an extraordinary figure, but you strip back the policy objectives and you’ll find he was all about neutering the power of the 20th century Left in the Australian Labor Movement. And depending on one’s point of view he either finished off the power of the industrial wing of that movement or he downsized it, reformed it so it could deal properly with the new challenges of life in the era of the Washington Consensus (the most important, yet often unspoken, form of consensus in the world of Hawkie consensualism).
I don’t know what great organisational or ideological challenge Gillard is supposed to ‘fix’ with a grand agenda (though the backdown in front of the miners tells me what problems she should refrain from creating).
I know she faces great challenges, but exactly why she is the best suited to tackle these challenges, moreso than any generic Labor leader, stumps me.
Every ALP leader gets to stand on the shoulders of every past Labor PM. Those were the people who had real fights on their hands just to stay in the job.
Right now I’m looking at Keating’s accomplishment in creating a new public persona for himself when he became leader. I really think that’s what the new PM has to do.
It is a bit early to take anything from Gillard’s rhetoric.
Remember a great part of what she was saying was for the purpose of papering over holes in her transition and to provide rationale for her transition. Such as ‘lost its way’ and seeking/building consensus/inclusion. These are also common sorts of statements from new leaders to reassure the troops and to sound warm and friendly.
The three issues that she has addressed so far leaves one a bit apprehensive of where she intends to go ideologically.
The resolution of the RSPT was not, I repeat Not, a good outcome if you look at the foundations of this issue. The basis of the negotiation were to stop the mining industry form attacking them and hurting their election prospects, which is of little interest to the public and not a legitimate reason to give away billions in revenue. Also in the resolution was the confirmation that this industy can affect who the Prime Minister of the day is. Julia would have done better to stick to her guns, and the people would have gone with her.
On the climate change issue I was just a little bit worried when she talked about building a consensus on a climate change resolution. Usually these sort of statements from politicians is code for not a good outcome. But we will know on that soon enough.
The question that I have is that when she urged Rudd to shelve the ETS (and who of the gang of 4 leaked that decision to media before Rudd could develop a means to inform the public?)- is what did she suggest as an alternate solution and, has she canvassed with Rudd alternate options, or is that only now. If it is only now then you wonder if the ETS dropping was for electoral reasons and not genuine concerns on developing a proper solution.
Her rhetoric on the boat people issue also was unclear and made it seem that she was going to seek consensus but but tougher. This is the problems with politicians and their rhetoric.
The issue with Gillard to me (apart form the improper manner of her ascension) will she take the party even further to the right in order to maintain highest TPP? Remembering that Rudd during the last election had already taken Labor to the right to cover the centre and centre right, though defining what that is maybe not easy.
It is interesting that from her rhetoric so far you can draw totally opposite views. This was the great ability of Howard too, the ability to imply one thing whilst intending to do another, but what he said seemed to speak to both sides of the troops.
I wonder if in two years time we are going to be comparing Gillards use of language with Howard.
It is early days yet so we have litle idea. The other issue Gillard will have on becoming like Hawke is will party discipline be maintained now that Rudd is out, and every body want to have a say, and publicly.
For me she is currently down two points – the disloyal and wihtout genuine purpose treatment of Rudd and the ethical democratic failure on the RSPT.
It is a bit early to take anything from Gillard’s rhetoric.
Remember a great part of what she was saying was for the purpose of papering over holes in her transition and to provide rationale for her transition. Such as ‘lost its way’ and seeking/building consensus/inclusion. These are also common sorts of statements from new leaders to reassure the troops and to sound warm and friendly.
The three issues that she has addressed so far leaves one a bit apprehensive of where she intends to go ideologically.
The resolution of the RSPT was not, I repeat Not, a good outcome if you look at the foundations of this issue. The basis of the negotiation were to stop the mining industry form attacking them and hurting their election prospects, which is of little interest to the public and not a legitimate reason to give away billions in revenue. Also in the resolution was the confirmation that this industy can affect who the Prime Minister of the day is. Julia would have done better to stick to her guns, and the people would have gone with her.
On the climate change issue I was just a little bit worried when she talked about building a consensus on a climate change resolution. Usually these sort of statements from politicians is code for not a good outcome. But we will know on that soon enough.
The question that I have is that when she urged Rudd to shelve the ETS (and who of the gang of 4 leaked that decision to media before Rudd could develop a means to inform the public?)- is what did she suggest as an alternate solution and, has she canvassed with Rudd alternate options, or is that only now. If it is only now then you wonder if the ETS dropping was for electoral reasons and not genuine concerns on developing a proper solution.
Her rhetoric on the boat people issue also was unclear and made it seem that she was going to seek consensus but but tougher. This is the problems with politicians and their rhetoric.
The issue with Gillard to me (apart form the improper manner of her ascension) will she take the party even further to the right in order to maintain highest TPP? Remembering that Rudd during the last election had already taken Labor to the right to cover the centre and centre right, though defining what that is maybe not easy.
It is interesting that from her rhetoric so far you can draw totally opposite views. This was the great ability of Howard too, the ability to imply one thing whilst intending to do another, but what he said seemed to speak to both sides of the troops.
I wonder if in two years time we are going to be comparing Gillards use of language with Howard.
It is early days yet so we have litle idea. The other issue Gillard will have on becoming like Hawke is will party discipline be maintained now that Rudd is out, and every body want to have a say, and publicly.
For me she is currently down two points – the disloyal and wihtout genuine purpose treatment of Rudd and the ethical democratic failure on the RSPT.
If Gillard = Hawke, ??? = Keating
If Gillard = Hawke, ??? = Keating
Great to hear Wong finally coming out in support of direct action. Or am I thinking of something different?
Great to hear Wong finally coming out in support of direct action. Or am I thinking of something different?
Latham, I always like his conga line of ….. Too bad he never made it.
At the moment I see Gillard as a typical politician with lots of politician experience. And I wonder if she is popular with the general public for the same reasons movie stars are, since the majority pay stuff all attention to political issues that go beyond 5 seconds. IMO
Latham, I always like his conga line of ….. Too bad he never made it.
At the moment I see Gillard as a typical politician with lots of politician experience. And I wonder if she is popular with the general public for the same reasons movie stars are, since the majority pay stuff all attention to political issues that go beyond 5 seconds. IMO
Gillard is not Hawke, but she’s not part of the same culture that Hawke operated in. Whether she’s ever drank as much as Bob apparently did, I couldn’t begin to surmise.
But, if people are not happy, we could have a witch -drowning ceremony. If she doesn’t sink, we can burn her later for being a smart arse.
But I can’t beleive she hasn’t the smarts to at least guide the Country to an election. And if the ALP is voted back, she’ll have the mandate; the legitimacy that some think she has some how so far somehow lacked.
allright, so it’s “Gloriana”.
But I think I’d still prefer even that to Abbott’s James 1st.
Gillard is not Hawke, but she’s not part of the same culture that Hawke operated in. Whether she’s ever drank as much as Bob apparently did, I couldn’t begin to surmise.
But, if people are not happy, we could have a witch -drowning ceremony. If she doesn’t sink, we can burn her later for being a smart arse.
But I can’t beleive she hasn’t the smarts to at least guide the Country to an election. And if the ALP is voted back, she’ll have the mandate; the legitimacy that some think she has some how so far somehow lacked.
allright, so it’s “Gloriana”.
But I think I’d still prefer even that to Abbott’s James 1st.
Julia has been blessed. Rudd bought Labor to government when nobody else was likely to, Rudd went graciously, and fate delivered Abbott as her opponent and not Turnbull.
That is three times lucky.
Julia has been blessed. Rudd bought Labor to government when nobody else was likely to, Rudd went graciously, and fate delivered Abbott as her opponent and not Turnbull.
That is three times lucky.
Nick
You have emboldened me to face my fears @11. And bicth!
There is no doubt Laurie Oakes is Australia’s greatest reservoir of current not-publically-available political knowledge. If he worked in an investment bank, he would be facing a 3,000 year jail term for insider trading!
Alas, as an analyst of that inside info, he is as insignificant as the investment banking back-office accountant.
Oakes was in too much of a hurry to be Australia’s greatest insider to wait around for the synthesizing gene to be handed out. What was the last book you read by Oakes on Australian history, politics, or biography?
Oakes would have no idea of Bob Hawke’s significance to the ALP, the 1980s, Australian history, or today.
On Julia Gillard I doubt he will ever have anything to say about her that has anything at all to do with her. How could he? He still has not read the memo about our new PM being a WOMAN. That last tome by Oakes on the joy of the female???
He will go to his grave clueless about just how clueless was every comment he made about her.
If it is true there is footage of Oakes opining on the similarities of Gillard and Hawke, I would love to see it. It would be excruciating.
Nick
You have emboldened me to face my fears @11. And bicth!
There is no doubt Laurie Oakes is Australia’s greatest reservoir of current not-publically-available political knowledge. If he worked in an investment bank, he would be facing a 3,000 year jail term for insider trading!
Alas, as an analyst of that inside info, he is as insignificant as the investment banking back-office accountant.
Oakes was in too much of a hurry to be Australia’s greatest insider to wait around for the synthesizing gene to be handed out. What was the last book you read by Oakes on Australian history, politics, or biography?
Oakes would have no idea of Bob Hawke’s significance to the ALP, the 1980s, Australian history, or today.
On Julia Gillard I doubt he will ever have anything to say about her that has anything at all to do with her. How could he? He still has not read the memo about our new PM being a WOMAN. That last tome by Oakes on the joy of the female???
He will go to his grave clueless about just how clueless was every comment he made about her.
If it is true there is footage of Oakes opining on the similarities of Gillard and Hawke, I would love to see it. It would be excruciating.
Hawke was good a creating consensus and resolving conflicts. Julia certainly looks as though she is well ahead of Rudd in these areas. For a number of years at least he was a critical part of the enormously successful Hawke/Keating team. Keating’s weakness’s would have been a lot more debilitating without Hawke -Not sure though who could play Keating in the Gillard/???? team. Funny thing is that the only starter I can think of is Rudd. Who else in the government has the Keating fire in the belly?
Hawke’s major contribution came from doing a Nixon in industrial relations. Anyone else would have struggled to convince the unions that real change was essential? Can’t think of anything offhand where Gillard is a logical candidate for doing a Nixon.
I am all in favour of deferring any moves to put a price on carbon and am cheered by the news that Wong is now putting something together on direct action. Will only really start to cheer when I am sure that what Labor is proposing will give faster, more cost effective emission reduction than what Greg Hunt is offering.
So far Julia has done a brilliant job of making statements that give her plenty of room to move while dealing with people’s concerns. She is also clearly setting things up so she can fight an election on the terms that she chooses instead of what Rudd has left her with.
Long term she could end up as a leader who is so careful to avoid upsetting people that she achieves little of substance. Or she could end up achieving heaps because she has clear priorities and the skills to make things happen.
Hawke was good a creating consensus and resolving conflicts. Julia certainly looks as though she is well ahead of Rudd in these areas. For a number of years at least he was a critical part of the enormously successful Hawke/Keating team. Keating’s weakness’s would have been a lot more debilitating without Hawke -Not sure though who could play Keating in the Gillard/???? team. Funny thing is that the only starter I can think of is Rudd. Who else in the government has the Keating fire in the belly?
Hawke’s major contribution came from doing a Nixon in industrial relations. Anyone else would have struggled to convince the unions that real change was essential? Can’t think of anything offhand where Gillard is a logical candidate for doing a Nixon.
I am all in favour of deferring any moves to put a price on carbon and am cheered by the news that Wong is now putting something together on direct action. Will only really start to cheer when I am sure that what Labor is proposing will give faster, more cost effective emission reduction than what Greg Hunt is offering.
So far Julia has done a brilliant job of making statements that give her plenty of room to move while dealing with people’s concerns. She is also clearly setting things up so she can fight an election on the terms that she chooses instead of what Rudd has left her with.
Long term she could end up as a leader who is so careful to avoid upsetting people that she achieves little of substance. Or she could end up achieving heaps because she has clear priorities and the skills to make things happen.
If you mean she’s like Hawke as in she genuflect to the AWU, then you’re bang on the money.
If you mean she’s like Hawke as in she genuflect to the AWU, then you’re bang on the money.
There’s still a lot to learn about her. She has long played her cards very close to her chest, which is unusual for an ALP figure and one purportedly from the Left (although that term seems to have become meaningless now). When I was younger they were ‘hearts-on-sleeves’ types. Even Hawkie was a bit that way. According to gossip, Lindsay Tanner thinks she’s “too pragmatic”.
I think she is very determined to carry the middle ground. The nearest analogy I can make is to playing squash. There, it seems a particular advantage to occupying the middle of the court about a metre in from the baseline. There you can get to almost any shot by your opponent with minimum expenditure of energy. And it’s harder for your opponent to occupy it if you’re already there. So if you can sustain it, you have an advantage over your opponent.
Then the big question is, with answer currently unknown, will she do anything with this middle ground, other than just occupy it?
That is, could we hope for a Dunstan-type approach where you use this mainstream popularity and success to bring the majority over to a more innovative approach. It can be done with a lot of patience and persuasion. I am at least encouraged that she was nurtured in Dunstan territory.
I was reminded a little of her approach by a Drum post by Julian Barnes mentioning that she was not at all sympathetic to rioting asylum seekers at Woomera (although he conceded that she clearly stated that women and children should not be there). A humanitarian would have hoped for some criticism of the conditions leading to the riots.
At the time Howard was beating up on asylum seekers to wedge Labor in the way that Keating would get the Liberals on the need for a Republic. Gillard’s task as Latham’s immigration spokesperson was to defuse the issue. She sacrificed leftist popular sentiment to deny the issue dog whistling ammunition. It should be noted that a condemnation of the Government would not have helped a single asylum seeker (and might have encouraged Howard to go harder). Pragmatic, yes, but maybe big picture, too.
Not long after, she thoroughly stitched up Ruddock in Parliament over the ‘cash for visas’ matter. Ruddock, Howard’s hero of the Tampa Election, was never a credible force again.
A statement deploring conditions at Woomera might have seemed more humane and decent. but I suspect her tactic might eventually have made things a little better for them.
I’m hoping anyway,even though I know Ken’s right. She’s not Hawke. She’s not Dunstan either, but maybe she can grow.
There’s still a lot to learn about her. She has long played her cards very close to her chest, which is unusual for an ALP figure and one purportedly from the Left (although that term seems to have become meaningless now). When I was younger they were ‘hearts-on-sleeves’ types. Even Hawkie was a bit that way. According to gossip, Lindsay Tanner thinks she’s “too pragmatic”.
I think she is very determined to carry the middle ground. The nearest analogy I can make is to playing squash. There, it seems a particular advantage to occupying the middle of the court about a metre in from the baseline. There you can get to almost any shot by your opponent with minimum expenditure of energy. And it’s harder for your opponent to occupy it if you’re already there. So if you can sustain it, you have an advantage over your opponent.
Then the big question is, with answer currently unknown, will she do anything with this middle ground, other than just occupy it?
That is, could we hope for a Dunstan-type approach where you use this mainstream popularity and success to bring the majority over to a more innovative approach. It can be done with a lot of patience and persuasion. I am at least encouraged that she was nurtured in Dunstan territory.
I was reminded a little of her approach by a Drum post by Julian Barnes mentioning that she was not at all sympathetic to rioting asylum seekers at Woomera (although he conceded that she clearly stated that women and children should not be there). A humanitarian would have hoped for some criticism of the conditions leading to the riots.
At the time Howard was beating up on asylum seekers to wedge Labor in the way that Keating would get the Liberals on the need for a Republic. Gillard’s task as Latham’s immigration spokesperson was to defuse the issue. She sacrificed leftist popular sentiment to deny the issue dog whistling ammunition. It should be noted that a condemnation of the Government would not have helped a single asylum seeker (and might have encouraged Howard to go harder). Pragmatic, yes, but maybe big picture, too.
Not long after, she thoroughly stitched up Ruddock in Parliament over the ‘cash for visas’ matter. Ruddock, Howard’s hero of the Tampa Election, was never a credible force again.
A statement deploring conditions at Woomera might have seemed more humane and decent. but I suspect her tactic might eventually have made things a little better for them.
I’m hoping anyway,even though I know Ken’s right. She’s not Hawke. She’s not Dunstan either, but maybe she can grow.
@17 – ossie, I was simply saying that a discussion of Marr and Rundle was off topic. It’s fine to take it to the open thread, as I said. You are well within your rights to discuss anything there, obviously provided it conforms with the comments policy, etc. It’s just a matter of keeping discussion focused on the actual topic of the post.
@18 – Dr Cat, yes, I think that people’s assessments will be more measured given a bit more time for things to settle down. I would observe, and I imagine you’d agree, that there have been rather over the top comments made by people on both sides of the Rudd and Gillard fences. That’s understandable, but I trust that she will be evaluated on her own merits, though obviously part of her story is how she got the top job.
You might have noticed that I waited a few days before I said anything about the leadership challenge. That was deliberate.
@19 – No, Nickws, I didn’t know that about Oakes.
Note that I am not comparing Gillard to Hawke. That is, it is not my personal view that they’re all that comparable, for some of the reasons people have noted (and because these x=y political history comparisons can be overdrawn – she’s a unique individual at a different time).
What I am saying is that it’s clear that Gillard and the ALP want her to be compared to Hawke, and it’s being intimated that a similar political strategy will be followed.
I’ve pointed out that consensus only reaches so far, and can only last so long, and that Rudd also sought a big tent at one point, which didn’t last.
@17 – ossie, I was simply saying that a discussion of Marr and Rundle was off topic. It’s fine to take it to the open thread, as I said. You are well within your rights to discuss anything there, obviously provided it conforms with the comments policy, etc. It’s just a matter of keeping discussion focused on the actual topic of the post.
@18 – Dr Cat, yes, I think that people’s assessments will be more measured given a bit more time for things to settle down. I would observe, and I imagine you’d agree, that there have been rather over the top comments made by people on both sides of the Rudd and Gillard fences. That’s understandable, but I trust that she will be evaluated on her own merits, though obviously part of her story is how she got the top job.
You might have noticed that I waited a few days before I said anything about the leadership challenge. That was deliberate.
@19 – No, Nickws, I didn’t know that about Oakes.
Note that I am not comparing Gillard to Hawke. That is, it is not my personal view that they’re all that comparable, for some of the reasons people have noted (and because these x=y political history comparisons can be overdrawn – she’s a unique individual at a different time).
What I am saying is that it’s clear that Gillard and the ALP want her to be compared to Hawke, and it’s being intimated that a similar political strategy will be followed.
I’ve pointed out that consensus only reaches so far, and can only last so long, and that Rudd also sought a big tent at one point, which didn’t last.
Don
Wow, what a misogynist rant. Thanks for telling us what upper class men reminded you of what his version of what the PRIME MINISTER herself said. Best we all start start reading The Drim, rather than listening to and quoting the little woman herself.
I do hope Mini-Dunstan doesn’t disappoint you, and buys some pink hot pants immediately. Still she’s only a girl, so not even that will make a Dunstan.
Presumably conducting ALP national conferences in nothing but speedoes and a cigar won’t be good enough either.
Do you know how good her typing is?
Don
Wow, what a misogynist rant. Thanks for telling us what upper class men reminded you of what his version of what the PRIME MINISTER herself said. Best we all start start reading The Drim, rather than listening to and quoting the little woman herself.
I do hope Mini-Dunstan doesn’t disappoint you, and buys some pink hot pants immediately. Still she’s only a girl, so not even that will make a Dunstan.
Presumably conducting ALP national conferences in nothing but speedoes and a cigar won’t be good enough either.
Do you know how good her typing is?
@32 – I can’t see anything remotely misogynist about what Don has written. He’s been commenting here for a very long time, and always thoughtfully.
Ossie, please note that the comments policy precludes attributing motives to other commenters – which you seem to me to be doing. Your comment is also lacking in civility.
Please abide by the comments policy. It’s a condition of contributing at this blog.
@32 – I can’t see anything remotely misogynist about what Don has written. He’s been commenting here for a very long time, and always thoughtfully.
Ossie, please note that the comments policy precludes attributing motives to other commenters – which you seem to me to be doing. Your comment is also lacking in civility.
Please abide by the comments policy. It’s a condition of contributing at this blog.
@30
Lindsay Tanner has a much less kind view of Gillard. He blocked her preselection twice.
@30
Lindsay Tanner has a much less kind view of Gillard. He blocked her preselection twice.
Something I wrote last year on the comments sections of this blog:
“This whole thread has reinforced my opinion that Gillard should be Rudd’s successor.
No daddy union leaders or macho state secretaries should replace Kev––at least for half-a-dozen years next decade.
Julia as PM would help integrate a lot of the cultural Left into identifying with the modern ALP.
(It won’t solve the ALP Left/Green feud, of course, but that wouldn’t be the point of a Gillard leadership.)”
I totally missed the fact Gillard would need to rely on the most patriarchal of the daddy unions (Ludwig! The SDA!!) as well as the macho ex-state secretaries to become leader. That alone effects the rest of what I wrote.
Sad to see I was a little too right about her inability to reach out to core Greens. The Friday newsdump about the MMRT hasn’t even begun to play out with those people yet.
I admit I was surprised she fessed up to being an atheist, yet I’m sure that might be the first time she ever addressed her personal faith on the public record, at least during the time she has been a truly national political figure. So she held out for as long as possible for that declaration?
Next up: the generation gap. Maybe not this election, but I fully expect the politically engaged younger cohort, 25 and under, to start diverging, violently, from Gillard should she keep delivering backdowns like the mining tax (and the backdowns she supported as Rudd’s deputy) and fail to have anything like Redfern Speechifying in her.
I don’t like the possibility Gillard might forever put herself forward as Rudd-only-done-right or Rudd-willing-to-tickle-caucus’s-tummy. If her leadership style ends up predicated on that then just who sees her as being the material of potential greatness? Middle aged liberal professional feminists? The former state secretaries? Joe de Bruyn?
Yes, yes, her predecessor was no better in addressing any of the broad issues beyond being better than the Coalition. But I always thought Gillard could be an agent of existential reform after the small ‘c’ conservatism of Rudd, not a hollow woman who might be content to rely on that asterisk of 1st female PM next to her name to prove she’s different.
Something I wrote last year on the comments sections of this blog:
“This whole thread has reinforced my opinion that Gillard should be Rudd’s successor.
No daddy union leaders or macho state secretaries should replace Kev––at least for half-a-dozen years next decade.
Julia as PM would help integrate a lot of the cultural Left into identifying with the modern ALP.
(It won’t solve the ALP Left/Green feud, of course, but that wouldn’t be the point of a Gillard leadership.)”
I totally missed the fact Gillard would need to rely on the most patriarchal of the daddy unions (Ludwig! The SDA!!) as well as the macho ex-state secretaries to become leader. That alone effects the rest of what I wrote.
Sad to see I was a little too right about her inability to reach out to core Greens. The Friday newsdump about the MMRT hasn’t even begun to play out with those people yet.
I admit I was surprised she fessed up to being an atheist, yet I’m sure that might be the first time she ever addressed her personal faith on the public record, at least during the time she has been a truly national political figure. So she held out for as long as possible for that declaration?
Next up: the generation gap. Maybe not this election, but I fully expect the politically engaged younger cohort, 25 and under, to start diverging, violently, from Gillard should she keep delivering backdowns like the mining tax (and the backdowns she supported as Rudd’s deputy) and fail to have anything like Redfern Speechifying in her.
I don’t like the possibility Gillard might forever put herself forward as Rudd-only-done-right or Rudd-willing-to-tickle-caucus’s-tummy. If her leadership style ends up predicated on that then just who sees her as being the material of potential greatness? Middle aged liberal professional feminists? The former state secretaries? Joe de Bruyn?
Yes, yes, her predecessor was no better in addressing any of the broad issues beyond being better than the Coalition. But I always thought Gillard could be an agent of existential reform after the small ‘c’ conservatism of Rudd, not a hollow woman who might be content to rely on that asterisk of 1st female PM next to her name to prove she’s different.
Gillard has come out today saying John Howard is not a racist, political correctness should be “swept away”, and that she will take a hard line on asylum seekers:
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/sunday-telegraph/im-not-pc-says-prime-minister-julia-gillard/story-e6frewt0-1225887495024
Gillard has come out today saying John Howard is not a racist, political correctness should be “swept away”, and that she will take a hard line on asylum seekers:
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/sunday-telegraph/im-not-pc-says-prime-minister-julia-gillard/story-e6frewt0-1225887495024
If she holds that persecuted people have the right to seek asylum elsewhere, that wanting to come to Australia is a legitimate aim and if there are mechanisms in place of getting here without embarking on dangerous sea journeys, then fine.
We’ll have to wait and see what she comes up with. Under Fraser we accepted that, especially given our role in Vietnam, we had an obligation to take refugees, so provisions were made to process asylum seekers in SE Asia. That takes time and doesn’t stop the boats entirely. If Gillard wants to enhance better processing in places like Indonesia and stump up money to help, she’ll be heading in the right direction, but will still be open to exploitation of the issue by the cynical conservatives.
If she holds that persecuted people have the right to seek asylum elsewhere, that wanting to come to Australia is a legitimate aim and if there are mechanisms in place of getting here without embarking on dangerous sea journeys, then fine.
We’ll have to wait and see what she comes up with. Under Fraser we accepted that, especially given our role in Vietnam, we had an obligation to take refugees, so provisions were made to process asylum seekers in SE Asia. That takes time and doesn’t stop the boats entirely. If Gillard wants to enhance better processing in places like Indonesia and stump up money to help, she’ll be heading in the right direction, but will still be open to exploitation of the issue by the cynical conservatives.
To be strictly accurate she should have said “John Howard is no more a racist than most AWU officials”.
To be strictly accurate she should have said “John Howard is no more a racist than most AWU officials”.
I wonder if Gillard is even aware of the irony of her using ‘sanctuary’ as a synonym for homeland, against those seeking sanctuary, let alone its religious roots.
I wonder if Gillard is even aware of the irony of her using ‘sanctuary’ as a synonym for homeland, against those seeking sanctuary, let alone its religious roots.
These comments are about as bad as could be imaginable for any PM to make.
It is very clear that Gillard would have won without these remarks, so it follows that she must be making them because she actually shares these attitudes.
Putting aside all questions of ethical principle, junking concepts like simple humanitarian concern, this is utterly unwise because it opens the door to the xenophobic right to hold her accountable for stopping the boats — something nobody here in Australia can do, short of measures you’d hope would be unthinkable. She risks being hoist by her own petard.
Just drawing up the demographics for a Gillard victory one has:
a) ALP tribals
b) Alan Jones listeners
c) Pauline Hanson fans
d) people who like a woman PM more than they object to xenophobia
e) Mortgage belt people
f) rural conservatives
g) Queenslanders and West Australians
h) Mothers’ clubs and people who volunteer in the school canteen
That’s plenty enough to win, so maybe 53-47 isn’t enough for her. She wants 54-46 or better, plus an increase in seats.
Having changed the optics to “common woman, common sense” (that 7PM show on 10 was running with her living with a bloke in a flat and eating takeaway) she will need to hold the election before the next major seasonal wave of boats if she is to get many of these of course, which again points to an August poll.
We now see why she was praising Howard’s candidacy for the ICC and why she has started wearing dresses.
Today I feel sure that there are many of us who feel as if we have become political refugees in our place of birth. Apparently, perhaps as little as 8% of the population believes in treating people fleeing conditions we would never endure with respect and humanity. I shake my head in disgust at the country Keating, Howard, Rudd and Gillard stand for and wonder when I’ll next feel comfortable admitting to being born here. I wonder what I’ll say to those of my students who have fled brutality to come here who ask me why our country fears them. I’m not sure I can offer an answer beyond, I’m so sorry, please don’t judge us all by the standards of the PM.
These comments are about as bad as could be imaginable for any PM to make.
It is very clear that Gillard would have won without these remarks, so it follows that she must be making them because she actually shares these attitudes.
Putting aside all questions of ethical principle, junking concepts like simple humanitarian concern, this is utterly unwise because it opens the door to the xenophobic right to hold her accountable for stopping the boats — something nobody here in Australia can do, short of measures you’d hope would be unthinkable. She risks being hoist by her own petard.
Just drawing up the demographics for a Gillard victory one has:
a) ALP tribals
b) Alan Jones listeners
c) Pauline Hanson fans
d) people who like a woman PM more than they object to xenophobia
e) Mortgage belt people
f) rural conservatives
g) Queenslanders and West Australians
h) Mothers’ clubs and people who volunteer in the school canteen
That’s plenty enough to win, so maybe 53-47 isn’t enough for her. She wants 54-46 or better, plus an increase in seats.
Having changed the optics to “common woman, common sense” (that 7PM show on 10 was running with her living with a bloke in a flat and eating takeaway) she will need to hold the election before the next major seasonal wave of boats if she is to get many of these of course, which again points to an August poll.
We now see why she was praising Howard’s candidacy for the ICC and why she has started wearing dresses.
Today I feel sure that there are many of us who feel as if we have become political refugees in our place of birth. Apparently, perhaps as little as 8% of the population believes in treating people fleeing conditions we would never endure with respect and humanity. I shake my head in disgust at the country Keating, Howard, Rudd and Gillard stand for and wonder when I’ll next feel comfortable admitting to being born here. I wonder what I’ll say to those of my students who have fled brutality to come here who ask me why our country fears them. I’m not sure I can offer an answer beyond, I’m so sorry, please don’t judge us all by the standards of the PM.
Oh come on, that’s the worst possible spin to put on it. What did you want her to do, grab a mic off some hapless journalist and say ‘Ooh, by the way, I’m an atheist!’ Perhaps nobody had asked her before. This is the converse of ticking her off for having an opinion about Howard and the cricket, where people are saying she should have kept her mouth shut. The pilers-on just keep coming.
Assuming you mean ‘liberal’ as in ‘liberal feminist’ rather than as in ‘Federal Opposition’, it’s revealing and useful to know that this is your idea of the bottom of the barrel, Nickws. I take it that young radical amateur (male) non-feminists are la crème, then.
Oh come on, that’s the worst possible spin to put on it. What did you want her to do, grab a mic off some hapless journalist and say ‘Ooh, by the way, I’m an atheist!’ Perhaps nobody had asked her before. This is the converse of ticking her off for having an opinion about Howard and the cricket, where people are saying she should have kept her mouth shut. The pilers-on just keep coming.
Assuming you mean ‘liberal’ as in ‘liberal feminist’ rather than as in ‘Federal Opposition’, it’s revealing and useful to know that this is your idea of the bottom of the barrel, Nickws. I take it that young radical amateur (male) non-feminists are la crème, then.
Kiim @33
Are you being serious? I’m sorry, but if you are oblivious to the increasing psycho misogyny towards Gillard here, you are either blind or in denial.
I suggest you take some time to re-read that post of Don’s. And having read some more, his is a relatively minor example of the genre, compared to some of the ugliness that is being posted here more and more about Julia.
Some of these posters need to re-read their posts, and wake up to the fact that Yes, Virginian there are misogynist tropes, and many LPers are nuking Julia with them.
While the misogyny is bad enough, it is striking how ill-informed most of it is. I have already emphasised the ignorance of the ALP that the first wave of this Julia-hate sprang from. Now, it has teamed up with barely disguised misogyny.
I’m all for free speech, but not ignornat speech. And of all people, I can’t uderstand why you defend it.
Kiim @33
Are you being serious? I’m sorry, but if you are oblivious to the increasing psycho misogyny towards Gillard here, you are either blind or in denial.
I suggest you take some time to re-read that post of Don’s. And having read some more, his is a relatively minor example of the genre, compared to some of the ugliness that is being posted here more and more about Julia.
Some of these posters need to re-read their posts, and wake up to the fact that Yes, Virginian there are misogynist tropes, and many LPers are nuking Julia with them.
While the misogyny is bad enough, it is striking how ill-informed most of it is. I have already emphasised the ignorance of the ALP that the first wave of this Julia-hate sprang from. Now, it has teamed up with barely disguised misogyny.
I’m all for free speech, but not ignornat speech. And of all people, I can’t uderstand why you defend it.
Fran
Quick, you had better ring Julia and order her never to wear a dress again!
Fran
Quick, you had better ring Julia and order her never to wear a dress again!
Post @ 40 has to win this year’s Ernie, without a competitor for dust. Why so ugly? I am starting to detect a lot jealousy.
Post @ 40 has to win this year’s Ernie, without a competitor for dust. Why so ugly? I am starting to detect a lot jealousy.
The Telegraph interview isn’t a dog whistle, it’s a dog vuvuzela. However, it doesn’t follow that Gillard necessarily believes them.
It’s much more likely that she doesn’t believe in anything.
I know people who know Gillard and they’ve told me for years how “pragmatic” she is. Some of them say it admiringly, some in the sense that they reckon she would send her parents to a Khmer Rouge killing field for political advancement.
I’m prepared to withhold judgement until I see what she does as PM, not what she does in a newspaper interview.
Although rimming the Alan Jones demographic is not good, not good at all.
The Telegraph interview isn’t a dog whistle, it’s a dog vuvuzela. However, it doesn’t follow that Gillard necessarily believes them.
It’s much more likely that she doesn’t believe in anything.
I know people who know Gillard and they’ve told me for years how “pragmatic” she is. Some of them say it admiringly, some in the sense that they reckon she would send her parents to a Khmer Rouge killing field for political advancement.
I’m prepared to withhold judgement until I see what she does as PM, not what she does in a newspaper interview.
Although rimming the Alan Jones demographic is not good, not good at all.
Ossie, #40 is nothing like an Ernie candidate, unless the original comment has been sin-binned and the numbering has changed. Fran’s talking about Gillard’s shift to and wooing of the right, which has been noted all over the internet. By the sentence about wearing a dress I believe she means “performing femininity for conservative elements”, may be right, may be wrong but is not misogynist.
Ossie, #40 is nothing like an Ernie candidate, unless the original comment has been sin-binned and the numbering has changed. Fran’s talking about Gillard’s shift to and wooing of the right, which has been noted all over the internet. By the sentence about wearing a dress I believe she means “performing femininity for conservative elements”, may be right, may be wrong but is not misogynist.
Thanks for that Sam. My ham and cheese croissant had just reached my mouth, which I now have to chew along with your image of Jones’ bits and pieces in action. Brilliant by the way, but please not before lunch.
Thanks for that Sam. My ham and cheese croissant had just reached my mouth, which I now have to chew along with your image of Jones’ bits and pieces in action. Brilliant by the way, but please not before lunch.
Helen
I suggest you read Fran’s “Julia Chapter” typed on LP over the past few days.
Helen
I suggest you read Fran’s “Julia Chapter” typed on LP over the past few days.
Ossie, has anyone ever told you what a bore you are?
Ossie, has anyone ever told you what a bore you are?
Anyway, I don’t think anyone wants this point to become the source of a long running feud of the definition of ‘misogyny.’ I think we all know what such disputes end up doing to a blog thread’s tone. It never ends up being all that worthwhile. Agreed?
I’ve expressed my opinion, you don’t agree. Can we leave it at that for now, and discuss some of the many, many other issues raised; perhaps returning to the ‘misogyny’ issue if/when a more appropriate thread is posted in the future?
Anyway, I don’t think anyone wants this point to become the source of a long running feud of the definition of ‘misogyny.’ I think we all know what such disputes end up doing to a blog thread’s tone. It never ends up being all that worthwhile. Agreed?
I’ve expressed my opinion, you don’t agree. Can we leave it at that for now, and discuss some of the many, many other issues raised; perhaps returning to the ‘misogyny’ issue if/when a more appropriate thread is posted in the future?
Great post @ 40, Fran. I fear that Kim has the wrong party with her Hawke comparison.
Chances are Gillard will be more likely remembered as Labor’s John Howard.
Great post @ 40, Fran. I fear that Kim has the wrong party with her Hawke comparison.
Chances are Gillard will be more likely remembered as Labor’s John Howard.
Sam, rimming? Charming. It’s a Sunday morning. Could you restrain yourself just a little? You know, for folks who don’t appreciate the kind of adjectival forms you are into?.
I am deeply unhappy that Julia Gillard sees fit to legitimate fears based on racist stereotype and thereby normalise the clearly abnormal state in which certain sections of the nation imagine themselves under siege by a few desperate people in boats. Border protection is it? Which borders? The borders between the imaginary and the real? Well good then. If winning an election for Gillard means that I can no longer tell the difference between the two major parties of Australia, even in minor degrees or shades, then it seems, quite inexplicably and horrifyingly, that she has just lost my vote.
I can’t really believe I wrote that. I can’t believe that I won’t vote for the first female Labor candidate for PM. But I won’t. Not if she makes desperate people in boats risking their lives the sacrifice in order to attain power. Not even if it’s all artifice and posture. I don’t care. These people are human beings. If Australia does not want them, if Australia does not like its obligations, Australia needs to remove it’s signature from the Convention and be done with it. But let’s not fuck around that we are “being strong and fair”. We are being craven and cowardly.
Sam, rimming? Charming. It’s a Sunday morning. Could you restrain yourself just a little? You know, for folks who don’t appreciate the kind of adjectival forms you are into?.
I am deeply unhappy that Julia Gillard sees fit to legitimate fears based on racist stereotype and thereby normalise the clearly abnormal state in which certain sections of the nation imagine themselves under siege by a few desperate people in boats. Border protection is it? Which borders? The borders between the imaginary and the real? Well good then. If winning an election for Gillard means that I can no longer tell the difference between the two major parties of Australia, even in minor degrees or shades, then it seems, quite inexplicably and horrifyingly, that she has just lost my vote.
I can’t really believe I wrote that. I can’t believe that I won’t vote for the first female Labor candidate for PM. But I won’t. Not if she makes desperate people in boats risking their lives the sacrifice in order to attain power. Not even if it’s all artifice and posture. I don’t care. These people are human beings. If Australia does not want them, if Australia does not like its obligations, Australia needs to remove it’s signature from the Convention and be done with it. But let’s not fuck around that we are “being strong and fair”. We are being craven and cowardly.
Stay classy, Sam.
Stay classy, Sam.
Just so Casey. I found it rather perverse as well. Reflecting on this I think the reasoning needs to deal with the following basic questions:
1. How likely is it that Abbott will win?
2. Will the support of leftists for the ALP regime actually make any positive difference at all?
3. If the possibility that he will win is significant, is the ALP as currently configured, all things considered measurably the lesser evil, from the POV of the people that I care about most of all?
At this stage, I rate the chances of an Abbott victory as zero. Even the betting markets have strengthened for the ALP with them going to $1.25 and the Coalition going over $3.00. Things can change of course but there simply is no space for thinking that Abbott can win, unless something dramatic changes for the worse for the ALP amongst the people they are pitching at. Accordingly, it doesn’t matter if they are the lesser evil of not. Even if they are the greater evil, it’s simply irrelevant. The question is moot.
This leads into the second point — they don’t need or even want the votes of leftists. For them, these are currently a liability because they are working the other side of the street, and repeated crossing of the street could get them hit by a heavy object moving at speed. It would disrupt the message. Indeed, the ALP might even be advantaged by the left attacking them as lurching to the right.
So again, even if one thought the victory of the ALP were the lesser evil, the question would be moot.
If you’re a leftist or even a simple humanitarian, there’s absolutely no reason to hold fire or even give the ALP the most savage and backhanded support.
Of course, the ALP is hard to present as the lesser evil any longer. A vote for them is now a vote for the victims of political Stockholm Syndrome. They are an expression of the xenophobic and cultural angst pervasive in what is loosely called “middle Australia”. OTOH a vote for the Liberals is a vote for just the same thing. Regardless of which of the two parties one supports, one’s vote will for reforging the weapons of cultural abuse wielded by the most powerful and reactionary fractions of the boss class against the working people of this country and for us leftists, therefore, of every other country. One simply can’t vote to perpetuate the enslavement of working humanity and still go by the name leftist.
But can one vote Green or socialist and escape crossing this line? This is more murky but personally, I’m doubtful. There is no doubt going to be a lot of symbolism in voting Green or socialist at this conjuncture that would not apply during a time of liberal consensus. It is very tempting to vote Green and close one’s eyes to where those preferences will go, but we all know that the votes will either be informal or support one of the major parties. There is no prospect of us voting for a Green or socialist government, so a vote for the Greens or socialists is ultimately at one or two removes, a vote for one of the parties of xenophobic boss class rule. There simply is no place to hide. If we vote Green or socialist, we must accept that this is pure symbolism and be prepared to exhaust our votes by placing the boss class parties equal last. At the last by-election I scrutineered at for The Greens, the returning officer ruled the primary valid in these cases, but it doesn’t matter either way because not supporting either party is the lesser evil now.
Just so Casey. I found it rather perverse as well. Reflecting on this I think the reasoning needs to deal with the following basic questions:
1. How likely is it that Abbott will win?
2. Will the support of leftists for the ALP regime actually make any positive difference at all?
3. If the possibility that he will win is significant, is the ALP as currently configured, all things considered measurably the lesser evil, from the POV of the people that I care about most of all?
At this stage, I rate the chances of an Abbott victory as zero. Even the betting markets have strengthened for the ALP with them going to $1.25 and the Coalition going over $3.00. Things can change of course but there simply is no space for thinking that Abbott can win, unless something dramatic changes for the worse for the ALP amongst the people they are pitching at. Accordingly, it doesn’t matter if they are the lesser evil of not. Even if they are the greater evil, it’s simply irrelevant. The question is moot.
This leads into the second point — they don’t need or even want the votes of leftists. For them, these are currently a liability because they are working the other side of the street, and repeated crossing of the street could get them hit by a heavy object moving at speed. It would disrupt the message. Indeed, the ALP might even be advantaged by the left attacking them as lurching to the right.
So again, even if one thought the victory of the ALP were the lesser evil, the question would be moot.
If you’re a leftist or even a simple humanitarian, there’s absolutely no reason to hold fire or even give the ALP the most savage and backhanded support.
Of course, the ALP is hard to present as the lesser evil any longer. A vote for them is now a vote for the victims of political Stockholm Syndrome. They are an expression of the xenophobic and cultural angst pervasive in what is loosely called “middle Australia”. OTOH a vote for the Liberals is a vote for just the same thing. Regardless of which of the two parties one supports, one’s vote will for reforging the weapons of cultural abuse wielded by the most powerful and reactionary fractions of the boss class against the working people of this country and for us leftists, therefore, of every other country. One simply can’t vote to perpetuate the enslavement of working humanity and still go by the name leftist.
But can one vote Green or socialist and escape crossing this line? This is more murky but personally, I’m doubtful. There is no doubt going to be a lot of symbolism in voting Green or socialist at this conjuncture that would not apply during a time of liberal consensus. It is very tempting to vote Green and close one’s eyes to where those preferences will go, but we all know that the votes will either be informal or support one of the major parties. There is no prospect of us voting for a Green or socialist government, so a vote for the Greens or socialists is ultimately at one or two removes, a vote for one of the parties of xenophobic boss class rule. There simply is no place to hide. If we vote Green or socialist, we must accept that this is pure symbolism and be prepared to exhaust our votes by placing the boss class parties equal last. At the last by-election I scrutineered at for The Greens, the returning officer ruled the primary valid in these cases, but it doesn’t matter either way because not supporting either party is the lesser evil now.
“Border protection is it? Which borders? The borders between the imaginary and the real?”
This wins the internets for today.
I read the Telegraph article, and now I feel so hopeless. I thought I was disillusioned before. Absolutely no hope of this voter being won back to Labor.
“Border protection is it? Which borders? The borders between the imaginary and the real?”
This wins the internets for today.
I read the Telegraph article, and now I feel so hopeless. I thought I was disillusioned before. Absolutely no hope of this voter being won back to Labor.
Chance or Opportunity?
Another time, another place,
Or even of a different race,
This child might not survive.
Yet here she is alive,
Living in prosperity.
This girl-child’s father and mother
Had no constraint to smother
Her, or choose to hide
While waiting for a ride
To hope across an open sea.
This little one, weak in her chest,
Was able still to pass the test
For passage to Australia.
No risk there of failure,
An ideal migrant family!
That child is grown and powerful now.
Does she ever wonder how
It happened, and what would have become
Of her, if not a ten pound Pom
She’d been instead a refugee?
Chance or Opportunity?
Another time, another place,
Or even of a different race,
This child might not survive.
Yet here she is alive,
Living in prosperity.
This girl-child’s father and mother
Had no constraint to smother
Her, or choose to hide
While waiting for a ride
To hope across an open sea.
This little one, weak in her chest,
Was able still to pass the test
For passage to Australia.
No risk there of failure,
An ideal migrant family!
That child is grown and powerful now.
Does she ever wonder how
It happened, and what would have become
Of her, if not a ten pound Pom
She’d been instead a refugee?
Howard liked to say that if you changed the government you changed the country. Something of a self-regarding over-statement but as events seem to be demonstrating, empirically wrong also.
Howard liked to say that if you changed the government you changed the country. Something of a self-regarding over-statement but as events seem to be demonstrating, empirically wrong also.
Yes it was a self-regarding statement, typical of its author; Paul Keating.
And you are correct, it is wrong. It is the country which changes governments.
Yes it was a self-regarding statement, typical of its author; Paul Keating.
And you are correct, it is wrong. It is the country which changes governments.
Don W@30: Got to the crux of the matter when he said:
We have seen too many Labor governments that have done so little above what the conservatives would have done that the only justification for voting for them is that they won’t do some of the bad things that the conservatives might do.
Whitlam was one of our better prime ministers because he made real and important changes that have persisted to this day. Many Prime ministers have lasted a lot longer and achieved far less.
Don W@30: Got to the crux of the matter when he said:
We have seen too many Labor governments that have done so little above what the conservatives would have done that the only justification for voting for them is that they won’t do some of the bad things that the conservatives might do.
Whitlam was one of our better prime ministers because he made real and important changes that have persisted to this day. Many Prime ministers have lasted a lot longer and achieved far less.
@32
Small ‘c’ conservative? What does that mean?
Do you mean social conservative, because you’re probably right there, but Kev’s economics were more left wing than any Prime Minister since Whitlam. Environmentally, he was the only parliamentarian who had any chance of doing something on climate change, and he was forced to give that up.
@32
Small ‘c’ conservative? What does that mean?
Do you mean social conservative, because you’re probably right there, but Kev’s economics were more left wing than any Prime Minister since Whitlam. Environmentally, he was the only parliamentarian who had any chance of doing something on climate change, and he was forced to give that up.
“I suggest you take some time to re-read that post of Don’s.”
With due respect, Ossie, maybe you should do the same. I greatly enjoyed your demolition of Spana recently, but I’m quite mystified where you’re coming from with this ‘misogynist’ thingo. At least it sent me to the dictionary, because it’s not in my normal vocabulary. And I have to say that it’s not in my behaviour as far as I’m aware. Hatred of women? WTF?
Obviously my communication skills are failing me a bit, because I thought my post was one of cautious optimism: i.e. let’s not bag or praise her too much before we see her in action.
The reference to the Barnes piece was simply to point out that her subsequent ACTIONS probably did a bit of good for asylum seekers. Howard no long had it as a dog whistle to rally and divide; then she took out his advance guardian, Ruddock. Pretty good real-politic outcome even if it might have failed the hand-wringing test.
As to the Dunstan pink shorts reference, if you really think that that was the type of thing that made Dunstan so successful (and he wasn’t averse to such publicity – at one time earning a nickname from John Hepworth of “Gorgeous Dunny”) then you have missed an important phase of public and political life in Australia.
I might post separately on Don Dunstan in Salon to save hi-jacking this thread.
But really, Ossie, there is something wrong either with my expression or your comprehension for you to take it that way.
“I suggest you take some time to re-read that post of Don’s.”
With due respect, Ossie, maybe you should do the same. I greatly enjoyed your demolition of Spana recently, but I’m quite mystified where you’re coming from with this ‘misogynist’ thingo. At least it sent me to the dictionary, because it’s not in my normal vocabulary. And I have to say that it’s not in my behaviour as far as I’m aware. Hatred of women? WTF?
Obviously my communication skills are failing me a bit, because I thought my post was one of cautious optimism: i.e. let’s not bag or praise her too much before we see her in action.
The reference to the Barnes piece was simply to point out that her subsequent ACTIONS probably did a bit of good for asylum seekers. Howard no long had it as a dog whistle to rally and divide; then she took out his advance guardian, Ruddock. Pretty good real-politic outcome even if it might have failed the hand-wringing test.
As to the Dunstan pink shorts reference, if you really think that that was the type of thing that made Dunstan so successful (and he wasn’t averse to such publicity – at one time earning a nickname from John Hepworth of “Gorgeous Dunny”) then you have missed an important phase of public and political life in Australia.
I might post separately on Don Dunstan in Salon to save hi-jacking this thread.
But really, Ossie, there is something wrong either with my expression or your comprehension for you to take it that way.
Gillard’s few statements on asylum seekers since becoming PM are, presently, unclear. She’s obviously determined not to demonise them the way Abbott and co are doing, and its probably a wise political move to tell the rednecks they’re not rednecks, even if they are. Unfortunately not all people are as courteous about ‘the other’ as Julia is.
My optimistic hope, gleaned from her first Prime Ministerial statements on the issue, is she will try and explain to people that its only a few thousand being drawn south by hope and gravity, and the ordinary oik shouldn’t get their knickers in a twist about it. At all.
Well, if that’s so, it might work, but the Libs have been pressing the panic button on this for over a decade now, and its their only chance of winning the election, so I don’t have much hope.
Gillard’s few statements on asylum seekers since becoming PM are, presently, unclear. She’s obviously determined not to demonise them the way Abbott and co are doing, and its probably a wise political move to tell the rednecks they’re not rednecks, even if they are. Unfortunately not all people are as courteous about ‘the other’ as Julia is.
My optimistic hope, gleaned from her first Prime Ministerial statements on the issue, is she will try and explain to people that its only a few thousand being drawn south by hope and gravity, and the ordinary oik shouldn’t get their knickers in a twist about it. At all.
Well, if that’s so, it might work, but the Libs have been pressing the panic button on this for over a decade now, and its their only chance of winning the election, so I don’t have much hope.
I wonder at what point we will decide to stop rationalising JGillard’s acts and words as something necessary, because she really in heart meant to do something else.
I sincerely hope that Kevin Rudd wasn’t the last Labor PM and what follows isn’t a future of pragmatic ideological prostitution.
Watch this space.
I wonder at what point we will decide to stop rationalising JGillard’s acts and words as something necessary, because she really in heart meant to do something else.
I sincerely hope that Kevin Rudd wasn’t the last Labor PM and what follows isn’t a future of pragmatic ideological prostitution.
Watch this space.
Thomas since at least 2001 the consistent apology for Labor has run something like this:
(a) Labor would really sincerely like to adopt progressive, socially just policies but unfortunately
(b) If they do, the evil Murdoch media will just misrepresent their position, leading to
(c)The election of those unspeakable conservatives, meaning
(d) All true believers should just bite their tongues and endorse Labor positions that are pretty much indistinguishable from the Libs, in the hope that
(e) At some time in the distant future, the real Labor will emerge and be able to implement some modestly progressive measures.
I am thoroughly sick of being told what Labor leaders would really like to do but how they can’t do it because of some reason or other that boils down to ‘they can’t persuade a majority of people that their position is correct so they have to resort to weaselly poll-driven slipperiness in the hope they don’t upset too many people’.
Boat people have been around for more than a decade. In all that time I have never understood how Labor believes they should be treated. Clearly they still don’t know either. It’s beyond pathetic.
Thomas since at least 2001 the consistent apology for Labor has run something like this:
(a) Labor would really sincerely like to adopt progressive, socially just policies but unfortunately
(b) If they do, the evil Murdoch media will just misrepresent their position, leading to
(c)The election of those unspeakable conservatives, meaning
(d) All true believers should just bite their tongues and endorse Labor positions that are pretty much indistinguishable from the Libs, in the hope that
(e) At some time in the distant future, the real Labor will emerge and be able to implement some modestly progressive measures.
I am thoroughly sick of being told what Labor leaders would really like to do but how they can’t do it because of some reason or other that boils down to ‘they can’t persuade a majority of people that their position is correct so they have to resort to weaselly poll-driven slipperiness in the hope they don’t upset too many people’.
Boat people have been around for more than a decade. In all that time I have never understood how Labor believes they should be treated. Clearly they still don’t know either. It’s beyond pathetic.
To add to my last comment:
Just once it would be nice to see the ALP adopt a principled position on something and then go out to try to persuade the electorate that the position should be supported, in the knowledge that this might take years of patient, persistent effort. It would be a refreshing change to proceed from a conviction that something was the right thing to do, instead of from weekly poll results about what is politically expedient.
To add to my last comment:
Just once it would be nice to see the ALP adopt a principled position on something and then go out to try to persuade the electorate that the position should be supported, in the knowledge that this might take years of patient, persistent effort. It would be a refreshing change to proceed from a conviction that something was the right thing to do, instead of from weekly poll results about what is politically expedient.
Well, I don’t have to wait to be disappointed. The outcome of the ex-RSPT negotiations has disappointed me, not that I ever thought they wouldn’t. For years now I’ve known big business runs governments here, regardless of what us stuck in the street think about it, or not.I’m hoping for a principled statement on asylum seekers that doesn’t treat them like the invading Asian hordes from the north that so terrified our parents and grandparents since before Federation, (something that wasn’t even true during WW2. (If anybody wants to debate that I’ll put a post on my blog in the next few days, and link. )
I’m hoping for a sensible outcome on climate change too. Not the CPRS – something more like a carbon tax where the polluter pays and there is adequate compensation for people on low incomes and welfare. Gillard has hinted at that.
Well, I don’t have to wait to be disappointed. The outcome of the ex-RSPT negotiations has disappointed me, not that I ever thought they wouldn’t. For years now I’ve known big business runs governments here, regardless of what us stuck in the street think about it, or not.I’m hoping for a principled statement on asylum seekers that doesn’t treat them like the invading Asian hordes from the north that so terrified our parents and grandparents since before Federation, (something that wasn’t even true during WW2. (If anybody wants to debate that I’ll put a post on my blog in the next few days, and link. )
I’m hoping for a sensible outcome on climate change too. Not the CPRS – something more like a carbon tax where the polluter pays and there is adequate compensation for people on low incomes and welfare. Gillard has hinted at that.
@Fran Barlow #40
Queenslanders aren’t all racists, thanks Fran. And we understand very well that a big part of the coup to get rid of OUR Prime Minister was southerners deciding that they couldn’t handle being led by someone not from Melbourne or Sydney.
@Fran Barlow #40
Queenslanders aren’t all racists, thanks Fran. And we understand very well that a big part of the coup to get rid of OUR Prime Minister was southerners deciding that they couldn’t handle being led by someone not from Melbourne or Sydney.
Don
I wasn’t targetting you specifically. And I certainly do not accuse you personally of being first, foremostly, and only a misogynist. It was more that you entire post privileged male political values, male political achievements, and male commentatory and judgment on whether Gillard measures up. There is no hint that those male ALP values and characteristics, and personalities, might be problematic, and not worthy of emulation.
In other words, despite us having a Labor PM who is a woman, it as though the past generation’s body of critique by ALP women did not exist.
If you’ve read any of my posts here, you would realise I am Not Happy Jan at how mus vicious and ill-informed bile has been sprayed at Gillard on a blog supposedly a major cheer squad for progressive politics, gender equality, and the Holy Grail of a woman PM. It was just your head that popped at last night raight at the moment, when I had just finished reading more of the bile.
What got my goat was that your post was using standards not only set exclusively by men, but judged by men.
Here, it is a male – Tanner – who gets to speak for Gillard. You cite him as validation of your sneer that from the Left “purportedly.”
Never mind, it is common knowledge she was a leader of the SOCIALIST Forum faction of the ALP; a faction which emerged in horror at Hawke and Keating’s flogging the nation’s silver, and neutering the trade unions. It was Gillard who was one of the key “pragamtists” who achieved a significant advance in ALP gender equity with firstly the 35% quota, Emily’s List. The sort of “pragmatic” work “purportedly” left-wing, without which much of Labor’s front bench, would not be wearing bras, cheap suits not large to cover the beer guts or hairy bum cracks. Paid Parental Leave? Hahahahahah.
Of the mountains of copy out there oj Julia explaining her position on hundred of issues over a 15 year parliamentary career and beyond, you dismiss for a snippet from Julian Burnside in The Drum, for chrissakes. You don’t even think it necessary to cite the Tanner one word quote. Apparently, its authority is immutable as is.
Of all the world’s politicians, why have you compared someone of Gillard’s status – a Prime Minister – with a provincial state premier from 40 years ago? You would never have done that if the PM were a bloke. No Golda Meir, Helen Clarkm Margaret Thatcher, Elenor Roosevelt, Angela Merkel
A “more innovative approach than what” I challenge to name any bloke who could got up what Gillard has so far in education!
And then again on asylum seekers. One again you silence Gillard herself. You quote an upper class bloke (JB) ideological bent on what he claims Gillard said. Then, you just accepted uncritically that bloke’s assessment.
Why did you need the alleged authority of Burnside, if you yourself were aware of “her approach.” Why not just tell what you knew?
Mr. Burnisde needs to be told that of he thinks he could juggle the balls that elected leaders have to, he should put his hand up.
You finish worse than you start.
Any “humanitarian” in particular Don? Presumably one called “Julian” and “Don” too perhaps. No women though!
To the reader of your post not very familiar with Australia, the woman PM finishes an ogre, whose mountains of commentary on asylum seekers and cognate policies are not worth the bother of typing.
While you, yourself Don, are probably not at all misogynist, your laziness has led you to buy into tropes about Gillard and politics generally that ARE misogynist.
Don
I wasn’t targetting you specifically. And I certainly do not accuse you personally of being first, foremostly, and only a misogynist. It was more that you entire post privileged male political values, male political achievements, and male commentatory and judgment on whether Gillard measures up. There is no hint that those male ALP values and characteristics, and personalities, might be problematic, and not worthy of emulation.
In other words, despite us having a Labor PM who is a woman, it as though the past generation’s body of critique by ALP women did not exist.
If you’ve read any of my posts here, you would realise I am Not Happy Jan at how mus vicious and ill-informed bile has been sprayed at Gillard on a blog supposedly a major cheer squad for progressive politics, gender equality, and the Holy Grail of a woman PM. It was just your head that popped at last night raight at the moment, when I had just finished reading more of the bile.
What got my goat was that your post was using standards not only set exclusively by men, but judged by men.
Here, it is a male – Tanner – who gets to speak for Gillard. You cite him as validation of your sneer that from the Left “purportedly.”
Never mind, it is common knowledge she was a leader of the SOCIALIST Forum faction of the ALP; a faction which emerged in horror at Hawke and Keating’s flogging the nation’s silver, and neutering the trade unions. It was Gillard who was one of the key “pragamtists” who achieved a significant advance in ALP gender equity with firstly the 35% quota, Emily’s List. The sort of “pragmatic” work “purportedly” left-wing, without which much of Labor’s front bench, would not be wearing bras, cheap suits not large to cover the beer guts or hairy bum cracks. Paid Parental Leave? Hahahahahah.
Of the mountains of copy out there oj Julia explaining her position on hundred of issues over a 15 year parliamentary career and beyond, you dismiss for a snippet from Julian Burnside in The Drum, for chrissakes. You don’t even think it necessary to cite the Tanner one word quote. Apparently, its authority is immutable as is.
Of all the world’s politicians, why have you compared someone of Gillard’s status – a Prime Minister – with a provincial state premier from 40 years ago? You would never have done that if the PM were a bloke. No Golda Meir, Helen Clarkm Margaret Thatcher, Elenor Roosevelt, Angela Merkel
A “more innovative approach than what” I challenge to name any bloke who could got up what Gillard has so far in education!
And then again on asylum seekers. One again you silence Gillard herself. You quote an upper class bloke (JB) ideological bent on what he claims Gillard said. Then, you just accepted uncritically that bloke’s assessment.
Why did you need the alleged authority of Burnside, if you yourself were aware of “her approach.” Why not just tell what you knew?
Mr. Burnisde needs to be told that of he thinks he could juggle the balls that elected leaders have to, he should put his hand up.
You finish worse than you start.
Any “humanitarian” in particular Don? Presumably one called “Julian” and “Don” too perhaps. No women though!
To the reader of your post not very familiar with Australia, the woman PM finishes an ogre, whose mountains of commentary on asylum seekers and cognate policies are not worth the bother of typing.
While you, yourself Don, are probably not at all misogynist, your laziness has led you to buy into tropes about Gillard and politics generally that ARE misogynist.
I wonder if JGillard proceeds down this right wing path it will give the opportunity for Abbott to label the Labor party Liberal Party B, or Liberal Party wannabes.
Depicting Gillard and her party as attempting to become the Liberal Party reduces contrast and the fear some might have of the Liberals. The unlikely advent of Turnbull coming on the scene would in such circumstance give everyone a bit of a fright as the contrast reduces even further.
I don’t get what Gillard was trying to achieve with her comments. They were totally unnecessary and confusing, unless they have internal polls telling a different story. But you don’t want to put doubts into the mind of your soft supporters or Green preferences. This she has now done. Maybe she thinks there are a few Liberal marginals to pick up.
I wonder if JGillard proceeds down this right wing path it will give the opportunity for Abbott to label the Labor party Liberal Party B, or Liberal Party wannabes.
Depicting Gillard and her party as attempting to become the Liberal Party reduces contrast and the fear some might have of the Liberals. The unlikely advent of Turnbull coming on the scene would in such circumstance give everyone a bit of a fright as the contrast reduces even further.
I don’t get what Gillard was trying to achieve with her comments. They were totally unnecessary and confusing, unless they have internal polls telling a different story. But you don’t want to put doubts into the mind of your soft supporters or Green preferences. This she has now done. Maybe she thinks there are a few Liberal marginals to pick up.
TP
Maybe she has not changed so much, but your perception of her might have always been a little inaccurate, which you are only just realizing. I am detecting an avalanche of this over the past week.
TP
Maybe she has not changed so much, but your perception of her might have always been a little inaccurate, which you are only just realizing. I am detecting an avalanche of this over the past week.
Kim: Ossie, please note that the comments policy precludes attributing motives to other commenters – which you seem to me to be doing. Your comment is also lacking in civility.
Nice sentiments in your comments policy Kim, but let’s be frank, many commenters are labelled as fascist, xenophobic, misogynist etc etc. I’m not sure that the policy is pragmatic, and I for one don’t mind the name calling because of the light it shines on the name caller!
Kim: Ossie, please note that the comments policy precludes attributing motives to other commenters – which you seem to me to be doing. Your comment is also lacking in civility.
Nice sentiments in your comments policy Kim, but let’s be frank, many commenters are labelled as fascist, xenophobic, misogynist etc etc. I’m not sure that the policy is pragmatic, and I for one don’t mind the name calling because of the light it shines on the name caller!
What should Julia do? My spin on the spin.
Offer a bi-partisan reponse to boat arrivals from Afghanistan (a la Vietnam – we are at war in their country – we should assist the displaced etc). Sri Lanka is a tougher call unless Howards comments on Muri can be construed as an act of agression – (quite possibly). But perhaps our war is on the people smugglers over all and on that basis we assist our region – perhaps diffuse the issue by taking more people directly from the refugee camps.Many of these people will have skills we need.
Ensure community integration, no behind bars (unless a potential absconder eg actual suspected smuggler) in areas where infrastructure needs to be assisted.
Target towns needing an injection of capital and population. Appeal to decent, caring communities to help break the redneck cycle. Ask people to help. Invite communities to step up to the plate. We will help you, help others (refugees, homeless, aged, mentally ill etc)
Her statement this afternoon on respecting points of view is the first nibble.
Move on Tony, nothing to see here.
What should Julia do? My spin on the spin.
Offer a bi-partisan reponse to boat arrivals from Afghanistan (a la Vietnam – we are at war in their country – we should assist the displaced etc). Sri Lanka is a tougher call unless Howards comments on Muri can be construed as an act of agression – (quite possibly). But perhaps our war is on the people smugglers over all and on that basis we assist our region – perhaps diffuse the issue by taking more people directly from the refugee camps.Many of these people will have skills we need.
Ensure community integration, no behind bars (unless a potential absconder eg actual suspected smuggler) in areas where infrastructure needs to be assisted.
Target towns needing an injection of capital and population. Appeal to decent, caring communities to help break the redneck cycle. Ask people to help. Invite communities to step up to the plate. We will help you, help others (refugees, homeless, aged, mentally ill etc)
Her statement this afternoon on respecting points of view is the first nibble.
Move on Tony, nothing to see here.
Fascinated
What should Julia do? Win the bloody election.
Fascinated
What should Julia do? Win the bloody election.
That too Ossie.
That too Ossie.
She should have to do little else than answer any question thrown at her with “I am not Tony Abbott.”
She should have to do little else than answer any question thrown at her with “I am not Tony Abbott.”
What about the Vietnamese boat people, Fascinated says?
What about the Vietnamese boat people, Fascinated says?
My last sentence at 61 still applies, Ossie.
‘You cite him as validation of your sneer that from the Left “purportedly.” ‘
Good heavens, I was only relaying what was attributed to Tanner, not validating an alleged sneer at the left “purportedly”. I could apply the same to Tanner himself, who was one of the first to endorse a privatising of Telstra with a scheme which would have been much better than the Howard one – the state hang on to the infrastructure and sell off the retail (they are starting to move in that direction with Broadband now anyway).
That was really the point I was making about the blurring of the old left-right divide. I don’t think there’s necessarily a predictable positioning on many issues and it’s a matter of working with what you’ve got. It’s a trend that started at least as far back as Brian Howe who had to work social justice in with the Keating-Hawke economic rationalist approach. I don’t deplore the trend. Better to get some achievements than none, and if you combine them with responsibility they might be lasting.
You missed the point of my reference to Dunstan. Of course there are differences between state and national and I’d never deny that Gough had a much harder time of it than Don. It was the way he did things. He took his defeat in 1968 (with 53% of the vote!) very hard, and resolved that it was important that he carry the public with him. He didn’t abandon innovation but used his considerable public skills to convince the public that there was little to fear and plenty to gain from change.
That is all that I meant by carrying the middle. She’s not going to fall over while she does that.
Without wishing to be too pedantic I made no reference to Julian Burnside. It was Barnes, and I was only summarising what he was saying, not supporting it. The point I was attempting to make, obviously unsuccessfully in your case, was that she was successful in the shadow portfolio. She took it out of the Howard wedge arena. And she got Ruddock. There was probably another that Barnes conceded and I didn’t make much of: that women and children should not be behind the razor wire. This ultimately put the coalition much more on the defensive on the whole asylum seeker strategy.
OK, you’ve made a point about international female leaders and my comments were comparing with males. But the topic was: can she be another Bob Hawke. It’s not unreasonable to mention Hawke in that context. Mine was a more parochial look, and there were not a lot of earlier female leaders on offer. She has risen to a much bigger position than, say Enid Lyon did.
“Any “humanitarian” in particular Don? Presumably one called “Julian” and “Don” too perhaps. No women though!”
I think you’re dissecting too much into a general remark. Would Marilyn Shepherd satisfy that question?
My last sentence at 61 still applies, Ossie.
‘You cite him as validation of your sneer that from the Left “purportedly.” ‘
Good heavens, I was only relaying what was attributed to Tanner, not validating an alleged sneer at the left “purportedly”. I could apply the same to Tanner himself, who was one of the first to endorse a privatising of Telstra with a scheme which would have been much better than the Howard one – the state hang on to the infrastructure and sell off the retail (they are starting to move in that direction with Broadband now anyway).
That was really the point I was making about the blurring of the old left-right divide. I don’t think there’s necessarily a predictable positioning on many issues and it’s a matter of working with what you’ve got. It’s a trend that started at least as far back as Brian Howe who had to work social justice in with the Keating-Hawke economic rationalist approach. I don’t deplore the trend. Better to get some achievements than none, and if you combine them with responsibility they might be lasting.
You missed the point of my reference to Dunstan. Of course there are differences between state and national and I’d never deny that Gough had a much harder time of it than Don. It was the way he did things. He took his defeat in 1968 (with 53% of the vote!) very hard, and resolved that it was important that he carry the public with him. He didn’t abandon innovation but used his considerable public skills to convince the public that there was little to fear and plenty to gain from change.
That is all that I meant by carrying the middle. She’s not going to fall over while she does that.
Without wishing to be too pedantic I made no reference to Julian Burnside. It was Barnes, and I was only summarising what he was saying, not supporting it. The point I was attempting to make, obviously unsuccessfully in your case, was that she was successful in the shadow portfolio. She took it out of the Howard wedge arena. And she got Ruddock. There was probably another that Barnes conceded and I didn’t make much of: that women and children should not be behind the razor wire. This ultimately put the coalition much more on the defensive on the whole asylum seeker strategy.
OK, you’ve made a point about international female leaders and my comments were comparing with males. But the topic was: can she be another Bob Hawke. It’s not unreasonable to mention Hawke in that context. Mine was a more parochial look, and there were not a lot of earlier female leaders on offer. She has risen to a much bigger position than, say Enid Lyon did.
“Any “humanitarian” in particular Don? Presumably one called “Julian” and “Don” too perhaps. No women though!”
I think you’re dissecting too much into a general remark. Would Marilyn Shepherd satisfy that question?
Don
As I kinda hinted, I think you are right, and I am reading too much into what you wrote. That’s why my subsequent post tried to cool it a bit by making my point not about you, per se. To be truthful, I could have done a much better job. :
But the fact remains, there is a hella lot of this stuff going on, particularly by people, I would have expected to be more thoughtful.
Don
As I kinda hinted, I think you are right, and I am reading too much into what you wrote. That’s why my subsequent post tried to cool it a bit by making my point not about you, per se. To be truthful, I could have done a much better job. :
But the fact remains, there is a hella lot of this stuff going on, particularly by people, I would have expected to be more thoughtful.
Well said Ken Lovell. It is indeed beyond pathetic and will remain so when people believe that winning a bloody election is an end in itself.
Well said Ken Lovell. It is indeed beyond pathetic and will remain so when people believe that winning a bloody election is an end in itself.
@ossie
Gillards not a saint, you know, or a champion of the left. She’s from the Ferguson Left fraction in Victoria, who always fold to the Right. That’s why the proper Socialist Left, especially in Victoria, don’t like or trust her. It’s not because she’s a woman, it’s because she sold out her own faction time and again.
@ossie
Gillards not a saint, you know, or a champion of the left. She’s from the Ferguson Left fraction in Victoria, who always fold to the Right. That’s why the proper Socialist Left, especially in Victoria, don’t like or trust her. It’s not because she’s a woman, it’s because she sold out her own faction time and again.
Paul Burns:
I’d love to see that post since it seems out of sync with most received wisdom about people’s attitudes towards the Japanese during WWII. I hope you’re not projecting modern attitudes into the past.
Paul Burns:
I’d love to see that post since it seems out of sync with most received wisdom about people’s attitudes towards the Japanese during WWII. I hope you’re not projecting modern attitudes into the past.
Don
I have quite a lot to say on the Gillard/Hawke comparison. But its probably better discussed when things have cooled down a bit.
Don
I have quite a lot to say on the Gillard/Hawke comparison. But its probably better discussed when things have cooled down a bit.
Ossie, with respect, but I think you’re the one reading too much into things here. What you seem to be arguing is that only women (and those who support her at that!) should be able to have opinions about Julia Gillard, and that comparing her to anyone but another prime minister (but not a male one, or something) is verboten. Burnside has been a refugee advocate for decades, I think he’s entitled to comment on prime ministers in that area, male or female.
Dunstan was one of Australia’s most popular, charismatic, and progressive politicians, and he has been compared – repeatedly – with politicians both male and female, left and right. Frankly, I would think it’s an honour to be compared to Dunstan!
Ironically, though you complain about unfair comparisons, you keep doing it yourself; no male minister could perform like she did with the education portfolio – well that’s a somewhat redundant hypothetical.
Also, fyi, Emily’s List (in Australia) was established in 1994 by Joan Kirner, four years before Gillard joined parliament, so I would suggest the credit doesn’t rest entirely with her.
I think this is a pretty fraught topic, but I would urge you not to take it out on Don for his mild-mannered, and I feel quite non-misogynist comment.
Ossie, with respect, but I think you’re the one reading too much into things here. What you seem to be arguing is that only women (and those who support her at that!) should be able to have opinions about Julia Gillard, and that comparing her to anyone but another prime minister (but not a male one, or something) is verboten. Burnside has been a refugee advocate for decades, I think he’s entitled to comment on prime ministers in that area, male or female.
Dunstan was one of Australia’s most popular, charismatic, and progressive politicians, and he has been compared – repeatedly – with politicians both male and female, left and right. Frankly, I would think it’s an honour to be compared to Dunstan!
Ironically, though you complain about unfair comparisons, you keep doing it yourself; no male minister could perform like she did with the education portfolio – well that’s a somewhat redundant hypothetical.
Also, fyi, Emily’s List (in Australia) was established in 1994 by Joan Kirner, four years before Gillard joined parliament, so I would suggest the credit doesn’t rest entirely with her.
I think this is a pretty fraught topic, but I would urge you not to take it out on Don for his mild-mannered, and I feel quite non-misogynist comment.
john
Oh and have no delusion whatsoever she is any kind of socialist.
john
Oh and have no delusion whatsoever she is any kind of socialist.
Up until Brian Burke, in 1982, and Hawke in 1983, I had only voted Labor. After ’83 I’ve voted Greens with preference to the ALP (except for the last state election). So there was a lot I didn’t like about Hawke, but we can be grateful that we had the neo-liberalism that was sweeping the world applied by Hawke, rather than say Thatcher or Reagan.
Hawke’s consensus was a lot better than Thatcher’s confrontation. Julia Gillard’s consensus approach is likely to be better than any other way of doing things. I too like to cite Whitlam’s legacy as justification of his brief period as PM. But Jeff Kennett also left a lasting legacy – be careful what you wish for in ‘crash through’ leaders.
It’s already a few days ago that I came to the conclusion that many of the anti-Julia comments here were sexist – there isn’t any other reason for the degree of animosity. Julia’s history seems to demonstrate her principles – her university politics, working for Slater & Gordon, and going into politics for the left.
Her resolution of the RSPT was the best anyone could expect. I’ve heard her, briefly, on the radio say careful but humane things about refugees: this is a really difficult topic for politicians in nearly every western country. I hope she does not listen to the superior types on this thread who think you don’t need to speak or listen to a large section of the community – that way lies another 12 years in opppsition. Let’s she what she does – remembering that she is a team player, and what she says will try to represent the whole caucus. It won’t be just Julia to blame if the government does something you don’t like.
Finally, remember what she said about standing for the leadership because she didn’t want Abbott to become PM. (And as far as I know, she was a loyal deputy, she didn’t scheme her way into it). If you’re thinking of not voting ALP, have a look at what the Conservatives are proposing for government in the U.K., starting with 25% – 40% cuts in government spending.
Up until Brian Burke, in 1982, and Hawke in 1983, I had only voted Labor. After ’83 I’ve voted Greens with preference to the ALP (except for the last state election). So there was a lot I didn’t like about Hawke, but we can be grateful that we had the neo-liberalism that was sweeping the world applied by Hawke, rather than say Thatcher or Reagan.
Hawke’s consensus was a lot better than Thatcher’s confrontation. Julia Gillard’s consensus approach is likely to be better than any other way of doing things. I too like to cite Whitlam’s legacy as justification of his brief period as PM. But Jeff Kennett also left a lasting legacy – be careful what you wish for in ‘crash through’ leaders.
It’s already a few days ago that I came to the conclusion that many of the anti-Julia comments here were sexist – there isn’t any other reason for the degree of animosity. Julia’s history seems to demonstrate her principles – her university politics, working for Slater & Gordon, and going into politics for the left.
Her resolution of the RSPT was the best anyone could expect. I’ve heard her, briefly, on the radio say careful but humane things about refugees: this is a really difficult topic for politicians in nearly every western country. I hope she does not listen to the superior types on this thread who think you don’t need to speak or listen to a large section of the community – that way lies another 12 years in opppsition. Let’s she what she does – remembering that she is a team player, and what she says will try to represent the whole caucus. It won’t be just Julia to blame if the government does something you don’t like.
Finally, remember what she said about standing for the leadership because she didn’t want Abbott to become PM. (And as far as I know, she was a loyal deputy, she didn’t scheme her way into it). If you’re thinking of not voting ALP, have a look at what the Conservatives are proposing for government in the U.K., starting with 25% – 40% cuts in government spending.
Good that it’s clarified, Ossie.
Also, I should have mentioned that my other reason for mentioning Dunstan was that his dominance was there in SA when she was nurtured. I’m kind of hoping that she’s absorbed some of his example and influence into her own beliefs.
Her family’s impoverished Welsh background, with folk inspirations from Nye Bevan and Lloyd George is another pretty good heritage.
She has, of course, developed entirely her own style and it has been pretty effective to this point. I can’t think of a parliamentarian that has outshone her.
There has been a bit of carping here, partly based on the suddenness of Rudd’s demise. I haven’t been in that corner. In fact I’m a fan.
But as I said in my first post, it’s a bit wait and see.
Good that it’s clarified, Ossie.
Also, I should have mentioned that my other reason for mentioning Dunstan was that his dominance was there in SA when she was nurtured. I’m kind of hoping that she’s absorbed some of his example and influence into her own beliefs.
Her family’s impoverished Welsh background, with folk inspirations from Nye Bevan and Lloyd George is another pretty good heritage.
She has, of course, developed entirely her own style and it has been pretty effective to this point. I can’t think of a parliamentarian that has outshone her.
There has been a bit of carping here, partly based on the suddenness of Rudd’s demise. I haven’t been in that corner. In fact I’m a fan.
But as I said in my first post, it’s a bit wait and see.
You have missed the context of my whole post.
(a.) My accusatory tone is directed at those who are happy for Gillard to rest on her laurels and not use her promise to build on the work of all those leader’s shoulders she is now standing on.
I only apologise for not phrasing ‘middle aged liberal professional feminist’ as ‘certain middle aged liberal professional feminists’. Otherwise I do think some of those people are likely to be the most senior members of the new coalition of the complacent, along with those other sections I mention.
(b.) What makes you think I reckon Labor ex-state secretaries or Joe De Bruyn are the bottom of the barrel? That first group contains Swan and Smith. I normally don’t have a problem with either.
I don’t hate the SDA’s boss or any other union type for the sake of hating a particular union.
I think you’re confusing me with the genuine self-indulgent, squabbling radicals from around here and elsewhere who don’t realise it’s 2010.
(c.) Religion, or lack thereof. Gillard had previously refused to answer a Sunday Age questionnaire about personal faith, yet both Nicola Roxon and I believe Lindsay Tanner were happy to declare themselves atheists on that form. Hell, Roxon renounces her parents’ Jewish faith! That’s a big thing for her as a Melbourne MP to do, as the relationship between the Victorian ALP Left and the Jewish community has historically been very delicate.
I would like to see evidence the new PM ever declared herself atheist between the time she became a national figure in the
Lathamlate Howard era and assuming the current job.Otherwise it peeves me she didn’t just do a Keating and refuse to discuss the subject at all. Now it looks like just another part of a greater media strategy. PowerPoint presentation sez: give the Cultural Left a bone before you move hard Right on asylum seekers…
You have missed the context of my whole post.
(a.) My accusatory tone is directed at those who are happy for Gillard to rest on her laurels and not use her promise to build on the work of all those leader’s shoulders she is now standing on.
I only apologise for not phrasing ‘middle aged liberal professional feminist’ as ‘certain middle aged liberal professional feminists’. Otherwise I do think some of those people are likely to be the most senior members of the new coalition of the complacent, along with those other sections I mention.
(b.) What makes you think I reckon Labor ex-state secretaries or Joe De Bruyn are the bottom of the barrel? That first group contains Swan and Smith. I normally don’t have a problem with either.
I don’t hate the SDA’s boss or any other union type for the sake of hating a particular union.
I think you’re confusing me with the genuine self-indulgent, squabbling radicals from around here and elsewhere who don’t realise it’s 2010.
(c.) Religion, or lack thereof. Gillard had previously refused to answer a Sunday Age questionnaire about personal faith, yet both Nicola Roxon and I believe Lindsay Tanner were happy to declare themselves atheists on that form. Hell, Roxon renounces her parents’ Jewish faith! That’s a big thing for her as a Melbourne MP to do, as the relationship between the Victorian ALP Left and the Jewish community has historically been very delicate.
I would like to see evidence the new PM ever declared herself atheist between the time she became a national figure in the
Lathamlate Howard era and assuming the current job.Otherwise it peeves me she didn’t just do a Keating and refuse to discuss the subject at all. Now it looks like just another part of a greater media strategy. PowerPoint presentation sez: give the Cultural Left a bone before you move hard Right on asylum seekers…
ossie @ 77 talks about people, I would have expected to be more thoughtful. I’ve been surprised at the tone of comment here too, but then it must be remembered that we are all still recovering from the shock of the spill. It’s a bit like PTSD. I don’t recall anything quite like it since 11/11/75. And it’s different from then too. It’s polarised people against each other on the left. Back then we were entirely united in our outrage. We need time and breathing space to recover.
ossie @ 77 talks about people, I would have expected to be more thoughtful. I’ve been surprised at the tone of comment here too, but then it must be remembered that we are all still recovering from the shock of the spill. It’s a bit like PTSD. I don’t recall anything quite like it since 11/11/75. And it’s different from then too. It’s polarised people against each other on the left. Back then we were entirely united in our outrage. We need time and breathing space to recover.
PatriciaWA@54: As they used to say in the olden days, right on.
PatriciaWA@54: As they used to say in the olden days, right on.
Hi patrick
As I replied to Don, yes I agree I went overboard on “deconstructing” Don. As we’ve agreed to shake hands, its probably best if we don’t continue that dust up. But just to clarify, in no way was I denying the role of women other than Gillard in the real progress made re gender equity in the ALP. Of course, you are right about Joan Kirner’s leadership role in creating Emily’s List. But I didn’t say otherwise. What I said was
But I am glad that you mentioned Kirner, as so far, people have only mentioned her as an example of Labor only ever elevating a woman, when catastrophic defeat is inevitable.
Hi patrick
As I replied to Don, yes I agree I went overboard on “deconstructing” Don. As we’ve agreed to shake hands, its probably best if we don’t continue that dust up. But just to clarify, in no way was I denying the role of women other than Gillard in the real progress made re gender equity in the ALP. Of course, you are right about Joan Kirner’s leadership role in creating Emily’s List. But I didn’t say otherwise. What I said was
But I am glad that you mentioned Kirner, as so far, people have only mentioned her as an example of Labor only ever elevating a woman, when catastrophic defeat is inevitable.
The new Bob Hawke?
Judging by the weekend’s dog whistling I’d say she’s fast looking like the new John Howard. All that political correctness offending ordinary Australians. Yay for deja vu…
The new Bob Hawke?
Judging by the weekend’s dog whistling I’d say she’s fast looking like the new John Howard. All that political correctness offending ordinary Australians. Yay for deja vu…
OB @ 81,
Will knock it up in the next few days and put it on my blog.
Its an historical debate that’s been taking place in Oz history for about ten years now. The present main proponent is Peter Stanley with his Invading Australia Working on both Australian and translated Japanese sources, I was one of the first to raise the argument in The Brisbane Line Controversy. Political Opportunism versus National Security, 1942-45.
Will link to an appropriate thread on LP when I’ve done it.
Apologies to all for going OT.
OB @ 81,
Will knock it up in the next few days and put it on my blog.
Its an historical debate that’s been taking place in Oz history for about ten years now. The present main proponent is Peter Stanley with his Invading Australia Working on both Australian and translated Japanese sources, I was one of the first to raise the argument in The Brisbane Line Controversy. Political Opportunism versus National Security, 1942-45.
Will link to an appropriate thread on LP when I’ve done it.
Apologies to all for going OT.
More dog whistling to come, probably of the kind that if one John Howard were the whistler we would all be condemning it from here to eternity.
I wish just one journalist would as her what ‘political correctness’ actually means, but nobody ever asked Howard either.
More dog whistling to come, probably of the kind that if one John Howard were the whistler we would all be condemning it from here to eternity.
I wish just one journalist would as her what ‘political correctness’ actually means, but nobody ever asked Howard either.
Political correctness is in fact far more than the use of gender/race/colour/sexuality neutral terms. When I went to uni, people used to call it ideological soundness. “PC”, with all its left-fascism hallmarks had not yet been invented in the US, but believe me it was around in Australia. It is a left wing, often far left wing intolerance of any opposing view (even those of the left) and as such should be strongly condemned in any free democratic society. Good on yer, Julia.
Political correctness is in fact far more than the use of gender/race/colour/sexuality neutral terms. When I went to uni, people used to call it ideological soundness. “PC”, with all its left-fascism hallmarks had not yet been invented in the US, but believe me it was around in Australia. It is a left wing, often far left wing intolerance of any opposing view (even those of the left) and as such should be strongly condemned in any free democratic society. Good on yer, Julia.
So, in that case Paul (assuming that your eccentric definition is accurate) what is the term for far right wing ‘intolerance of any opposing view’?
And where are these ‘far left’ views that have influenced public discourse to such an extent that a special term has been coined for them. Please give me the names of some of those who publicly profess such views so that I can judge for myself what a ‘far left’ view actually is in Australia in 2010.
So, in that case Paul (assuming that your eccentric definition is accurate) what is the term for far right wing ‘intolerance of any opposing view’?
And where are these ‘far left’ views that have influenced public discourse to such an extent that a special term has been coined for them. Please give me the names of some of those who publicly profess such views so that I can judge for myself what a ‘far left’ view actually is in Australia in 2010.
Not too much left to be said after JGillard’s rather large jump to the right on boat people. I think she landed in the lap of Ericabetz, now they are snogging.
Howard’s use of the term ‘politically correct’ was usually just before he was about to give implied approval for the demonisation of some minority or other. Gillard’s use of it was a means to justify pretty much the same, nasty dangerous boat people. Turn them back.
As I have said in a few years people will be remarking on the similarities of JGillard and JHoward’s use of language. (if not their ideology)
The dumping of the ETS is now also looking like an indication on Gillar’s position on CC / GW.
Dear Malcolm, get out that old ETS, dump Abbott, come to the left on drowning boat people and maybe we get a contest.
Not too much left to be said after JGillard’s rather large jump to the right on boat people. I think she landed in the lap of Ericabetz, now they are snogging.
Howard’s use of the term ‘politically correct’ was usually just before he was about to give implied approval for the demonisation of some minority or other. Gillard’s use of it was a means to justify pretty much the same, nasty dangerous boat people. Turn them back.
As I have said in a few years people will be remarking on the similarities of JGillard and JHoward’s use of language. (if not their ideology)
The dumping of the ETS is now also looking like an indication on Gillar’s position on CC / GW.
Dear Malcolm, get out that old ETS, dump Abbott, come to the left on drowning boat people and maybe we get a contest.
Ken L:
Just once it would be nice to see the ALP adopt a principled position on something and then go out to try to persuade the electorate that the position should be supported, in the knowledge that this might take years of patient, persistent effort. It would be a refreshing change to proceed from a conviction that something was the right thing to do, instead of from weekly poll results about what is politically expedient.
A. FRIGGIN. MEN.
Ken L:
Just once it would be nice to see the ALP adopt a principled position on something and then go out to try to persuade the electorate that the position should be supported, in the knowledge that this might take years of patient, persistent effort. It would be a refreshing change to proceed from a conviction that something was the right thing to do, instead of from weekly poll results about what is politically expedient.
A. FRIGGIN. MEN.
As I have said in a few years people will be remarking on the similarities of JGillard and JHoward’s use of language. (if not their ideology)
Michelle Grattan’s done it already.
Very, very disappointed. Gutted.
As I have said in a few years people will be remarking on the similarities of JGillard and JHoward’s use of language. (if not their ideology)
Michelle Grattan’s done it already.
Very, very disappointed. Gutted.
The point is that these particular ‘supporters’ have been determined by those in control of the ALP to be so small in number as to be politically insignificant and therefore dispensible.
The point is that these particular ‘supporters’ have been determined by those in control of the ALP to be so small in number as to be politically insignificant and therefore dispensible.
Helen …
so may it be indeed. What is the point of having a Labor Party if it is just the same as the coalition?
Helen …
so may it be indeed. What is the point of having a Labor Party if it is just the same as the coalition?
I know how you feel, Helen. If someone could remind me why the previous PM was removed from office?
Those that may consider the following as good reasons need not waste their time:
- Was going to lose the next election, even though the polls indicated that he would most probably win.
- Couldn’t get on with his staff and was a nasty workaholic.
- Was a poor communicator, but apparently must have been a better communicator than the renowned political genius that he overthrew in, you know, the election.
- Didn’t consult with the party enough, except for those who are now in positions of authority now like the new PM and deputy PM.
- Wasn’t really very nice behind closed doors.
- It’s happened now so let’s all get behind the new leader moving forward.
Have I missed anything?
I know how you feel, Helen. If someone could remind me why the previous PM was removed from office?
Those that may consider the following as good reasons need not waste their time:
- Was going to lose the next election, even though the polls indicated that he would most probably win.
- Couldn’t get on with his staff and was a nasty workaholic.
- Was a poor communicator, but apparently must have been a better communicator than the renowned political genius that he overthrew in, you know, the election.
- Didn’t consult with the party enough, except for those who are now in positions of authority now like the new PM and deputy PM.
- Wasn’t really very nice behind closed doors.
- It’s happened now so let’s all get behind the new leader moving forward.
Have I missed anything?
adrian,
I oppose any infringement of free speech, whether it comes from the right or the left. If one cannot work out differences of opinion through reasoned discussion or an agreement to disagree,(not necessarily respectful) rather than the shutting down of debate, there’s not much hope for the survival of democracy, only an imposition of a fascism of either the right or the left. (Albeit, the right do it with an immense hypocrisy, opposing “poliitical correctness”, while ensuring the flourishing of an illiberal neo-conservatism.
adrian,
I oppose any infringement of free speech, whether it comes from the right or the left. If one cannot work out differences of opinion through reasoned discussion or an agreement to disagree,(not necessarily respectful) rather than the shutting down of debate, there’s not much hope for the survival of democracy, only an imposition of a fascism of either the right or the left. (Albeit, the right do it with an immense hypocrisy, opposing “poliitical correctness”, while ensuring the flourishing of an illiberal neo-conservatism.
Paul Burns
Thank you for this long overdue correction of the misuse and ill-informed claims of the meaning and origin of “political correctness.” As you say it is a far-left term. The actual term “PC” comes from the US leftist scene of the 1980s (though obviously started earlier). While the Australian far left phrase “correct line” is very close there are some significant differences.
I first encountered “correct line” at uni in the 1980s as a member of Left Action, but it originated in the late 1920s/1930s, with the Australian CPA purges of anybody who dared question Comintern directives from Moscow.
Comintern had decided that the “correct line” was that ALP was “socially fascist” and an enemy of the working class. Thus any CPA member who dared to demur was kicked out, vilified, and even beaten. The Cominmtern “correct line” directives continued, and Australan far Leftists kept adding to them long after Comintern’s demise.
Unfortunately, the heirs of correct line thinking are still with us today, many posting on LP.
By the late 1980s, Left Action had a correct line on El Salvador, Palestine, child care, banning a certain beer brand, and on and on.
In the US, “political correctness” was a movement started not by people demanding that the weak and marginalised be treated with respect. That phenomenon was known as “campus speech codes.”
PC was about the demand by far left academics that the “correct” answer to academic issues in the humanities and social sciences was to be found in “correct” political frameworks – genocide of the Native Americans, no biological differences between men and women and so on.
I urge Julia Gillard to announce an address to the nation, where she declares a War on Politcial Correctness, where no prisoners will be taken.
Paul Burns
Thank you for this long overdue correction of the misuse and ill-informed claims of the meaning and origin of “political correctness.” As you say it is a far-left term. The actual term “PC” comes from the US leftist scene of the 1980s (though obviously started earlier). While the Australian far left phrase “correct line” is very close there are some significant differences.
I first encountered “correct line” at uni in the 1980s as a member of Left Action, but it originated in the late 1920s/1930s, with the Australian CPA purges of anybody who dared question Comintern directives from Moscow.
Comintern had decided that the “correct line” was that ALP was “socially fascist” and an enemy of the working class. Thus any CPA member who dared to demur was kicked out, vilified, and even beaten. The Cominmtern “correct line” directives continued, and Australan far Leftists kept adding to them long after Comintern’s demise.
Unfortunately, the heirs of correct line thinking are still with us today, many posting on LP.
By the late 1980s, Left Action had a correct line on El Salvador, Palestine, child care, banning a certain beer brand, and on and on.
In the US, “political correctness” was a movement started not by people demanding that the weak and marginalised be treated with respect. That phenomenon was known as “campus speech codes.”
PC was about the demand by far left academics that the “correct” answer to academic issues in the humanities and social sciences was to be found in “correct” political frameworks – genocide of the Native Americans, no biological differences between men and women and so on.
I urge Julia Gillard to announce an address to the nation, where she declares a War on Politcial Correctness, where no prisoners will be taken.
“Have I missed anything?”
That the assessment was made that Julia would do a better job and get a better result in the coming election.
“What is the point of having a Labor Party if it is just the same as the coalition?”
Fran, people said the same of Blair /Brown …. now that Cameron is PM you begin to see the difference.
“Have I missed anything?”
That the assessment was made that Julia would do a better job and get a better result in the coming election.
“What is the point of having a Labor Party if it is just the same as the coalition?”
Fran, people said the same of Blair /Brown …. now that Cameron is PM you begin to see the difference.
Post is in moderation. Did I use a spam-sensitive word?
Post is in moderation. Did I use a spam-sensitive word?
The problem with having two parties over to the right is that it drags the centre to the right. And the eventual result of that you worry could be a continual drift to the right as the Liberals try to differentiate themselves and Labor chase them.
The problem with having two parties over to the right is that it drags the centre to the right. And the eventual result of that you worry could be a continual drift to the right as the Liberals try to differentiate themselves and Labor chase them.
“Ken L:
Just once it would be nice to see the ALP adopt a principled position on something and then go out to try to persuade the electorate that the position should be supported, in the knowledge that this might take years of patient, persistent effort. It would be a refreshing change to proceed from a conviction that something was the right thing to do, instead of from weekly poll results about what is politically expedient.
A. FRIGGIN. MEN.”
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Leadership is about doing what is right and making it popular, not the other way around.
“Ken L:
Just once it would be nice to see the ALP adopt a principled position on something and then go out to try to persuade the electorate that the position should be supported, in the knowledge that this might take years of patient, persistent effort. It would be a refreshing change to proceed from a conviction that something was the right thing to do, instead of from weekly poll results about what is politically expedient.
A. FRIGGIN. MEN.”
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Leadership is about doing what is right and making it popular, not the other way around.
Why don’t we wait until JG announces her policy on this? Then we can see if she is bringing anything new to this to differentiate the government from the opposition. There’s a lot of supposition and posturing here before we know what her line is actually going to be. Is it possible she’s trying to get the opposition to do that too and overplay its hand?
Why don’t we wait until JG announces her policy on this? Then we can see if she is bringing anything new to this to differentiate the government from the opposition. There’s a lot of supposition and posturing here before we know what her line is actually going to be. Is it possible she’s trying to get the opposition to do that too and overplay its hand?
I haven’t yet heard the context, but I for one wouldn’t lose much sleep over referring to “political correctness”.
A few years back as a workplace delegate I attended a meeting on Equal Employment Opportunity within my department. I brought up the situation of a female who had been waiting for ages for a transfer, with nothing much happening. I started the discussion, “This lass in my region…” and never got any further. Shot down by all other delegates complaining at how dare I use such a sexist expression. It even ended up on my personnel file.
“Lass” in some circles unknown to me or the dictionaries I used was apparently considered an expression of derision. Sometimes we can spend too much time on the language and not enough on the action or behaviour.
97. Don’t be too hard on men, Helen. Last one I knew to show such courage was Don Dunstan… a man. But I’ve said too much already about him.
I haven’t yet heard the context, but I for one wouldn’t lose much sleep over referring to “political correctness”.
A few years back as a workplace delegate I attended a meeting on Equal Employment Opportunity within my department. I brought up the situation of a female who had been waiting for ages for a transfer, with nothing much happening. I started the discussion, “This lass in my region…” and never got any further. Shot down by all other delegates complaining at how dare I use such a sexist expression. It even ended up on my personnel file.
“Lass” in some circles unknown to me or the dictionaries I used was apparently considered an expression of derision. Sometimes we can spend too much time on the language and not enough on the action or behaviour.
97. Don’t be too hard on men, Helen. Last one I knew to show such courage was Don Dunstan… a man. But I’ve said too much already about him.
Some years back, an American chap, admittedly seen widely as a kind of radical, spoke as folows.
That was in 1952 … more than 40 years later, in 1986, he continued the thought:
He wasn’t my kind of radical, but passing over his references to God and the divine, what he said counts as progressive and liberal.
I wonder who in Australia today would dare express themselves on refugees in these terms.
I leave it to others to recall who uttered these words.
Some years back, an American chap, admittedly seen widely as a kind of radical, spoke as folows.
That was in 1952 … more than 40 years later, in 1986, he continued the thought:
He wasn’t my kind of radical, but passing over his references to God and the divine, what he said counts as progressive and liberal.
I wonder who in Australia today would dare express themselves on refugees in these terms.
I leave it to others to recall who uttered these words.
Don @108: Read it again. A.FRIGGIN.MEN. Does not refer to men!
Don @108: Read it again. A.FRIGGIN.MEN. Does not refer to men!
That’s the first laugh I’ve had in days.
That’s the first laugh I’ve had in days.
“Lass” in some circles unknown to me or the dictionaries I used was apparently considered an expression of derision. Sometimes we can spend too much time on the language and not enough on the action or behaviour.
I know it hurts to be pulled up on something. but the use of “lass” or the much more common “girl” to refer to a grown woman is a problem in our society, because this language infantilises and allows a picture of infantilised women to enter the back of our minds, thereby militating in a very subtle way against our acceptance of women in authority or in positions of responsibility. along with other archetypes, such as mother, schoolmarm, etc.
I wouldn’t blame you entirely for something that had been part of the cultural landscape for so long at the time of the event you mentioned, but it’s a good thing to get these tropes out and pull them apart.
Also, Paul Burns, beware of people using the words “political correctness” for things which are merely a minimal level of respect, or good manners. People use “PC” every day to try and get away with racist or belittling language or actions. It’s the weasel word to end all weasel words. “Asshole politics” has such a grip on the popular imagination I’ve heard people say they’re “politically correct” when they’re just displaying good manners, or doing the right thing, as opposed to being a tool. A blogger called Zuky wrote the go-to post on “PC”, unfortunately his blog is down. Caz Cooke also wrote a bottler of a short article on it, I should ask her permission to reprint it.
[/derail] – sorry.
“Lass” in some circles unknown to me or the dictionaries I used was apparently considered an expression of derision. Sometimes we can spend too much time on the language and not enough on the action or behaviour.
I know it hurts to be pulled up on something. but the use of “lass” or the much more common “girl” to refer to a grown woman is a problem in our society, because this language infantilises and allows a picture of infantilised women to enter the back of our minds, thereby militating in a very subtle way against our acceptance of women in authority or in positions of responsibility. along with other archetypes, such as mother, schoolmarm, etc.
I wouldn’t blame you entirely for something that had been part of the cultural landscape for so long at the time of the event you mentioned, but it’s a good thing to get these tropes out and pull them apart.
Also, Paul Burns, beware of people using the words “political correctness” for things which are merely a minimal level of respect, or good manners. People use “PC” every day to try and get away with racist or belittling language or actions. It’s the weasel word to end all weasel words. “Asshole politics” has such a grip on the popular imagination I’ve heard people say they’re “politically correct” when they’re just displaying good manners, or doing the right thing, as opposed to being a tool. A blogger called Zuky wrote the go-to post on “PC”, unfortunately his blog is down. Caz Cooke also wrote a bottler of a short article on it, I should ask her permission to reprint it.
[/derail] – sorry.
Fran @ 100 – Howard’s greatest legacy is … the ALP – at least as it exists now.
Fran @ 100 – Howard’s greatest legacy is … the ALP – at least as it exists now.
That’s Bronwyn Bishop using the word “girl” on Twitter, and it illustrates how language is used in the ways Helen points out.
That’s Bronwyn Bishop using the word “girl” on Twitter, and it illustrates how language is used in the ways Helen points out.
Fran – perhaps appropriate to qute an actor? Julia’s dealing with a real, thorny issue – how many other leaders currently are doing well with this?
Can you remember back, even before Reagan, at how many times we had our hearts broken (George McGovern?) by people with high ideals who didn’t weren’t able to use the power of being in office to achieve things. Julia wants to see what she can achieve in office – give her a go.
Fran – perhaps appropriate to qute an actor? Julia’s dealing with a real, thorny issue – how many other leaders currently are doing well with this?
Can you remember back, even before Reagan, at how many times we had our hearts broken (George McGovern?) by people with high ideals who didn’t weren’t able to use the power of being in office to achieve things. Julia wants to see what she can achieve in office – give her a go.
Oh I’m not so sure, Chris. The ALP of today is largely the ALP authored by the rout of Whitlam, the triumph of Bob Hawke over the union movement, the collapse of the USSR and Comecon, and the rise of Keating.
Howard could not have risen from the Ashes without Keating and indeed, he was the Coalition’s Keating, modified by the post-2001 consensus. And of course Rudd built upon the Howard precedent.
I am reminded again of the 18th Brumaire.
Oh I’m not so sure, Chris. The ALP of today is largely the ALP authored by the rout of Whitlam, the triumph of Bob Hawke over the union movement, the collapse of the USSR and Comecon, and the rise of Keating.
Howard could not have risen from the Ashes without Keating and indeed, he was the Coalition’s Keating, modified by the post-2001 consensus. And of course Rudd built upon the Howard precedent.
I am reminded again of the 18th Brumaire.
Clever one, #116!
Clever one, #116!
Paul
As you say it is a far-left term. The actual term “PC” comes from the US leftist scene of the 1980s (though obviously started earlier). While the Australian far left phrase “correct line” is very close there are some significant differences.
I first encountered “correct line” at uni in the 1980s as a member of Left Action, but it originated in the late 1920s/1930s, with the Australian CPA purges of anybody who dared question Comintern directives from Moscow.
Comintern had decided that the “correct line” was that ALP was “socially fascist” and an enemy of the working class. Thus any CPA member who dared to demur was kicked out, vilified, and even beaten. The Cominmtern “correct line” directives continued, and Australan far Leftists kept adding to them long after Comintern’s demise.
By the late 1980s, Left Action had a correct line on El Salvador, Palestine, child care, banning abd even banning certain beer brand! You can imagine the process by which these innumerable “correct lines” were reached
In the US, “political correctness” was a movement started not by people demanding that the weak and marginalised be treated with respect – such as not using derogatory language for people with a disability, or physical featues, race, sexuality, etc. That phenomenon was known as “campus speech codes.”
PC was about the insistence that the “correct” answer to academic issues in the humanities and social sciences was to be found in “correct” political frameworks – genocide of the Native Americans, no biological differences between men and women and so on. American PC was thus a college campus thing, which lead on to debates, such as the History Wars.
Paul
As you say it is a far-left term. The actual term “PC” comes from the US leftist scene of the 1980s (though obviously started earlier). While the Australian far left phrase “correct line” is very close there are some significant differences.
I first encountered “correct line” at uni in the 1980s as a member of Left Action, but it originated in the late 1920s/1930s, with the Australian CPA purges of anybody who dared question Comintern directives from Moscow.
Comintern had decided that the “correct line” was that ALP was “socially fascist” and an enemy of the working class. Thus any CPA member who dared to demur was kicked out, vilified, and even beaten. The Cominmtern “correct line” directives continued, and Australan far Leftists kept adding to them long after Comintern’s demise.
By the late 1980s, Left Action had a correct line on El Salvador, Palestine, child care, banning abd even banning certain beer brand! You can imagine the process by which these innumerable “correct lines” were reached
In the US, “political correctness” was a movement started not by people demanding that the weak and marginalised be treated with respect – such as not using derogatory language for people with a disability, or physical featues, race, sexuality, etc. That phenomenon was known as “campus speech codes.”
PC was about the insistence that the “correct” answer to academic issues in the humanities and social sciences was to be found in “correct” political frameworks – genocide of the Native Americans, no biological differences between men and women and so on. American PC was thus a college campus thing, which lead on to debates, such as the History Wars.
And if I hear another politician (Ferguson I’m looking at you) or commentator talk about people in ‘Western Sydney’ thinking this that or the other, as though everybody who lives west of Balmain is one amorphose blob, I’ll scream.
And the irony of Ferguson talking about people in western Sydney worrying about overcrowding when we’re talking about a handful of assylum seekers, and it is NSW Labor’s failure to deal with infrastructure problems that has caused any ‘overcrowding’ problems in the first place, is yet another pitiful example of the uselessness of the current ALP.
And if I hear another politician (Ferguson I’m looking at you) or commentator talk about people in ‘Western Sydney’ thinking this that or the other, as though everybody who lives west of Balmain is one amorphose blob, I’ll scream.
And the irony of Ferguson talking about people in western Sydney worrying about overcrowding when we’re talking about a handful of assylum seekers, and it is NSW Labor’s failure to deal with infrastructure problems that has caused any ‘overcrowding’ problems in the first place, is yet another pitiful example of the uselessness of the current ALP.
I can’t recall anytime over the past ten years when “political correctness” has closed down debate over refugee and asylum seeker policy in Australia.
The voices that Julia Gillard is encouraging to speak up have had a loud voice in the mainstream media over that period. Who has been afraid? Lots of people.
Julia ought ot acknowledge if we are going to have the full debate that she is calling for that many of the recent emigrants to Australia have copped the anger of less recent emigrants have clearly been afraid.
What has been absent from the debate over this period has been informed comment from positions of political leadership on the exact nature and extent of the issues involved and a willingness to contribute constructively. Julia may wish to consider in her contribution picking up the mantle of the late Peter Andren member for Calare and following his example from the 2001 electorate.
I can’t recall anytime over the past ten years when “political correctness” has closed down debate over refugee and asylum seeker policy in Australia.
The voices that Julia Gillard is encouraging to speak up have had a loud voice in the mainstream media over that period. Who has been afraid? Lots of people.
Julia ought ot acknowledge if we are going to have the full debate that she is calling for that many of the recent emigrants to Australia have copped the anger of less recent emigrants have clearly been afraid.
What has been absent from the debate over this period has been informed comment from positions of political leadership on the exact nature and extent of the issues involved and a willingness to contribute constructively. Julia may wish to consider in her contribution picking up the mantle of the late Peter Andren member for Calare and following his example from the 2001 electorate.
This is the Facebook Status Update from the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre
Yes. Just what is the Federal Labor party intending here? Suggesting race based fear is something reasonable? Look at the numbers for fFS.
The Labor party, by starting here, has just condemned this nation to another decade of risible fear driven poll driven race based vote getting rhetoric and it’s targetted some of the most vulnerable people in the world, to do it with.
Julia Gillard can’t go anywhere but right down well worn Liberal paths with this foreshadowing of ‘frank discussion’. It’s more than just talk.
Look at what all the Lobby Groups are saying in this article. All sorts of people are worried, including Abbott who knows what’s going down:
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/07/05/2944693.htm?section=justin
I don’t get it still. Labor was in power. It was on track to win. There was the possibility of being both ethical, compassionate and victorious.
You have to wonder what was said behind closed doors that night for Rudd to categorically state at his second last press conference that the Labor party would not move to the right on asylum seekers don’t you?
This is the Facebook Status Update from the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre
Yes. Just what is the Federal Labor party intending here? Suggesting race based fear is something reasonable? Look at the numbers for fFS.
The Labor party, by starting here, has just condemned this nation to another decade of risible fear driven poll driven race based vote getting rhetoric and it’s targetted some of the most vulnerable people in the world, to do it with.
Julia Gillard can’t go anywhere but right down well worn Liberal paths with this foreshadowing of ‘frank discussion’. It’s more than just talk.
Look at what all the Lobby Groups are saying in this article. All sorts of people are worried, including Abbott who knows what’s going down:
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/07/05/2944693.htm?section=justin
I don’t get it still. Labor was in power. It was on track to win. There was the possibility of being both ethical, compassionate and victorious.
You have to wonder what was said behind closed doors that night for Rudd to categorically state at his second last press conference that the Labor party would not move to the right on asylum seekers don’t you?
I am so angry about this and Doug’s mention of Peter Andren is such a great example of what can be done by someone with integrity and intelligence, to lead, educate and promote compassion.
It’s not that the good people of Calare are any better or worse than anywhere else in Australia, it is just that they were lucky enough to have a representative who actually believed in something and respected those he represented enough to realise that they could share that belief.
People like Gillard simply have no respect for the Australian people.
I am so angry about this and Doug’s mention of Peter Andren is such a great example of what can be done by someone with integrity and intelligence, to lead, educate and promote compassion.
It’s not that the good people of Calare are any better or worse than anywhere else in Australia, it is just that they were lucky enough to have a representative who actually believed in something and respected those he represented enough to realise that they could share that belief.
People like Gillard simply have no respect for the Australian people.
By her announcement that she will move to toughen up “border protection,” Gillard has confirmed that her visit to Sydney’s western suburbs to talk about “sustainable population” was really dog-whistling to the racists and rednecks. I never thought she would stoop so low so quickly. And where are the laft Labor MPs speaking up against the sudden lurch to the right within their own party?
By her announcement that she will move to toughen up “border protection,” Gillard has confirmed that her visit to Sydney’s western suburbs to talk about “sustainable population” was really dog-whistling to the racists and rednecks. I never thought she would stoop so low so quickly. And where are the laft Labor MPs speaking up against the sudden lurch to the right within their own party?
Common Rudd speak out, its your last chance dude.
Common Rudd speak out, its your last chance dude.
“I don’t get it still. Labor was in power. It was on track to win. There was the possibility of being both ethical, compassionate and victorious.”
Casey, do you know what the focus groups were telling the ALP? Maybe the ALP would have won, maybe not – the ALP caucus seemed to be less certain than you are. As Guy Pearse writes in The Monthly, Rudd the conviction politician had shattered his image. Gillard is a safer bet, and I think she’ll try to be as ethical and compassionate as she and caucus think the electorate will allow.
“I don’t get it still. Labor was in power. It was on track to win. There was the possibility of being both ethical, compassionate and victorious.”
Casey, do you know what the focus groups were telling the ALP? Maybe the ALP would have won, maybe not – the ALP caucus seemed to be less certain than you are. As Guy Pearse writes in The Monthly, Rudd the conviction politician had shattered his image. Gillard is a safer bet, and I think she’ll try to be as ethical and compassionate as she and caucus think the electorate will allow.
Fran @ 116 – it appears to me that Labor are introducing policies (like those on refugees, income quarantining) that they would have been very critical of if in opposition and Howard had brought them in. And with Labor in power and the Liberals in agreement a lot of the public protest machinery never gets into gear.
Fran @ 116 – it appears to me that Labor are introducing policies (like those on refugees, income quarantining) that they would have been very critical of if in opposition and Howard had brought them in. And with Labor in power and the Liberals in agreement a lot of the public protest machinery never gets into gear.
casey
Just out of interest, are you a member of the ALP?
casey
Just out of interest, are you a member of the ALP?
We may end up hoping for the Greens to develop into something bigger and better to fill the massive gap left. But they need some good and high profile candidates.
Bob Brown is retiring any time soon? Wonder if Rudd and some want to join the Greens. lol
We may end up hoping for the Greens to develop into something bigger and better to fill the massive gap left. But they need some good and high profile candidates.
Bob Brown is retiring any time soon? Wonder if Rudd and some want to join the Greens. lol
112
“I know it hurts to be pulled up on something. but the use of “lass” or the much more common “girl” to refer to a grown woman is a problem in our society, because this language infantilises and allows a picture of infantilised women to enter the back of our minds, thereby militating in a very subtle way against our acceptance of women in authority or in positions of responsibility. along with other archetypes, such as mother, schoolmarm, etc.”
I’m not as annoyed now as I was 13 years ago, Helen, but it still does strike me as a frivolous storm in a teacup. It did nothing to address the injustice that the girl faced at the time. Whispering into my personnel file that I behaved in a sexist manner, I might have found offensive myself if I’d had any ambition left by then.
I checked an online dictionary in case my own was obsolete:
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/lass
No reference at all to what you say. How is one to guard against these situations? Is there a guide book out there somewhere?
I know that context can affect things. In early post-colonial societies, and maybe the Deep South, “Boy” can take on certain connotations to some who were recently on the receiving end of discrimination. What do you do, outlaw it? Yet here it can be used in a manner not inherently offensive. I think Wran was known as the “boy from Balmain” and Peacock as “the colt from Kooyong” without earning disapproval.
Maybe I am unconsciously a serial offender. At a graduate class some years ago I was chided for relaying a recollection of a “Qantas Hostie”. I understood that it might concern some, but it was the way she had described herself to me in telling me her story.
I just wonder whether we make too much of language as a means of correcting discrimination and not enough of action.
Perhaps I’m too pedantic on language. I’m not convinced that using the word “gay” did a lot to end homosexual discrimination (although no doubt an improvement on some other words too commonly used). But it did change the way we perceived the word “gay”.
Put another way, would it help the cause of wiping out anti-semitism by referring to Jews as “pre-Christians”?
112
“I know it hurts to be pulled up on something. but the use of “lass” or the much more common “girl” to refer to a grown woman is a problem in our society, because this language infantilises and allows a picture of infantilised women to enter the back of our minds, thereby militating in a very subtle way against our acceptance of women in authority or in positions of responsibility. along with other archetypes, such as mother, schoolmarm, etc.”
I’m not as annoyed now as I was 13 years ago, Helen, but it still does strike me as a frivolous storm in a teacup. It did nothing to address the injustice that the girl faced at the time. Whispering into my personnel file that I behaved in a sexist manner, I might have found offensive myself if I’d had any ambition left by then.
I checked an online dictionary in case my own was obsolete:
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/lass
No reference at all to what you say. How is one to guard against these situations? Is there a guide book out there somewhere?
I know that context can affect things. In early post-colonial societies, and maybe the Deep South, “Boy” can take on certain connotations to some who were recently on the receiving end of discrimination. What do you do, outlaw it? Yet here it can be used in a manner not inherently offensive. I think Wran was known as the “boy from Balmain” and Peacock as “the colt from Kooyong” without earning disapproval.
Maybe I am unconsciously a serial offender. At a graduate class some years ago I was chided for relaying a recollection of a “Qantas Hostie”. I understood that it might concern some, but it was the way she had described herself to me in telling me her story.
I just wonder whether we make too much of language as a means of correcting discrimination and not enough of action.
Perhaps I’m too pedantic on language. I’m not convinced that using the word “gay” did a lot to end homosexual discrimination (although no doubt an improvement on some other words too commonly used). But it did change the way we perceived the word “gay”.
Put another way, would it help the cause of wiping out anti-semitism by referring to Jews as “pre-Christians”?
Paul Burns
I replied to your take on “pc” but it got spaminated. Has now been released.
http://larvatusprodeo.net/2010/07/03/is-julia-gillard-the-new-bob-hawke/#comment-897092
Paul Burns
I replied to your take on “pc” but it got spaminated. Has now been released.
http://larvatusprodeo.net/2010/07/03/is-julia-gillard-the-new-bob-hawke/#comment-897092
Don
The “lass” example you used, is not what political correctness was about, as I explain in #103. “Political correctness” is NOT about “language manners.”
Don
The “lass” example you used, is not what political correctness was about, as I explain in #103. “Political correctness” is NOT about “language manners.”
Helen @113
I’m sorry, but that is a complete misunderstanding of “political correctness.” Paul Burns is spot on.
Helen @113
I’m sorry, but that is a complete misunderstanding of “political correctness.” Paul Burns is spot on.
Patricia WA @ 108 since when does the ALP supinely allow the parliamentary leader to dictate policy? What’s the process … elect a leader and if you don’t like their policies, you get rid of them and elect another one and then see what policies they can come up with?
The Labor Party has had almost 10 years since Tampa to come up with a policy, but the best it can do now is say wait until Julia’s thought about it for a bit and she’ll tell us what to do? Who TF would want to entrust government to such a useless pack of sheep?
Patricia WA @ 108 since when does the ALP supinely allow the parliamentary leader to dictate policy? What’s the process … elect a leader and if you don’t like their policies, you get rid of them and elect another one and then see what policies they can come up with?
The Labor Party has had almost 10 years since Tampa to come up with a policy, but the best it can do now is say wait until Julia’s thought about it for a bit and she’ll tell us what to do? Who TF would want to entrust government to such a useless pack of sheep?
No it isn’t. The plight of people who are full-time carers for disabaled loved ones is a problem in our society. Perhaps ypu meant that you don’t like it. I say “girl” all the time. In fact, every single person I know aged 1 to 90 uses “girl” as one of a dozen names for a “grown woman.”
Infantilises? Oh dear. The rest is not even typing.
Helen, .you do not have the authority to blame anybody on this issue.
You are not “pulling apart” anything, let alone “tropes.” All you are doing is being presumptuous in thinking you are privileged to decide how other perfectly well adjusted and socially skilled adults can communicate with each other.
I have already commented on ypur misunderstanding of “political correctness.”
No it isn’t. The plight of people who are full-time carers for disabaled loved ones is a problem in our society. Perhaps ypu meant that you don’t like it. I say “girl” all the time. In fact, every single person I know aged 1 to 90 uses “girl” as one of a dozen names for a “grown woman.”
Infantilises? Oh dear. The rest is not even typing.
Helen, .you do not have the authority to blame anybody on this issue.
You are not “pulling apart” anything, let alone “tropes.” All you are doing is being presumptuous in thinking you are privileged to decide how other perfectly well adjusted and socially skilled adults can communicate with each other.
I have already commented on ypur misunderstanding of “political correctness.”
It really shows how far we have regressed that we’re prepared to accept this shit from the ALP, or the stinking carcass of what used to be the ALP. No wonder Lindsay Tanner one of the few with any integrity, quit.
Let’s remind ourselves of the reason to vote Labor. That’s right, they’re better than the coalition. Come back Malcolm all is (mostly) forgiven.
It really shows how far we have regressed that we’re prepared to accept this shit from the ALP, or the stinking carcass of what used to be the ALP. No wonder Lindsay Tanner one of the few with any integrity, quit.
Let’s remind ourselves of the reason to vote Labor. That’s right, they’re better than the coalition. Come back Malcolm all is (mostly) forgiven.
It seems to me that you are the one who is misunderstanding and conflating the origin of a term with how it is commonly used. Language evolves, it is not a static thing.
Yes, the historical origins of the term do have all the elements Paul Burns outlined. But how people generally use the term today, and how our PM was using it in her speechifying on the immigration debate, were in the much more commonly used way of “words/phrases other people will object to” with the clear implication that even objecting to something clearly derogatory is merely being “politically correct”.
As to whether “girl” or “lass” is infantilising towards grown women, of course using a term that means “immature” is infantilising, just as boy/lad is infantilising for grown men. Infantilising terms certainly can be used affectionately sometimes, but they often are used dismissively and contemptuously too, and that is how the Liberal attack ad is using “girl”.
Pointing out subtext is not dictating your or anybody else’s behaviour, ossie. It merely gives you more information about subconscious layers to your word choices, and leaves the decision of whether or not you continue to use certain words in certain ways entirely up to you.
It seems to me that you are the one who is misunderstanding and conflating the origin of a term with how it is commonly used. Language evolves, it is not a static thing.
Yes, the historical origins of the term do have all the elements Paul Burns outlined. But how people generally use the term today, and how our PM was using it in her speechifying on the immigration debate, were in the much more commonly used way of “words/phrases other people will object to” with the clear implication that even objecting to something clearly derogatory is merely being “politically correct”.
As to whether “girl” or “lass” is infantilising towards grown women, of course using a term that means “immature” is infantilising, just as boy/lad is infantilising for grown men. Infantilising terms certainly can be used affectionately sometimes, but they often are used dismissively and contemptuously too, and that is how the Liberal attack ad is using “girl”.
Pointing out subtext is not dictating your or anybody else’s behaviour, ossie. It merely gives you more information about subconscious layers to your word choices, and leaves the decision of whether or not you continue to use certain words in certain ways entirely up to you.
On the whole, that is true.
The coalition has Abbott, Abetz, Andrews … and that’s just the A’s, and not even all of them.
Yes, it’s choice between shit and piss, but the choice still has to be made.
On the whole, that is true.
The coalition has Abbott, Abetz, Andrews … and that’s just the A’s, and not even all of them.
Yes, it’s choice between shit and piss, but the choice still has to be made.
Actually the context in which Gillard used “PC” was precisely in its proper historical context, outlined by Paul Burns.
Actually the context in which Gillard used “PC” was precisely in its proper historical context, outlined by Paul Burns.
Since we are onto PC …
It seems to me that like most words and phrases in the English language (and one may assume, other living languages) the term PC has been uttered and iterated in a succession of contexts which have altered its lexical value. It was very probably first uttered as a somewhat ironic response to the “correct line” stuff that Ossie describes above. I can recall left-leaning feminists using it in this way in 1979.
Later, it was taken up by the right as an attack on the cultural commentary of “left wing trendies” (when was the last time anyone heard that phrase? — for me it was about mid-1980s). By the time the rightwing talking heads like John Laws, Stan Zemanek, John Pierce, Alan Jones and Mike Carlton were dropping it, it was both a protest against snag/feminist culture and a defence of apparent plebeian authenticity and the masculine gaze. To be anti-PC was to be authentic and real and above all masculine in the traditional sense. It was an incipient cri-de-coeur against institutional authority, that one could raise regardless of the position of the dominant discourse on any matter.
Today of course it is a commonplace prefatory defence to all and any objection to any controversial statement, which seeks to position any potential objector as the mindless dupe of unidentified, remote and thus illegitimate authority. A stands back and ducks as the wailing harpies object defence. This very afternoon some Vet on the Drive Show on 702 claimed that I know it’s not PC to say so, but dogs that wind up in pounds do so for a reason. Goodness me … I left out vacuous as qualifier above.
I note in passing, Don, that having received an answer from Helen on the use of lass that noted that infantilisation of women was objectionable, you go on to use the term girl in preference. Do you really not know that the word girls refers either to a female child or is used as a diminutive?
It is true that the term boy is sometimes used men in much the same way, but the difference surely goes to the nature of inter-gender power relations. Men have never been structurally disempowered in Western society on the basis of their masculinity. That is salient here.
Since we are onto PC …
It seems to me that like most words and phrases in the English language (and one may assume, other living languages) the term PC has been uttered and iterated in a succession of contexts which have altered its lexical value. It was very probably first uttered as a somewhat ironic response to the “correct line” stuff that Ossie describes above. I can recall left-leaning feminists using it in this way in 1979.
Later, it was taken up by the right as an attack on the cultural commentary of “left wing trendies” (when was the last time anyone heard that phrase? — for me it was about mid-1980s). By the time the rightwing talking heads like John Laws, Stan Zemanek, John Pierce, Alan Jones and Mike Carlton were dropping it, it was both a protest against snag/feminist culture and a defence of apparent plebeian authenticity and the masculine gaze. To be anti-PC was to be authentic and real and above all masculine in the traditional sense. It was an incipient cri-de-coeur against institutional authority, that one could raise regardless of the position of the dominant discourse on any matter.
Today of course it is a commonplace prefatory defence to all and any objection to any controversial statement, which seeks to position any potential objector as the mindless dupe of unidentified, remote and thus illegitimate authority. A stands back and ducks as the wailing harpies object defence. This very afternoon some Vet on the Drive Show on 702 claimed that I know it’s not PC to say so, but dogs that wind up in pounds do so for a reason. Goodness me … I left out vacuous as qualifier above.
I note in passing, Don, that having received an answer from Helen on the use of lass that noted that infantilisation of women was objectionable, you go on to use the term girl in preference. Do you really not know that the word girls refers either to a female child or is used as a diminutive?
It is true that the term boy is sometimes used men in much the same way, but the difference surely goes to the nature of inter-gender power relations. Men have never been structurally disempowered in Western society on the basis of their masculinity. That is salient here.
What tigtog said.
What tigtog said.
oops Mods … please close italics in the post above after “harpies object”
Thanks …
oops Mods … please close italics in the post above after “harpies object”
Thanks …
Kevin@134 – I made the same point on another thread here about Julia Gillard’s undignified rush with Rudd’s uncongealed blood staining her nails to reassure the US President Australians were still on board for the clusterf**k in Afghanistan. What presumption. Worse, it was based on minority opinion at best, if not her own single individual preference, since a clear majority of Australians oppose our involvement in this hideous and futile American war and she had not in between times canvassed this issue with anyone else or not that we’ve been told.
And why exactly was it so important for her to prioritise affirming her stance on this issue above most others on her first day in office?
Kevin@134 – I made the same point on another thread here about Julia Gillard’s undignified rush with Rudd’s uncongealed blood staining her nails to reassure the US President Australians were still on board for the clusterf**k in Afghanistan. What presumption. Worse, it was based on minority opinion at best, if not her own single individual preference, since a clear majority of Australians oppose our involvement in this hideous and futile American war and she had not in between times canvassed this issue with anyone else or not that we’ve been told.
And why exactly was it so important for her to prioritise affirming her stance on this issue above most others on her first day in office?
Sorry, Ken, but where did I suggest that the ALP supinely allow the parliamentary leader to dictate policy? I simply observed that there was a lot of negative comment on something as yet unannounced. I understand Gillard has been consulting caucus members and the cabinet and we can expect a decision on the suspended processing of Sri Lankan and Afghani boat people soon. Like most other people here I have been a bit taken aback by some of her terminology e.g. ‘sanctuary’ in that odd context. But she’s not dumb and I’m hoping by refusing to preach to the pagans she may yet find some formula for at least disarming them or even somehow bringing them on side without ‘lurching’ anywhere. God knows how, but she managed the Gordian knot act on the mining tax. Let’s wait and see what happens with this.
Sorry, Ken, but where did I suggest that the ALP supinely allow the parliamentary leader to dictate policy? I simply observed that there was a lot of negative comment on something as yet unannounced. I understand Gillard has been consulting caucus members and the cabinet and we can expect a decision on the suspended processing of Sri Lankan and Afghani boat people soon. Like most other people here I have been a bit taken aback by some of her terminology e.g. ‘sanctuary’ in that odd context. But she’s not dumb and I’m hoping by refusing to preach to the pagans she may yet find some formula for at least disarming them or even somehow bringing them on side without ‘lurching’ anywhere. God knows how, but she managed the Gordian knot act on the mining tax. Let’s wait and see what happens with this.
Howard wasn’t dumb either.
Howard wasn’t dumb either.
Actually the result of that was Gillard giving away $1.5bn to the mining industry so they would stop hurting Labor’s re-election prospects with that advertising. It worked.
Actually the result of that was Gillard giving away $1.5bn to the mining industry so they would stop hurting Labor’s re-election prospects with that advertising. It worked.
Actually, ossie, ‘infantilises’ is a perfectly good word that clearly describes an effect that language can, and often does, have. As for the rest not even being typing, well, to you it may not be. But to those of us, and I include myself and Helen and Tigtog and several other people on this thread, whose posts and comments at LP over the years show that we have done extensive reading on the subject of feminism and language, your scorn for Helen’s perfectly reasonable point just makes you look ill-informed and silly.
Actually, ossie, ‘infantilises’ is a perfectly good word that clearly describes an effect that language can, and often does, have. As for the rest not even being typing, well, to you it may not be. But to those of us, and I include myself and Helen and Tigtog and several other people on this thread, whose posts and comments at LP over the years show that we have done extensive reading on the subject of feminism and language, your scorn for Helen’s perfectly reasonable point just makes you look ill-informed and silly.
On the contrary, Labor getting into power with Howard type policies permanently moves the centre further to the right. Then the election after that would be over if AS be allowed to wear casual clothes or prison garb.
In the long term you would be better if Labor lost and made to return to less extreme policy.
On the contrary, Labor getting into power with Howard type policies permanently moves the centre further to the right. Then the election after that would be over if AS be allowed to wear casual clothes or prison garb.
In the long term you would be better if Labor lost and made to return to less extreme policy.
Patricia WA you wrote @ 108 (my emphasis) ‘Why don’t we wait until JG announces her policy on this? Then we can see if she is bringing anything new to this to differentiate the government from the opposition.’ I don’t think there’s anything ambiguous about that, although obviously you’re entitled to explain it’s not really what you meant.
The larger point is that Labor should already have a policy. It’s had 10 bloody years to consult and cogitate.
Patricia WA you wrote @ 108 (my emphasis) ‘Why don’t we wait until JG announces her policy on this? Then we can see if she is bringing anything new to this to differentiate the government from the opposition.’ I don’t think there’s anything ambiguous about that, although obviously you’re entitled to explain it’s not really what you meant.
The larger point is that Labor should already have a policy. It’s had 10 bloody years to consult and cogitate.
Gillard the new Howard? I called it here (comment 327) over her performance in Education. This drew some criticism (and also some support, thanks).
I’m 45 and I’ve never been a member of a political party but I joined the Greens this morning.
Gillard the new Howard? I called it here (comment 327) over her performance in Education. This drew some criticism (and also some support, thanks).
I’m 45 and I’ve never been a member of a political party but I joined the Greens this morning.
Sigh.
Why do I sense a lurch further left at LP?
Where even a suggestion of ‘let’s wait and see’
Is pounced on and pounded until I agree
I’m a wrong headed rightist and so un-PC……
Phrases like ‘Rudd’s uncongealed blood staining her nails‘ are making my own blood run cold.
I think I’ll go for a walk in the sun with Tacker along the river. I also want to savor the unambiguous shift in the political climate out there beyond LP, hitherto my ‘sanctuary’ of sanity and good sense.
Sigh.
Why do I sense a lurch further left at LP?
Where even a suggestion of ‘let’s wait and see’
Is pounced on and pounded until I agree
I’m a wrong headed rightist and so un-PC……
Phrases like ‘Rudd’s uncongealed blood staining her nails‘ are making my own blood run cold.
I think I’ll go for a walk in the sun with Tacker along the river. I also want to savor the unambiguous shift in the political climate out there beyond LP, hitherto my ‘sanctuary’ of sanity and good sense.
[james mcdonough]
Seems like a good call.
I think people are hoping that she doesn’t really mean what she says, it is just a ploy and eventually she will show her real Labor colours.
Not necessary.
But this will be a test of the remainder of Labor. Will they let themselves be made to whore away Labor principals or will some of them speak up? If none speak up, well the party is hardly much better than the Liberals. Full of spineless self seekers.
[james mcdonough]
Seems like a good call.
I think people are hoping that she doesn’t really mean what she says, it is just a ploy and eventually she will show her real Labor colours.
Not necessary.
But this will be a test of the remainder of Labor. Will they let themselves be made to whore away Labor principals or will some of them speak up? If none speak up, well the party is hardly much better than the Liberals. Full of spineless self seekers.
Pavolv’s Cat
You read books? That’s great. But I wasn’t responding to you.
Pavolv’s Cat
You read books? That’s great. But I wasn’t responding to you.
ossie, this forum is a roundtable. Anybody can respond to anybody else. You wrote something ill-informed and silly, and anyone at all is entitled to call you out on it.
ossie, this forum is a roundtable. Anybody can respond to anybody else. You wrote something ill-informed and silly, and anyone at all is entitled to call you out on it.
Seconded. Unedifying, to say the least, levels of vituperation and hyperbole.
Seconded. Unedifying, to say the least, levels of vituperation and hyperbole.
OK tigtog, my comment to Pavlov was snarky and unnecessary. I would delete it, if I could go back in time 12 hours.
OK tigtog, my comment to Pavlov was snarky and unnecessary. I would delete it, if I could go back in time 12 hours.
The uncongealed blood phrase was a little odd. However, the argument that Gillard keeps Aussie troops (‘our boys’) committed in Afghanistan without consultation with the electorate because apparently about 65% of us oppose such a commitment across the political spectrum, but can’t work out what to do with a couple of hundred asylum seekers wqithout consulting the oiks up hill and down dale, still stands.
The uncongealed blood phrase was a little odd. However, the argument that Gillard keeps Aussie troops (‘our boys’) committed in Afghanistan without consultation with the electorate because apparently about 65% of us oppose such a commitment across the political spectrum, but can’t work out what to do with a couple of hundred asylum seekers wqithout consulting the oiks up hill and down dale, still stands.
Very well phrased, PB. It’s an inconsistent stance for policy decisions, definitely.
Very well phrased, PB. It’s an inconsistent stance for policy decisions, definitely.
Remember Australia is a representative – as opposed to direct/radical – democracy. I don’t thinl many here would like too much if Australia were to move more towards direct democracy.
Remember Australia is a representative – as opposed to direct/radical – democracy. I don’t thinl many here would like too much if Australia were to move more towards direct democracy.
tigtog @ 158,
Actually, it should read; ‘… about 65% of us across the political spectrum oppose …”
[pulls pedant's hat over ears and runs away]
tigtog @ 158,
Actually, it should read; ‘… about 65% of us across the political spectrum oppose …”
[pulls pedant's hat over ears and runs away]
A.LASS, A.LACK, A.BLOODY.MEN
Political correctness
Rears its bloody head again
What need for understanding risk or ethics
Is there when squealing
About politics-as-feeling
A.LASS, A.LACK, A.BLOODY.MEN
Political correctness
Rears its bloody head again
What need for understanding risk or ethics
Is there when squealing
About politics-as-feeling
Paul
While I get your general point, one of the great poxes on our current polity is opinion polls. Don’t get me wrong, I think polls in theory are a democratic advance, and they can make democracy more direct than it is now.
The current problem is they are still methodology too dodgy.
I doubt more than about 1,000 people in Australia give the Afghanistan imbroglio any thought whatsoever unless phoned by Newspoll, Galaxy, etc.
Paul
While I get your general point, one of the great poxes on our current polity is opinion polls. Don’t get me wrong, I think polls in theory are a democratic advance, and they can make democracy more direct than it is now.
The current problem is they are still methodology too dodgy.
I doubt more than about 1,000 people in Australia give the Afghanistan imbroglio any thought whatsoever unless phoned by Newspoll, Galaxy, etc.
Roger Jones @ #161:
1) No need at all, when you’re a white male.
2) Risk and/or ethics on the one hand and what you disdainfully call ‘feeling’ (!) on the other are not mutually exclusive. In fact some of us would go so far as to say that an awareness of the former depends on some sort of access to the latter. You can’t analyse a sociopolitical situation until you have some sense of who is being oppressed by what, and those of us interested in language think that language use is part of systemic oppression. Ask any Scot.
Roger Jones @ #161:
1) No need at all, when you’re a white male.
2) Risk and/or ethics on the one hand and what you disdainfully call ‘feeling’ (!) on the other are not mutually exclusive. In fact some of us would go so far as to say that an awareness of the former depends on some sort of access to the latter. You can’t analyse a sociopolitical situation until you have some sense of who is being oppressed by what, and those of us interested in language think that language use is part of systemic oppression. Ask any Scot.
“In the long term you would be better if Labor lost and made to return to less extreme policy.”
I must admit I’m starting to wonder on this as well. Disappointing to say, or even think it, but there’s more than just the next 3 years at stake.
“In the long term you would be better if Labor lost and made to return to less extreme policy.”
I must admit I’m starting to wonder on this as well. Disappointing to say, or even think it, but there’s more than just the next 3 years at stake.
I don’t agree it would be better if the ALP lost. I just don’t agree that it would be better if they won. There’s simply no adequarte basis for drawing any conclusion at all about which would be the lesser evil.
What we need to do, IMO, is to conduct our politics and develop our ethical claims regardless of the balance of advantage between the major parties and certainly, without recommending a vote for either.
I don’t agree it would be better if the ALP lost. I just don’t agree that it would be better if they won. There’s simply no adequarte basis for drawing any conclusion at all about which would be the lesser evil.
What we need to do, IMO, is to conduct our politics and develop our ethical claims regardless of the balance of advantage between the major parties and certainly, without recommending a vote for either.
Abbott, Abetz, Andrews, the Bishops, that horrible monarchist woman whose name I forget, Tuckey, Heffernan, Dutton … you can’t tell me that a government comprised of these people would not be worse, all things considered, than a Gillard government.
Abbott, Abetz, Andrews, the Bishops, that horrible monarchist woman whose name I forget, Tuckey, Heffernan, Dutton … you can’t tell me that a government comprised of these people would not be worse, all things considered, than a Gillard government.
No way, Armagny.
Just heard her speech. She’s taken the first steps to defusing race politics as an issue. Liked her opening referring to Lowy’s refugee origins, and her own family’s as impoverished migrants want a fair go.
Processing off-shore (missed all details but I think she’s talking East Timor and maybe Bali) is aimed at taking People Smugglers out of the equation (they were there mainly as a Lib dob whistle, anyway). Nowhere for race politics or the Libs to go on this on my reading. Brown hasn’t got all that much room either.
Agree with Paul that it’s bizarre that we can ignore the punters on Afghanistan and have to consult on a few thousand boat people. But them’s the politics. All accept that we have to bow to the Americans even against our inclinations, but we can’t change the latter till we’re a lot less parochial.
Well, on my reading (at least for the upcoming election campaign) is that that’s the second one off the table. Now for ETS …
Pretty good result on my take.
No way, Armagny.
Just heard her speech. She’s taken the first steps to defusing race politics as an issue. Liked her opening referring to Lowy’s refugee origins, and her own family’s as impoverished migrants want a fair go.
Processing off-shore (missed all details but I think she’s talking East Timor and maybe Bali) is aimed at taking People Smugglers out of the equation (they were there mainly as a Lib dob whistle, anyway). Nowhere for race politics or the Libs to go on this on my reading. Brown hasn’t got all that much room either.
Agree with Paul that it’s bizarre that we can ignore the punters on Afghanistan and have to consult on a few thousand boat people. But them’s the politics. All accept that we have to bow to the Americans even against our inclinations, but we can’t change the latter till we’re a lot less parochial.
Well, on my reading (at least for the upcoming election campaign) is that that’s the second one off the table. Now for ETS …
Pretty good result on my take.
PC,
I wondered how that might be taken, given there are several possibilities.
Risk perception is used to fight with and against ‘political correctness’. While perception is important, it can be used in both misleading and beneficial ways. Recent cognitive research is suggesting that reason (applied as some external fact(s) about risk) and perception are indivisible in the formation of conclusions about risk. So while I don’t consider the two separate, they are both necessary in sensible debate. The bottom line though is that risk from people in boats as a) undesirables, or b) and inherent threat to Australian identity, is low. The possibility of being seen as a destination by those willing to risk the voyage is not so low, but whether that amplifies the above two risks is an interesting question. The experts in people trafficking tend not to think so.
My view is that calls for a debate on arrivals seeking asylum prefaced by reference to political correctness without re-examination of ethics and exploration of the above risks as objectively as possible, will just re-enforce entrenched positions without advancing the debate. One might suspect that the caller is more interested in shoring up their own position.
Perhaps my gender, age and skin colour influences this view. I try not to make it so.
It’s also possible I found the defence of the first use of the word lass, and the misreading of Helen’s a.bloody.men ridiculous and pretty funny because of that.
PC,
I wondered how that might be taken, given there are several possibilities.
Risk perception is used to fight with and against ‘political correctness’. While perception is important, it can be used in both misleading and beneficial ways. Recent cognitive research is suggesting that reason (applied as some external fact(s) about risk) and perception are indivisible in the formation of conclusions about risk. So while I don’t consider the two separate, they are both necessary in sensible debate. The bottom line though is that risk from people in boats as a) undesirables, or b) and inherent threat to Australian identity, is low. The possibility of being seen as a destination by those willing to risk the voyage is not so low, but whether that amplifies the above two risks is an interesting question. The experts in people trafficking tend not to think so.
My view is that calls for a debate on arrivals seeking asylum prefaced by reference to political correctness without re-examination of ethics and exploration of the above risks as objectively as possible, will just re-enforce entrenched positions without advancing the debate. One might suspect that the caller is more interested in shoring up their own position.
Perhaps my gender, age and skin colour influences this view. I try not to make it so.
It’s also possible I found the defence of the first use of the word lass, and the misreading of Helen’s a.bloody.men ridiculous and pretty funny because of that.
Don’t disagree. But isn’t the quandrary people are grappling with the potential lack of options they face once they have conducted their politics and developed their ethical claims?
It would take worse to make me support Abbott, or the Liberals generally, but I am just starting to wonder about the relative effects of different outcomes to this awful campaign. Effects, that is, on the political and ethical positions I’ve put a lot of energy into developing.
Don’t disagree. But isn’t the quandrary people are grappling with the potential lack of options they face once they have conducted their politics and developed their ethical claims?
It would take worse to make me support Abbott, or the Liberals generally, but I am just starting to wonder about the relative effects of different outcomes to this awful campaign. Effects, that is, on the political and ethical positions I’ve put a lot of energy into developing.
Just to add the comments about lasses and girls and boys, going back my memory is that the point of the original post related to a percieved injustice being perpetrated against a young woman in a work situation. Someone, speaking in her defence, called her a “lass”, and was rounded on for using, shall we say, infantilising language. The original point about the injustice seems to have been lost, and may well be more pertinent in gender politics terms than the crime of saying “lass”. Just before anyone thinks that I disagree that this type of language can and does have the effects that others have pointed out, let me say I do not. However we should also keep our eyes on the prize of whether or not those objecting to the use of “lass” were doing so because of their concerns about infantilising women, or about something else. It seems to me that there could be greater injustices meted out to young women in positions of relatively low power than worrying about whether they are called “lass”(of course, again, just in case anyone thinks I am saying something I am not, of course the original poster should have called her a woman rather than a lass).
Just to add the comments about lasses and girls and boys, going back my memory is that the point of the original post related to a percieved injustice being perpetrated against a young woman in a work situation. Someone, speaking in her defence, called her a “lass”, and was rounded on for using, shall we say, infantilising language. The original point about the injustice seems to have been lost, and may well be more pertinent in gender politics terms than the crime of saying “lass”. Just before anyone thinks that I disagree that this type of language can and does have the effects that others have pointed out, let me say I do not. However we should also keep our eyes on the prize of whether or not those objecting to the use of “lass” were doing so because of their concerns about infantilising women, or about something else. It seems to me that there could be greater injustices meted out to young women in positions of relatively low power than worrying about whether they are called “lass”(of course, again, just in case anyone thinks I am saying something I am not, of course the original poster should have called her a woman rather than a lass).
Jester opined:
Doubtless that is so … of course, the fact that she is referred to as “lass” may simple be a manifestation of the context in which the much greater injustices are meted out. Would any Tory supporter, for example, have called Margaret Thatcher that lass who became British PM. It would have raised an ironic laugh because she was seen as very much in charge — an Iron Lady no less.
Jester opined:
Doubtless that is so … of course, the fact that she is referred to as “lass” may simple be a manifestation of the context in which the much greater injustices are meted out. Would any Tory supporter, for example, have called Margaret Thatcher that lass who became British PM. It would have raised an ironic laugh because she was seen as very much in charge — an Iron Lady no less.
Sam@166 challenged:
I’m unsure. Call me agnostic on the question. We will probably never know, regardless of who wins. Gillard might prove worse in practice, because she is an ALP leader currently declaring open slather for rednecks and mining bosses to have the resolution of their problems privileged.
That means in practice that there is no place at all within the polity for those who oppose this to hide. You can stop supporting the ALP or endorse the policy, whereas before it was at least open to debate. The new Julia Gillard PC embraces rednecks and corporate bullies. A cultural reversal like that is much worse than the ALP losing. OTOH, the coalition winning would be dreadful too, because it might seem that the ALP hadn’t gone far enough in embracing rednecks and corporate bullies and that the state should drop all pretence and be run by a focus group from the no more Islamic Schools crowd out at Lindsay and some company HQd in Switzerland.
Sam@166 challenged:
I’m unsure. Call me agnostic on the question. We will probably never know, regardless of who wins. Gillard might prove worse in practice, because she is an ALP leader currently declaring open slather for rednecks and mining bosses to have the resolution of their problems privileged.
That means in practice that there is no place at all within the polity for those who oppose this to hide. You can stop supporting the ALP or endorse the policy, whereas before it was at least open to debate. The new Julia Gillard PC embraces rednecks and corporate bullies. A cultural reversal like that is much worse than the ALP losing. OTOH, the coalition winning would be dreadful too, because it might seem that the ALP hadn’t gone far enough in embracing rednecks and corporate bullies and that the state should drop all pretence and be run by a focus group from the no more Islamic Schools crowd out at Lindsay and some company HQd in Switzerland.
Basically, YEH! She is as sharp as a tack but I suppose I would like to see her lose those CANKLES!
Basically, YEH! She is as sharp as a tack but I suppose I would like to see her lose those CANKLES!
@ 22, SHE IS BOTH!
Wrap that around your laughing gear……!
=X^\/><
@ 22, SHE IS BOTH!
Wrap that around your laughing gear……!
=X^\/><
Race politics unfortunately is currently part of the political landscape in Australia today. It didn’t used to be, even in the old days of White Australia. And even as those restrictions slowly eased in the late 60s and early 70s, neither major side attempted to exploit the issue.
John Howard, after a couple of failed attempts, finally found a way of exploiting it firstly through Hanson/One Nation and then through his own refining of Dog Whistling. He succeeded where Enoch Powell had failed in the UK in the 70s. And that sadly is his primary legacy to Australian political life.
I don’t think that it can be banished from the political scene as rapidly as Howard himself has been, especially given the imbalance in media narratives about this and other issues. It has to be done in stages.
Fran noted that Gillard had blurred the separate issues of overcrowded immigration to the outer suburbs (with totally inadequate infrastructure) with the unconnected piddling-level arrivals of boat people. And it is true that they are unconnected.
But that is not the perception that people battling away in those outer areas have. Many believe that arrivals add to an already uneasy situation. The perception is wrong but it is not necessarily xenophobic to have it. I think Gillard is acutely aware of this, being from an outer Melbourne electorate herself. It is probably why she has woven in another theme “sustainable population growth”, which is also only tenuously related.
What she proposes may sound a bit like the Pacific Solution and it may not even work as hoped. But I think it will take the heat out of the issue and help remove race politics from the political agenda. It is optimistic to expect that it can just go from the agenda immediately. I like her appeals to Australians’ sense of fairness and the respect shown to human dignity in the way asylum seekers are to be treated.
I think that she has successfully defused race politics as an issue at the coming election. There’s still a lot to be done before it moves to the dustbin, but you’ve got to start somewhere. It runs a lot bigger than just saving Lindsay.
Race politics unfortunately is currently part of the political landscape in Australia today. It didn’t used to be, even in the old days of White Australia. And even as those restrictions slowly eased in the late 60s and early 70s, neither major side attempted to exploit the issue.
John Howard, after a couple of failed attempts, finally found a way of exploiting it firstly through Hanson/One Nation and then through his own refining of Dog Whistling. He succeeded where Enoch Powell had failed in the UK in the 70s. And that sadly is his primary legacy to Australian political life.
I don’t think that it can be banished from the political scene as rapidly as Howard himself has been, especially given the imbalance in media narratives about this and other issues. It has to be done in stages.
Fran noted that Gillard had blurred the separate issues of overcrowded immigration to the outer suburbs (with totally inadequate infrastructure) with the unconnected piddling-level arrivals of boat people. And it is true that they are unconnected.
But that is not the perception that people battling away in those outer areas have. Many believe that arrivals add to an already uneasy situation. The perception is wrong but it is not necessarily xenophobic to have it. I think Gillard is acutely aware of this, being from an outer Melbourne electorate herself. It is probably why she has woven in another theme “sustainable population growth”, which is also only tenuously related.
What she proposes may sound a bit like the Pacific Solution and it may not even work as hoped. But I think it will take the heat out of the issue and help remove race politics from the political agenda. It is optimistic to expect that it can just go from the agenda immediately. I like her appeals to Australians’ sense of fairness and the respect shown to human dignity in the way asylum seekers are to be treated.
I think that she has successfully defused race politics as an issue at the coming election. There’s still a lot to be done before it moves to the dustbin, but you’ve got to start somewhere. It runs a lot bigger than just saving Lindsay.
Fran @ 171 “Doubtless that is so … of course, the fact that she is referred to as “lass” may simple be a manifestation of the context in which the much greater injustices are meted out.”
Doubtless this is so also, though the interesting thing about the first example was that it seemed that the objection to the use of the word “lass” was for obfuscatory purposes, rather than a as committment to adressing greater injustices. It may be that the objection to the use of the word lass was just a way of veiling the power that was really at work, and we need to be equally aware of such uses of power as we watch what others say (and don’t say) and the way they say it.
Fran @ 171 “Doubtless that is so … of course, the fact that she is referred to as “lass” may simple be a manifestation of the context in which the much greater injustices are meted out.”
Doubtless this is so also, though the interesting thing about the first example was that it seemed that the objection to the use of the word “lass” was for obfuscatory purposes, rather than a as committment to adressing greater injustices. It may be that the objection to the use of the word lass was just a way of veiling the power that was really at work, and we need to be equally aware of such uses of power as we watch what others say (and don’t say) and the way they say it.
As the culprit in the apparently incorrect usages of “lass” and “girl”, I appreciate your take on it, Jester. You’re right. Not one of them showed the least interest in the injustice.
I could write a book about peoples desperate attempts to overcome disparagement or discrimination in language. An early troublesome one was “chairman”. which led to the cumbersome “chairperson”. Why add an extra syllable? Fortunately commonsense eventually prevailed and usage led to “chair” and/or “president” which overcame objections.
My favourite invention came from my time in the CES network (also where the “lass” incident occurred). There some earnest person laboured hard to come up with a non-discriminatory replacement for the redundant waiter/waitress terminologies in this gender-neutral age.
The result was “waitperson”, which actually caught on like wildfire for printouts on job vacancy cards. I used to shudder whenever I saw it, but these days just regard it as hilarious.
I’m not sure that language changing helped all that much with job discrimination either.
As the culprit in the apparently incorrect usages of “lass” and “girl”, I appreciate your take on it, Jester. You’re right. Not one of them showed the least interest in the injustice.
I could write a book about peoples desperate attempts to overcome disparagement or discrimination in language. An early troublesome one was “chairman”. which led to the cumbersome “chairperson”. Why add an extra syllable? Fortunately commonsense eventually prevailed and usage led to “chair” and/or “president” which overcame objections.
My favourite invention came from my time in the CES network (also where the “lass” incident occurred). There some earnest person laboured hard to come up with a non-discriminatory replacement for the redundant waiter/waitress terminologies in this gender-neutral age.
The result was “waitperson”, which actually caught on like wildfire for printouts on job vacancy cards. I used to shudder whenever I saw it, but these days just regard it as hilarious.
I’m not sure that language changing helped all that much with job discrimination either.
Jester proposed:
Indeed. That is why in another thread on a related issue I noted that it is not merely a worthy goal to use inclusive language. The process of working out what inclusive language entails by interrogating what stands behind it is itself worthy.
Yet you can’t do the latter without taking a look at the former, any more than you can discover and deal with any big problem before seeing its first and apparently least impressive manifestation. Usually, it’s the little things that tip you off.
Jester proposed:
Indeed. That is why in another thread on a related issue I noted that it is not merely a worthy goal to use inclusive language. The process of working out what inclusive language entails by interrogating what stands behind it is itself worthy.
Yet you can’t do the latter without taking a look at the former, any more than you can discover and deal with any big problem before seeing its first and apparently least impressive manifestation. Usually, it’s the little things that tip you off.
“By 2013 no asylum seeker shal be living in Australia!”
JG. 2010 Campaign Speech.
“By 2013 no asylum seeker shal be living in Australia!”
JG. 2010 Campaign Speech.
I hope Julia is not the new drover’s dog.
Hawke’s accord lead to a massive cuts in wages and gutted the union movement by creating the super unions that were massively out of touch with the rank and file.
To Prime minister Gillard & the Labour Party, concerning a wage rise – Things are getting beyond Australians being able to afford their weekly grocery & other commodities especially for working couples trying to keep their family going with just these simple essentials.
The Pensioners are also doing a very hard battle especially the single ones that own their homes & are having a battle to be able to keep up the payments like Rates, Electricity, Telstra, Insurances, Fuel for their vehicle, & just their groceries etc.
We don’t want to lose our homes that we worked hard for over the many years.
Everytime we get a wage rise is just before everything has gone up.
Please help us the people before it’s too late.
Please help the pensioners too as some of them are desperate.