Sunday, January 26, 2014

The pond is not of their world ...



This really is a special day, especially at the Sunday Terror, the least trusted newspaper in Australia, where the loons come out and howl at the moon ...

Of course any other day of the week, Akker Dakker would be moaning and groaning about all the lefties and the do gooders and the hand wringers wanting apologies to the blacks, or being sorry about the mistreatment of gays, or sorry about the history of abuse women have suffered over the years ...

Sorry? Never apologise, never look back, never say you're sorry, never put on the black armband ...

Here you go, back in November 2008:

Many Australians were moved by the Hollywood-style apology to Aborigines delivered by Prime Minister Kevin Rudd in February. 
Rudd’s address embraced the widely-accepted politically correct notion that white Australians were collectively guilty of crimes against black Australians. 
It was unequivocal in its recognition of the so-called Stolen Generations, though no court had found any basis for such claims, and it held out the hope that practical solutions might replace the symbolism of rhetoric. 
It would be an understatement to say there was an orgy of smug self-congratulation among those who had supported the false, black armband view of Australian history.

And so on and so forth, at endless tedious barking mad Akker Dakker length. No apologies then, or even an apology for a lack of apology.

Not symbolism, not rhetoric, and not another hand-out, just reality. Worth 1000 sorries any day.

Akker Dakker is such a goose he doesn't even seem to understand that his latest display of historical bile - what a toad he is, if we can mix our species - is about as clear an indication as any you could want that the crazed right wingers view the national curriculum not as an educative process, but as an ideological club.

But hey, not doubt the ALP will apologise for union war crimes, if any can be found, the very moment that Akker Dakker apologises for the war crimes of Pig Iron Bob Menzies.

Heck, drag Ming the Merciless from his grave and make him apologise and then stick him next to Tony Abbott while Abbott himself apologises, followed by the rest of the Liberal party and their commentariat flunkies. There's a few things that require an apology:




And while we're at it, an apology for the ongoing misrepresentation of deserter and leftie Simpson by donkey right wing members of the commentariat wouldn't go astray either.

Of course it would be interesting to have a curriculum which explored both sides, but when you're a zealot of the fascist Akker Dakker kind, you won't even find a scale or a balance in a butcher's shop.

But since this is meditative Sunday and while on matters of history, if you ever wanted evidence of why the Catholic church managed so well under Franco in Spain, and came to a perfectly reasonable understanding with Mussolini, here it is:


Yep, the Catholic church has always done well with jingoism and patriotism and chauvinism, and shrouding itself with the prevailing national ideology, and what a perfect job George Pell does, when taking time out from his other work as one of the world's leading climate scientists.

Truly Pellism is right at home in the least trusted newspaper in Australia, jostling cheek to jowl with the likes of the very jowly Akker Dakker.

It also produces extraordinary comedy:

We are an outpost of Western civilisation. It is one thing to oppose England in the cricket, but it is foolish not to acknowledge the British origins of our institutions - except the Catholic Church.

Why you could run that riff - except the Catholic Church - right through the rest of the Pellist blather.

Parliament, the law, schools, hospitals and military all follow British models. And Europe, like the Americas and Australia, cannot be understood without the Judaeo-Christian tradition - except the Catholic Church.

For these reasons, among others, I commend the national school curriculum review - but please, let's except the Catholic Church.

A curriculum which does not mention James Cook and has no secondary references to the First Fleet or the Anzacs is badly skewed - and where's the Catholic Church, even if it comes from wog land?

Christianity is mentioned only 11 times, once more than Islam. Europe, Britain and the US are mentioned 76 times, while Asia is referred to more than 200 times, as is the concept of sustainability for the planet - and what about the Catholic Church, which let's face it, is much more important than a sustainable planet, because you're all going to hell ...

All the evils of the Industrial Revolution are listed, while the prosperity it brought is ignored - and how could they overlook the Catholic Church  while I recycle this kind of Nick Cater tripe?

Children need to know our convicts were never slaves and they integrated into society, and that transportation was stopped as Australian society became one of the success stories of colonial history - and never mind the Catholic Church simply refusing to understand that forced convict labour was indeed a kind of slavery.

The ILO even devised a Forced Labour Convention to look at this area, and while the "unfree labour" it discusses is a form of forced labour, it doesn't score an exemption, because in the old days, convicts were placed at the disposal of private individuals and companies. (more on unfree labour here).

But where were we? Oh yes:

Children who do not know our national achievements are deprived because they cannot know what makes us tick, especially if they have little knowledge of the the malevolent, mischievous, duplicitous, fascist loving ways of the Catholic church.

But gather around little ones, and we'll tell you a tale of threatening penguins tying thumbs behind back with string and making the child kneel on the hot concrete in the Tamworth sun, and the spanking and the whacking on the cheeks and the hands and the bums, and the rulers flashing at the knuckles and the cane soaring through the air with a snickering sound, and the assigning of Dunce caps and the standing in the corner, and that's before we get on to the mental abuse of the rote recital of the catechism, with an error getting us back to the physical abuse ... and everyone truly grateful for not being at the Christian Brothers where the leather strap took on the mythic form of legend.

It is, perhaps a tad unfortunate, that Cardinal Pell should have chosen this very day to celebrate national achievements, with the past week having been dedicated in the media to the singular behaviour of assorted Marist brothers, and the astonishing acknowledgment that the molestation of children wasn't perceived as an actual crime, but as a personal or moral failure, and perhaps as something requiring counselling or some form of spiritual direction (Jailed child sex offender still has Marist Brother title, with transcript).

And that getting rid of the odd smell still lingering in the air would involve "quite a bit of paperwork" and anyway I'm not sure that the word 'crime' would have come into my mind. (Inquiry hears paedophile still a member of Catholic order).

But back to Pell and his jingoism, which is of the quaint British kind, with a European flavour sufficient to get the Catholic church out of wog jail.

Once upon a time, it was the bog Irish and the wog Italians who were perceived as not belonging to the British tradition - they were deviant Catholics, don't you know:

The Catholic dogs,
jump like frogs,
eat no meat in Friday

The correct response?

When the Catholics ring the bell
all the Proddies will go to hell!

Her Proddie Majesty and her spawn included, no doubt.

It was all very tribal and as strong in the 1950s as it was in the day when Cardinal Mannix led the charge against conscription in the first world war and was perceived by the ruling Protestant establishment as a traitor who ruined the war effort.

What did Carolyn Landon learn from it as a five year old?

I had no idea what a Protestant actually was, but I certainly realised it left me branded as different and hopeless. This was, possibly, the most important lesson I learnt at St Joseph's Catholic Primary School: the lesson of religious intolerance. It made no sense to me, but I soon began to recognise that religious prejudice was  everywhere. (here)

The pond learned that lesson too, but flash forward, and now how do we define "the other", those who are different and alien and foreign and suspect and possibly weird, most certainly strange?

Show us the way, Pellists:

Australia Day should be when we rejoice in our national achievements while giving thanks for who we are. 
We should count our blessings by comparing our situation with neighbouring countries and our long-term allies. By most standards we rate well. 
On other occasions we can mark the dark stains on our national history, but on Australia Day we acknowledge our strengths so we can draw on them to remedy our mistakes. Acknowledging the injustice done to Aborigines is essential. More needs to be done. 
Australia welcomes more migrants, by percentage, than any other country and a similarly high percentage of refugees. This diversity is enriching. 
Nearly all these migrants come to us because ours society built on traditional European values. We should know more about Asia, but we do not belong to Asia. We are not of that world.

See how it's done? A quick hop and a jump and we're away from British values to traditional European values, and therefore the Catholic church, and meanwhile, let's not mention swarthy gents from the middle East setting out certain values. Let's just conflate Judeo-Christian with Roman and Greek, in the manner of a Murdochian lackey.

And certainly let's not mention the blacks on the very day we celebrate the nation, which just so happens to be the day that the country was invaded. Never mind, much injustice might have been done, and more needs to be done, so why not do it on the very day some of them get a tad upset about the invasion ...

And as for Asia? We are not of that world.

The other, the alien, the foreign, the new dogs and frogs ...

And from there it's just a short hop and a skip to rioting on the beach at Cronulla ...

What's left? Well how about a pox on the Akker Dakkers and the Pellists of this world, so up themselves they've lost any notion of a balanced view of the world ....

(Below: and so, thank the long absent lord, to a few cartoons, and plenty more here at the Australian Cartoon Museum, well worth the visit).




13 comments:

  1. I think I'll give radio and tv a miss today, particularly 'the news'.
    [Closest I get to newspapers is here.]
    Might watch the Swiss or the Spaniard win the Australian Open tho'.
    When does the footy start?

    fred

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    Replies
    1. So you saw the Chinese woman win? Strange, how can this happen in the last outpost of western civilisation?

      The pond tips the Spaniard, and has a a threepenny bit riding on it, and a paella planned for the evening meal.

      Delete
  2. Here's something else Menzie's acolytes could also consider apologising for (2 chances?):

    Mirror (Perth, WA : 1921 - 1956), Saturday 15 July 1939, p. 17:

    Mr. Menzies' "Departed Friends"

    FURTHER HE GOES, THE MORE PRIME MINISTER MENZIES IS FORCING EVEN HIS MOST BITTER OPPONENTS TO ADMIT ONE THING—THAT HE IS A SCRUPULOUSLY FAIR FIGHTER. 'I FIND IT BETTER TO FIGHT FAIRLY, EVEN IF YOU HAVE A MAN BEATEN AND DOWN,' SAID MR. MENZIES ON WEDNESDAY NIGHT. AND, IN HIS EFFORTS TO BE FAIR, HE EVEN PUT UP WITH A GOOD DEAL OF HECKLING.

    'History will label Hitler as one of the really great men of the century,' he said — and that started the hullabaloo. In the back of the hall a good looking young woman jumped up waving aloft a placard. Another let fly at Mr. Menzies a battery of words that were finally drowned in cat-calls and cheers. Definitely, Herr Hitler wasn't popular with the audience in Anzac House. Prime Minister explained that, whatever outside nations thought of Hitler's aggres sive methods, the Fuehrer had certainly dragged his people from the depths of the despair which followed the Great War and gave them another place among the great powers. 'As far as the German people are concerned' he said, 'Hitler has proved himself a great man and a tireless worker. He dragged his nation from bankruptcy and revolution, and I think he has too much intelligence lightly to cast them back into another war.'
    "BAD BOY" HITLER
    It was perfectly sound reasoning on Mr. Menzies' part; but Hitler has been the bad boy of the cables too long now for the average person to judge him from a purely German standpoint. "Let us judge Hitler soberly and fair . . . ." began Mr. Menzies. but the rest of the sentence was drowned. Then a voice close to the microphone whispered to the speaker: "Would you like her thrown out?" Mr. Menzies hesitated, then decided that, if he was going to finish his speech, the Interjectors would have to be given their walking orders. So the police had a busy few minutes, and the ranks of the interjectors were lessened by a dozen or so. But Mr. Menzies Saw the humorous side of it before the meeting closed. "I would like," he said, '"to thank all those present — and those who are no longer present." And even the opposition gave him a good hand for that.

    I have other reasons for bearing a perpetual loathing for Menzies & his acolytes for which I expect an apology would be equally against the grain.

    Keep up the great work!

    Dannosaurus

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    1. And if anyone doubts you Danny of the Saurians, let them read the original at Trove here:

      http://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/article/75869223?searchTerm=menzies%20hitler&searchLimits=exactPhrase|||anyWords|||notWords|||l-textSearchScope=*ignore*%7C*ignore*|||fromdd|||frommm|||fromyyyy|||todd|||tomm|||toyyyy|||l-title=253|||l-word=*ignore*%7C*ignore*|||sortby

      Keep up the great reminders. We'll make a historian of Akker Dakker yet ... for Ming the Merciless did indeed, at that very late stage, in July 1939, say that History would label Hitler as one of the really great men of the century ...

      To call Menzies the Neville Chamberlain of Australia would be to dishonour Chamberlain. (And apologies if the link doesn't work, the pond might just publish it tomorrow as part of our Akker Dakker history lessons).

      Delete
  3. I must correct you, Dorothy, about the Christian Bros. using a leather strap on the boys. Our school would not do such a thing!
    No, our tool of discipline was a strip of three ply rubber conveyor belt, cut to a size of approx. 5 by 40 centimetres...

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    Replies
    1. Sheesh, Glen h, consider yourself lucky, why the Marquis de Sade himself would be pleased to see the Catholic church embrace his ways ...

      Delete
  4. Give them all a big hand! Let's appoint the ABC as the national cheerleader. In fact, most ABC programs could be effectively replaced by a giggle track and acres of applauding from a studio audience.

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    1. The pond has left the ABC Trev. Give world radio a go. After all half the time you're already listening to the BBC or watching Al Jazeera

      Delete
  5. An outpost? “Nous”?! What a humiliating portrayal - and on Australia Day, too!

    Love the cardinal's counting of words as evidence of something. How many times does the Bible mention sin, wickedness and evil? Under Pell's logic, the Bible is clearly a negative work of the devil. In line with the Pond's Awards, give the good cardinal the PM's Abacus Award, because Abbott can always count on the Cardinal, who uses the “low-tech” method.

    Let's not mention the Chinese contribution to the search for gold or the Pacific Islanders'
    valuable contribution to Australian sugar production, because we would have to also mention that they were treated inhumanely by our forebears.

    As if readers don't see that Pell's writing is PR to try to lift the reputation of the Catholic church. Trouble is, Pell's scribblings only make religion sink further.

    Which brings one back to Pell's description of Australia as an outpost of Western civilzation. The worst part of this comment is not his portrayal of Australia as still a lesser appendage of Britain, but that he suggests that we are the only civilized people in this region. What a disparaging view of neighbouring nations.

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    1. The Abacus Award! The pond loves it. History done by Abacus counting! Now there's the best form of history for the last outpost of western civilisation in the region (New Zealand and Tasmania only being the last outer provinces)

      Delete
    2. On the Catholic church's cover up of child abuse - the story is becoming clearer in Australia, not so in the Pacific islands where many abusers were sent to hide, and some still live.

      http://asopa.typepad.com/asopa_people/2012/11/was-png-a-training-ground-for-priestly-child-molesters.html

      Delete
  6. Pell: “We are not of that world”. “We”? It should be first person singular not first person plural.

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  7. The British Conservative politician Boris Johnson has been named Honorary Australian of the Year in the UK by the Australia Day Foundation.

    "I am very proud and a bit baffled by the award, but I think it is because I am the mayor of the 12th largest Australian city here in London," Mr Johnson said.

    He’s not the only who is baffled.


    http://bit.ly/1dYGD3F

    ReplyDelete

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