We have just moved to Tasmania, so not much chance to contribute till now. I wrote this a while back and just found it again. Seems not much has changed. Something to chew over.
 
Yet, surely, we are also prepared to listen.
 
 
Up to now we have fought wars against a known enemy, usually a country or bloc of countries.
 
What were the main defining features of those wars?
 
An identifiable geographical location and an identifiable foe, usually in uniform or distinct clothing or with distinct physical features.
 
Now we have the ‘war on terror’.
 
If the term ‘war’ is to be used, then certain questions should be asked:
 
1.      Who is the enemy?
2.      Where are they?
3.      Why are they attacking us?
4.      What do they want?
 
 
To expand on those questions.
 
Who is the enemy?
 
The simple answer, currently in vogue, is that the ‘terrorists’ are the enemy. The fact that most are from Muslim countries has, inexorably, led to the identification of Muslims as the source of the enemy. If the Muslims are the source of the enemy then we have a true ‘war’. We have an identifiable enemy, with, if not a uniform, at least distinct physical features. Not to mention a history of enmity stretching back to the crusades. They are simply not us, so therefore they must be them, so therefore they are the logical enemy.
 
Where are ‘they’?
 
Now we have a possible answer to the first question, the answer to the second question becomes obvious. Where ‘they’ are is any country that has a predominant Muslim population. That country must now swear allegiance or become a legitimate target of attack. “You are either with us or you are against us.”
 
Now, at least, we know where to find ‘them’.
 
Why are they attacking us?
 
For many people that seems to be truly incomprehensible. It certainly does not appear to be seriously addressed in the mainstream media. But should it be so? After a history which includes the crusades, colonialism, the inquisition, the partition of Palestine, the invasion and occupation of Iraq and so on, it is perhaps not so incomprehensible. There is a certain ‘them and us’ theme threading its way through history.
 
What do they want?
 
I have heard many answers to that question. It is the question that I regard as fundamental.
 
Apparently, Osama Bin Laden simply wants the west out of the Middle East. In particular, Arabia and Iraq, which have special significance to Islam. By being there, the west has become the Infidel, the enemy, a legitimate target of attack.
 
Is that all? Does Bin Laden speak for all who use terror as a tactic? Do Muslim’s have a hidden agenda?
 
Do they want more, do they want to convert us all to Islam?
 
Heaven forbid!
 
We didn’t win the crusades for nothing, you know.
 

Conclusion

 
It would appear, that in an attempt to answer those four questions, I have ended up with Muslims as the enemy. Or, at least, the source of the enemy.
 
Yet, we are told we are in a ‘war on terror’, not a ‘war on Muslims’.
 
A ‘war on terror’ sounds like a typical media hype, such as the ‘war on want’, the ‘war on drugs’, the ‘war on poverty’, the war on this and the war on that. The term ‘war’ suggesting an effort above and beyond the normal. That effort directed at a theme. That theme, I would suggest, is like a hydra, it has many heads. It manifests in identifiable points and then disappears into the ether to become a theme again. ‘Want’ manifests as a starving child, a homeless family. Yet, no matter how many children are fed or families housed, there are more. ‘Want’ as the cause, stays. It has not been addressed. Yet, we all feel good that we are in a war against such a worthy enemy. Drugs kill our youth. Yet, no matter what laws are passed, drugs still seem exists. We have not addressed the cause. Poverty still stalks this planet. Yet, no matter how much money is spent on welfare or aide, it continues to exist. We have not addressed the cause.
 
To win a war, it is axiomatic that you need an enemy you can defeat. An enemy that, at a certain point, you can identify as having been defeated. We knew when  WWI & WWII had been won. (Well, on a superficial level anyway).
 
Terror is not an enemy. It is a tactic of the enemy.
 
We will not defeat the enemy unless we can first of all identify who the enemy is. Once we know, for certain, who is the enemy, we can then assess whether we can, indeed defeat them or it, or whether we will have to negotiate a peace.
 
My suggestion is the United Nations establishes a forum for representatives of the people who use terror as a tactic to voice their concerns. To voice what is driving them on to commit such horrendous acts against innocent civilians. Innocent civilians who are both Christian and Muslim, or indeed of any religious persuasion.
 
We in the West, quite rightly, will not be cowed by or bow to terrorism as a tactic.
 
We will stand and defend what we hold to be sound values.
 
Yet, surely, we are also prepared to listen.
 
We, the people on the ground, the innocent civilians, the foot soldier sent to fight, the emergency workers who have to clear up the corpses, deserve to be clearly told why we are fighting, why we are in danger.
 
As democratic nations, the people tend to get it right once they know the facts.
 
I would suggest that we are not being told the facts, and what we are being told is being distorted through the media.
 
A United Nations Forum could tell us.
 
The ‘other side’ of this ‘war’ will then be able to tell us. Will be invited to clearly state their demands. Will identify themselves as the spokesmen/women for an identifiable group rather than splinter extremists.
 
If they are splinter extremists, then at least we will know they have no wider mandate. That all we have to do is find and eliminate them. The problem then goes away.
 
It is the potential that they represent more that is the concern.
 
Is the source of suicide bombers finite or infinite?
 
Once the ‘other side’ reveals both themselves and their demands, we, the people, can then decide if we can live with a negotiated peace or if we will chose to go to war.
 
At least we will have sought to do it peacefully. We will have clearly shown that we are prepared to listen. That, I suggest, would leave the extremist elements nowhere to go within their communities. 
 
It is that, or trust that our leaders are acting in good faith. I make no judgment either way. However, the waters appear to be very muddy. If we, the people, are going to put our freedoms and our lives at risk, then we deserve to know that the cause is both just and worthwhile.
 
Too often, history has clearly shown that wars have not been fought on valid grounds. Too often, history has shown that a genuine commitment by both sides to understanding the concerns of the other would have avoided war.
 
The choice: a peaceful forum where all sides are invited to talk, or, a war on terror.
 
Are we prepared to listen?
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

How can a once mighty river be reduced to an environmental nightmare?

The original inhabitants of this island managed to look after it for 50,000 years and it was in pristine condition when the British arrived to nick the joint by force of arms and a legal fiction found in the Blackstone Chronicles.

Then it has taken just over 200 years to turn the mouth of the river into slurry. The theft of Australia was legally justified on the basis that there was no-one wandering around, terra nullius. That was a legal fiction, a construct of the mind. A way of seeing things that justified an action that was, ironically, against the very basis of Britain’s Common Law, property. A further irony is that many of those first reluctant colonialists had been sent to Botany Bay for the theft of a ridiculously small amount of property, the Common Law finding such theft so morally repugnant. Yet they were co-opted into the grand larceny of a continent. It is interesting that the legal fiction was upheld by the courts in Australia until 1993 when the Mabo decision in the High Court said, effectively, ‘oh, alright, fair cop, we nicked it, but we are not giving it back because the other great pillar of the common law is that possession is nine tenths of it.’ 

Possession: OED (On-Line): noun 1 the state of possessing something. 2 a thing owned or possessed. 3 the state of being possessed by a demon, emotion, etc. 4 (in sport) temporary control of the ball by a player or team.

The original owners of Australia would identify with 3. ‘the state of being possessed by a demon …’ 

1 & 2, the state of possessing something, a thing owned. The British arrived, took possession of a tiny bit of it and using a legal fiction they magically used that possession to own all of it, to gain legal title (note, it was legal title under British law not the Aboriginal Law, the only smoking ceremony the British understood emanated from the barrel of a gun). The concept of property is ridiculous if you think about it. That an ephemeral organism with a really, really short lifespan can ‘own’ something that has a lifespan measured in millions of years, the planet. That a really, really small organism can ‘own’ a really, really big thing, the planet.

Still, when you believe in ghosts and believe that a ghost gave you dominion over the planet, well, I suppose you will believe anything…… and the British laughed at the Aboriginal Dreamtime? 

I think the Aboriginal Peoples had it right, the land owned them. They were of the environment, not separate from it. They were born, lived and died leaving a very light footprint.

Enter the British and ‘possession’, which boils down to, “We own it and we can do what we bloody well like with it.” 

The Common law recognises a whole bundle of rights vested in the notion of property. What the Common law did not do is demand any notion of custodianship in return. The rights were all one way, to exclude others, to be able to lay waste if so desired. It took Legislative initiative to wrest such absolute control from the Common law.

Rachel Carson kicked the whole environmental thing off in the 1960’s following ‘Fallen Spring’. People started to become aware that the environment could not be trashed indefinitely, that there was a tipping point.

For nearly 200 years we had calculated the price of bounty wrested from the land based on an economic model that did not include the ‘externality’ of environmental degradation. It was another flawed human construct. If you can’t see it then you don’t have to include it in the price. Economists and accountants really struggle with the concepts of price and value. 

The hidden cost just kept adding up and up.

Now, ‘suddenly’, it is a big problem we have to solve. It is a huge cost we have to pay as a society. The Murray River has been allocated 10 Billion dollars. That’s a lot of money! It is almost a house in Zimbabwe (an economy the West seems to be trying to emulate at the moment).  

The trouble is, it was economists who calculated the 10 billion dollar price tag, yet it was economists who got us into this mess in the first place. Then the price was ‘sanitised’ by politicians who hate to be the bearers of bad news, which is not good for their ‘Superannuation’ fund.

What is the true cost of ignoring environmental degradation as a function of price? I fear our grandchildren will find out, if not our children. How moral is that? 

I once heard an economist justify ignoring environmental degradation as an externality on the basis that mankind keeps on coming up with solutions when they need them, and they will this time. Let’s hope so.

The Aboriginal dreamtime spirits must be laughing at us.    
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 

Things just don’t seem to change because society, through it’s politicians, are addressing the symptom not the disease.

In today’s news: KEVIN Rudd's big idea for this weekend's 2020 Summit is a plan to help working families by setting up a national chain of government-run parent-and-child centres.

The Australian

A quote from the Sydney Mornign Herald Article,  Aug 2005

 ‘The cost of child care has escalated under the Howard Government, rising almost every quarter since it was elected nearly a decade ago.

In the past 12 months, the average weekly cost of child care has shot up by 12.4 per cent - five times the rate of other goods and services - according to government figures compiled for the Opposition.
The average weekly fee paid by parents using private long-day-care centres is now $208, up from $154 in 1997. For community-run centres, the average weekly cost has jumped from $162 to $211.
Although the Government has substantially increased funding for child care, the growth in places has not kept up with demand. This gap will widen next year when single parents move into jobs because of the Government's welfare-to-work program.
"Families' budgets are under extra pressure, with child-care fees as high as $90 to $100 a day in capital cities," the Opposition's spokeswoman on child care, Tanya Plibersek, said.
The number of children in child care had risen from 544,700 in 1997 to 752,800 last year.’

Aren’t we treating the symptom not the disease?

Men, in particular, are responding to their perceived family responsibilities in one of two ways. Predominantly, they are working harder to give their children a material standard of living the parents deem to be necessary. In the minority, are men who have chosen to work less and spend more time with their children.  

I know that promoting family values is not de rigor. However, what would be the net effect of having all families with one working partners and one at home? Would the economic world fall apart?

Note, I said ‘partner’. Also, I, as a male, am quite happy pottering around at home while my wife works, which she chooses to do. Although that is distorted somewhat as all the kids have left home. 

Of more relevance is my son. He has chosen time with his family. They are as poor as church mice, materially, but as rich as kings in the things that matter. Just how do you replace time with your young family as they grow up? Here son, have another computer??

Why do you replace your values as parents with those of a person unknown? I hasten to add, I have every respect for child-care workers. However, you are not the parents. That role simply cannot be replaced. 

So, why this desperate need to provide childcare support? It was an issue at the last election and the one before that and will be at the next one.

My daughter worked as a childcare assistant after she left school in 2000. She refused to go on the dole, although the wage she was paid was only marginally more each week.  

A hearing on the wages paid to childcare workers finished shortly after. The decision was to raise their wages from what I considered to be subsistence levels to just must mere poverty levels. There was an outcry! How could two income families survive this terrible blow, which would inevitably mean higher fees? What they were in effect saying, was that one section of society should work at minimal wages so another section of society could afford to hire them.

Why? Because of the desperate need to have material things. I address the issue of the right for women to work  below. 

Then, of course, the trap of borrowing to have those material things and to have that house that is flying out of reach. Then the need to have several houses because that is the way to make money. Oh, and lets buy shares on margin, more money free of the bothersome need to work.

Then, you can’t get off the treadmill. Then the partner has to work and so on. 

As a matter of interest, what is the benefit to females in having to work, as opposed to having the right to work?

In the end, it is simple economics. Take away the demand for childcare and the price will go down.  

Is that possible?

Probably not, it would appear. Most families have mortgaged their future to the great god, consumerism.  

 

 

 

 

Surprise, surprise. This is the legacy of a corrupt financial system under the United States Federal Reserve. Last century the American people, through their elected representatives, gave Wall St the keys to the vault in the 1970’s. Greenspan then untied all the regulatory knots and opened the spigots pouring trillions of dollars into the worlds economies and letting the hedge funds loose.

The real wealth of the world has been debased by the U.S Fed (enthusiastically assisted by Reserve banks around the world) and then leveraged into the stratosphere. 

All that money has to go somewhere.

It has been into tech stocks, into stocks in general, into housing, into metals. 

Now, it is flowing into food, which to a hedge fund is just another commodity. 

There is too much money and leverage in the world economy and it has to be taken out. The solution of the Fed Reserve is to pour more money on the fire. The politicians run around in circles crying, ‘do something’, but don’t inflict any pain on anyone.

The world probably has more people than it can feed easily. Hence it has come down to who can pay for what food there is. 

That has implications for political and economic stability, implications for the environment, and now we see, implications that go to the very heart of humanity, having enough to eat.

The bright young thing at the hedge fund computer screen making and losing millions in a flicker has no connection with the starving child in Haiti. 

Greenspan unbolted the shackles from Wall St. This is the result of letting an immoral monster loose with unlimited money through the Fed’s printing press and hedge fund leverage.

A humanitarian crisis 

 

 The Age

 

The Trouble with Islam
A muslim’s call for reform in her faith
By Irshad Manji
2003 Random House Australia

A review by Graeme Mills (DialecticBlue)

After trying to set a context, I have taken selected passages from the book; a book that will help us understand both Islam and Muslims a little better.


Context

To make sense of a series of incidents, humans tend to try to find a grand theme, a meta-narrative, an over-arching theory; modernism, in fact.

Diss-satisfaction with modernism led to post-modernism. Postmodernism looks to individual stories. It eschews the metanarrative. *

Metanarratives evolve and change over time. That change is driven by the individual narratives. Both are important.

The grand sweep of human history has two great themes, two great metanarratives, THUGS and THEOLOGIANS.

Go to the Review