AUSTRALIA'S MEDIA BECOMES "RUPERTISED"!

The current media politics in Australia have become mono-voiced and the mono-voice has taken its cue from the main monopolistic media broker in the country.

Have you noticed that with the one voice they are crying "GET GILLARD BY FAIR MEANS OR FOUL!"

I am not a Gillard fan - she and her ALP government have let down the Australian population and those who would hope to become part of that population, and they have failed us on many issues.

However, with one voice the media are trying to destroy a legally elected government and to prove that the natural government of the country is in the hands of the most conservative voices ever to shout from the rooftops ""WE SHALL GOVERN AND WE ALONE SHALL DECIDE WHO GOVERNS THE COUNTRY"!

The main voice has been the Murdoch-controlled media which is roughly 70 per cent of all media in Australia. But the other 30 per cent is more or less Fairfax media and the ABC which has thrown in its lot with the Murdoch gang to the extent that there is no possibility of ever obtaining fair and reasoned argument on that once august organisation.

From Keating onwards, all governments hve undermined and underfunded the ABC and of course the coup de grace was when Howard appointed Mark Scott as Managing Director of the organisation after he had already subverted journalism at Fairfax.

Journalists who might actually voice dissent and reason with sound arguments are on notice not to rock the media boats which give them their livelihoods - which are shrinking anyway, because alternative media are able to tell the truths which the main stream media (MSM) won't do - they are all supporting reactionary, right-wing, homophobic bigotry and worse.

Is this a media dictatorship taking over?

It certainly seems so!

Here is an interesting letter from The Age 0n 6 February 2013:

Media must pin down politicians

IT IS time the media accepted some responsibility for the contempt in which politicians seem to hold their constituents. Fatuous sound bites from doorstep interviews have become the basis for opinion pieces. When did fact checking and research go out of the journalistic kitbag?

The public has learnt to expect that politicians have difficulty with the truth, but it seems the media, caught up in the frenzy of being first with the news, are also losing credibility. Pinning politicians down to answer questions, and presenting in-depth analysis once were the basics of political journalists.

Policies and costings for every political party's platform should be demanded by the press and then properly scrutinised and reported by journalists. If journalists went back to basics, the freedom of the press would mean something. It would mean electors would be free to choose the government they want, knowing exactly what it is intending to do.

Greg Tuck, Warragul

MICHELLE GRATTAN DOES MORE DAMAGE AND THEN SUDDENLY MOVES ON!

Michelle Grattan has worked for Fairfax media for many years and has slowly but inexorably moved from centre (?) to ultra right, becoming more and more extreme in the last 5 years since the Rudd/Gillard governments arrived in Canberra.

She has done her best to destabilise the present government and undermine Gillard at every turn.

She has done nothing to ensure investigation of the Slipper/Ashby/Thomson/Jackson scandals, she has done nothing to investigate the Oppositions's role in destablising the government and indeed she has done her level best to assist them - the Opposition - at every turn.

Grattan is reported as having accepted a post at the Australian National University where she will apparently be involved in media studies.

I pity her students - one-sided narrow prejudiced reporting does not academic freedom make as we are witnessing at the moment in the USA where - as in Australia - any criticism of Israel is taken to be anti-semitic, where the real anti-semites are the Israelis and zionists around the world!

The Gillard government may not be the best government ever seen in this or any other country, but in the country of the fair go - supposedly - every effort is being mounted by the media - Murdoch/Fairfax/ABC - you name it - they are all trying to cause the government to collapse.

We all make mistakes, some worse than others, but human beings are fallible creatures and it does not make them be condemned for all their efforts.

Gillard and Rudd have personally done me a great deal of harm, and their approaches to many aspects of government have been appalling, but do people like Grattan really believe that the Abbott-led team will be so much better than those who are in government at the moment?

If so, they are deluding themselves, and should the unthinkable occur at the election in September 2013 many of these people will be as shocked as the Queenslanders and News South Welshmen have been since electing Newman and O'Farrell.

GILLARD'S ANTI-DISCRIMINATION BILL 2012 RENAMED DISCRIMINATION BILL!

The Gillard Government put out a discussion paper for a proposed bill to encompass 5 anti-discrimination acts and consolidate them into one act.

The bill is called the "Human Rights and Anti-Discrimination Bill 2012".

Now let's get this clear - we need to understand the meaning of anti-discrimination.

Basically anti is a preposition and derives from the Greek anti - against. In the English language the meaning in general usage is opposed to.

Discrimination means unfavourable treatment based on prejudice.

The proposed bill allows religious organisations to discriminate against certain members of the population which religions deem to be against their interests in relation to such issues as employment, teaching, administration and several others.

Although these institutions are tax exempt - another anomaly when it comes to anti-discrimination, many are in fact subsidised by the government to carry out their discriminatory activities.

As I mentioned in a previous post, in South Africa as soon as the apartheid government wanted to introduce a new discriminatory piece of legislation, it was couched in terms which seemed to suggest the opposite.

This is, in fact, the intent of the current bill. It is designed to entrench discrimination and is the opposite of anti-discrimination.

It can therefore not be supported in any way as the bill now stands and Gillard has firmly stated that she has no intention of changing the direction of the bill - and as I also said before - this from an atheist unmarried prime minister living with a partner against the teachings of the religious institutions to which she is providing exemptions and for which she continues to provide funding and provide tax exemptions.

Gillard may look more personable now with her glasses than she has ever looked before, but the person behind the glasses is as steely-minded as ever and as Margaret Thatcher so infamously said, "The Lady is Not For Turning".

GILLARD IS A HOMPHOBIC HYPOCRITICAL BIGOT AND YOU SHOULD NOT VOTE FOR HER!

The following article appeared in The Age on 17 January 2013, and the letters following the article are relevant to this and an earlier post. You have to ask yourself how low can this government get? Isn't it at rock-bottom yet? It must be pretty close by now!

Religious groups free to discriminate against pregnant women

By Jane Lee and Clay Lucas

The draft bill makes clearer which groups religious organisations can discriminate against lawfully.

Religious organisations, including those funded by the state government, retain their legal right to discriminate against pregnant women under a new human rights bill. The draft of the Human Rights and Anti-Discrimination Bill consolidates five existing federal discrimination laws after a decades-long campaign by lawyers and human rights advocates. The draft bill makes clearer which groups religious organisations can discriminate against lawfully.

Under the draft bill, faith-based groups, including schools and hospitals, can still refuse to hire people because of a wide range of attributes that would be unlawful for any other organisation, including women who are pregnant or potentially pregnant.

When the Sex Discrimination Act - which came into force in 1984 - was drafted, a number of religious bodies argued they should be allowed to discriminate against pregnant or ''potentially pregnant'' women to avoid having to employ unwed mothers.

The Human Rights Law Centre's director of advocacy and strategic litigation, Anna Brown, said that while the bill introduced important new protections from discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity, and removed the ability of religious bodies to discriminate on the basis of age, sex and breastfeeding, it was a ''missed opportunity'' to narrow the broad exemptions available to religious groups.

Weet-Bix manufacturer Sanitarium is a religious organisation owned and operated by the Seventh-Day Adventist church, which means it could discriminate against people with these attributes.

An online advertisement for a manufacturing team leader position with the company says: ''If you share our passion for what we do, our products and you can align with our Christian-based principles this is a great opportunity for you.''

Sanitarium spokeswoman Julie Praestiin said the company's workplace culture was ''grounded on Christian-based values of care, courage, humility, integrity and passion which are generally shared by the Australian community''.

She said Sanitarium complied with employment laws. ''We are an equal opportunity employer and have a diverse workforce which encompasses a variety of cultures and worldviews. Religious belief is not a condition of employment.''

Hugh de Kretser, executive officer of the Federation of Community Legal Centres, said that Sanitarium, which is understood to have a turnover of $300 million a year – although the church is not required to lodge Sanitarium's financial reports – should not be allowed to discriminate.

''That a large organisation with a turnover of $300 million a year is given a green light by the law to discriminate highlights the problems with these exemptions,'' he said.

''It's about balancing freedom of religion from freedom from discrimination, and getting it right as to where we draw the line. And examples like this show that the exemptions need to be wound back.''

President of the Australian Human Rights Commission, Professor Gillian Triggs, said that the government had aimed to consolidate laws rather than ''embark on full-scale reform''.

Professor Triggs acknowledged that there were some tensions between how the bill protected different human rights. ''In a secular society such as Australia . . . one does not want to give any sort of particular priority to one freedom above the right of people to non-discriminatory employment.'' She said it was important ''that we don't throw the baby out with the bathwater'' as the bill was the first step towards creating a coherent federal human rights system.

Jane.Lee@fairfaxmedia.com.au ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Letters in The Age:

A betrayal of human rights

January 17, 2013

THE Gillard government had the opportunity to create a law that prevented discrimination against workers and volunteers on the basis of certain ''attributes'' including sexuality and single parenthood. Instead it chose to exclude faith-based organisations (The Age, 16/1) from this even though they receive billions of dollars of taxpayers' money, via funding agreements with governments, to provide essential education, health and community services. Frequently they are the sole local service provider.

Imagine how it feels to know you are denigrated to such an extent that, no matter how experienced and competent you are at work, you can be sacked with no redress because your very being ''injures the religious sensitivities of adherents of that religion''. What do taxpayer-funded, universal services have to do with religious sensitivities? This is a human rights issue that should involve the whole community. I am still haunted by the car stickers proclaiming ''Kill a Queer for Christ'' that I saw in the United States. Bad things happen when good people do nothing.

Lyn McKenzie, Fitzroy

Illustration: Jack Chadwick.

Enshrining bigotry

IN 1981, a friend was sacked from his teaching job at a Catholic school in Geelong after he let slip to a colleague that he was living with his girlfriend. That such action was legal in the 1980s was lamentable. Fast forward to 2013 and the legality of that bigotry is about to be enshrined in the Human Rights and Anti-Discrimination Bill. Haven't we come a long way?

Richard Aspland, Rosanna

Well, fair's fair

SO RELIGIOUS groups can refuse to hire law-abiding people they deem to be sinners. Presumably they will not get too upset if I refuse to hire someone because they are religious. Do unto others…

Andy Stewart, Coburg

Shameful legislation

FAR from being the courageous leader she markets herself as, Julia Gillard lacks a spine. She also betrays the real values of Labor and sells out a fairer Australia for base political interests. It is bad enough that she is happy to entrench discrimination against those who face discrimination in their daily lives. Worse is that Penny Wong, an openly gay person, says she is seeking ''to balance the existing law and the practice of religious exemptions with the principle of non-discrimination''. There is no balance when discrimination is legislated. Labor's move to the extreme right of politics is complete. Shame on Gillard and Wong.

Douglas Potter, Surrey Hills

But the Bible said …

RELIGIOUS groups discriminate against gays because the Bible tells them it is OK to hate them. Shamefully, the government agrees. I am looking forward to religious groups sacking menstruating women and those who eat shellfish, trim their beards and wear clothes of mixed material. However, owning and beating slaves is OK.

Ian Smith, Whittlesea

...and another thing

SHAME on Gillard for giving in to bullying by the so-called Australian Christian Lobby. No government should condone discrimination.

Robert Humphreys, Coburg

Discrimination

TO THOSE faith-based organisations that don't want me as an employee: do you still want my taxes?

Michael Dalton, Yarraville

CHURCHES can discriminate against those who are ''different''. That's a lovely Christian attitude. What utter hypocrisy.

Keith Beman, Woodend

GIVEN the revelations of clergy abuse, the last thing churches should be allowed to do is ''vet the sexual practices of potential employees''.

Benjamin Doherty, West Melbourne

GILLARD is our most disappointing atheist prime minister. She could have promoted tolerance and rationality, but she caved in to superstitious bigotry.

Terry Kelly, Carlton North

........and to add insult to injury, WE have to continue to pay our taxes and those who discriminate DON'T pay any at all!!! (RED_JOS COMMENT)

THOMSON, FEDERAL OPPOSITION, MEDIA - WHERE DOES IT START AND WHERE WILL IT END?

Tony Abbott is desperate to become prime minister of Australia. He is prepared to stoop to whatever depths he is able to in order to achieve his life's ambition.

Should this ever occur, "CRY THE BELOVED COUNTRY", and never forget that George Pell is Abbott's mentor!

Let's start with the media. Here is a situation of one of the worst beat-ups this country has ever seen, and the people responsible are the Murdoch media, Fairfax media, ABC television and many smaller parts of the media that still survive in Australia.

We are censored so that we only get what the media want us to get, and the rest we have to get from independent and overseas media outlets.

What have we in Parliament? Where to start?

Heffernan the perennial homophobe who learns nothing from the past, Pyne, well, methinks he doth protest too much!! - others in the Coalition who support what Abbott is doing, in both houses of parliament, who will regret too one day in the future if Abbott succeeds and also when many hidden issue are exposed, the governing party which could also expose more but seem unwilling to do so!

The disgraceful behaviour in the parliament where one man's reputation is being dragged through the gutter because another is so desperate for power, and his own supporters whose ongoing conduct shows they care nothing for the well-being of the people of this country who watch this soap-opera unfold on a daily basis and wonder what it is all about. The man who would be prime minister is never, ever, seen as someone who could lead this country - he has no vision, he negates everything, he has no policies, he makes himself be seen in the most ridiculous places, doing the most ridiculous things to show he is a "man of the people" - well, if ever there was a load of crap and bullshit, this is it!! - and people are ready to vote for him???

All because Gillard won government when Abbott had decided he was going to win and he is now desperate and beside himself.

TEN YEARS ON FROM THE TAMPA - REFUGEES DENIED FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS

2 JANUARY 2012

The following article was published in the University of Western Sydney's GradLife alumni journal - Volume 3 Issue 2 November 2011. It is an article of such importance as to merit publishing it in as many places as possible to give the matter as much publicity as possible:

Opinion piece:

ten years on from the Tampa - refugees denied fundamental rights

UWS Law School Professor Michael Head reviews the controversial Malaysia Solution.

Inflated claims have been made by some lawyers about the August 31 High Court ruling on the refugee 'Malaysian Solution' - such as that the court has become a 'people's court' and a de facto court of human rights.

In reality, the court's decision was an extremely narrow one. It leaves in place the system of 'onshore' detention within Australia - a system that denies fundamental legal and democratic rights to asylum seekers, such as to seek political protection without being penalised, and not to be detained without trial.

It should be recalled that in 2001, the High Court permitted the forced removal of the Tampa refugees to Nauru, and in 2004 the court ruled that the government could keep refugees detained within onshore Australian detention centres indefinitely, even in violation of international law, including the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

The latest High Court decision was based on an interpretation of specific sections of the Migration Act and the Immigration (Guardianship of Children) Act.

In particular, section 198A(3) of the Migration Act was interpreted to reflect obligations under the international Refugee Convention. These obligations are minimal: not to deport someone who is officially classified as a refugee to face political persecution and not to punish people making protection applications.

As several judges made clear, the ruling does not prohibit other versions of so-called offshore processing, as long as they satisfy these very limited requirements.

The High Court decision leaves intact mandatory detention, that is, the imprisonment of all asylum seekers arriving in boats - a punitive regime that, in effect, violates the Refugee Convention by seeking to deter refugees from exercising their right to seek asylum. Australia is the only country to maintain such compulsory detention, which was first introduced by a Labor government in the 1990s.

Much of the commentary surrounding the court's ruling was guided by the conception that detention is acceptable as long as the Australian government remains in control of the process. This standpoint ignores the fact that the treatment of asylum seekers in Australian facilities is punitive and degrading, and has caused immense personal suffering.

Across Australia's detention network, incidents of self harm, most often through attempted suicide or mass hunger strikes, have escalated. According to statistics obtained by the Ombudsman from the Immigration Department, there were 1132 instances of actual or threatened self-harm in 12 months - an average of three per day. In just one week during July, there were 50 such incidents.

In line with the reaction of successive governments to any challenge by incarcerated refugees to the denial of their fundamental rights, the federal government has responded with repression, including the use of tear gas and rubber bullets. Desperate protests by inmates, attempting to draw public attention to their plight, have been met with the arbitrary removal of demonstrators to high-security prisons and threats by government ministers to retaliate by stripping refugees of their right to seek asylum.

The experience of the past two decades suggests that the conditions inside the detention centres will only worsen as asylum seekers wait longer and longer for decisions on their visa applications. The High Court late last year held that detainees on Christmas Island could not be denied access to the courts. Given the numbers of detainees and the lengthy nature of the official and judicial processes, however, many are likely to remain imprisoned, waiting months, if not years, for appeal outcomes.

The government's move to circumvent the latest ruling reveals a contempt for basic legal norms. Its draft legislation effectively repudiated the requirements of the Refugee Convention, placed all power in the personal hands of the immigration minister to declare any country an 'offshore processing country' in the 'national interest' and precluded any overriding vote by parliament.

More fundamentally, the entire political establishment, including the Greens, advocate some form of 'border protection' regime, which ultimately means using military force, in one way or another, either to physically 'turn back the boats' or to otherwise block refugees. Intrinsically, it denies the right to flee persecution and seek asylum, which means nothing if countries shut their borders.

Political and media commentators generally attribute this policy to widespread public hostility to refugees. An interesting opinion poll conducted by Fairfax Media, however, found just 25 percent support for 'offshore processing'.

To the extent that anti-refugee sentiment exists among certain layers of the population, it is largely the result of political and media campaigns aimed at fomenting xenophobic fears about the country being 'under siege' or facing 'invasion' by hordes of aliens responsible for driving 'Australians' out of jobs, lowering their wages and cutting their living standards. Such rhetoric has always been used in times of economic crisis to deflect domestic discontent away from the real culprits - the political and ruling elite and the profit system itself.

Not only the right to asylum but a more basic democratic principle is at stake in this issue: that all people should have the elementary right to live and work with full citizenship rights in any country of their choosing. Without that fundamental right they can be denuded of virtually any other civil and political right.

GILLARD GETS GOD!!!!! - THE ATHEIST PRIME MINISTER OF HYPOCRISY

GILLARD GETS GOD!!!!!!!!!!!!! – Southern Star Observer 240311

Julia Gillard is a self-confessed atheist - when it suits her! Her hypocrisy over certain issues is breathtaking - how can she possibly expect to be taken seriously after the utterances below, reported in the Southern Star Observer on 24 March 2011.

I am against marriage - it is an institution that has failed, was introduced as a capitalist concept to ensure the man owns the woman and she must stay at home and make babies as the next labour force.

I support marriage for the gay, lesbian, transgender and HIV/AIDS communities only on the basis of equality for all, otherwise who needs it?

When legislation providing equality in every aspect of the law is achieved, we will have won the fight.

Until then homophobia will continue unabated, bashings, assaults and murders will continue, suicides amongst members of our communities will continue to be several times higher than the heterosexual equivalent, and the governments of the day will continue to get the support of the religious right voters.

Until governments tax religious institutions we will continue to be discriminated against by official government sanction and the government's amending of 85 pieces of legislation in 2008/2009 will have no meaning whatsoever!!

Julia is a disaster, the ALP is a disaster, the Coalition is a disaster and more and more voters ought to be turning their votes away from the major parties.

Only then will we even begin to approach some modicum of democracy for all our citizens!

Marriage equality un-Australian: Gillard

Prime Minister Julia Gillard has declared that marriage rights for same-sex couples are incompatible with Australian culture and heritage one day after hundreds demanded their rights in Sydney and Brisbane.

“I do find myself on the conservative side in this question … because of the way our society is and how we got here,” Gillard told Sky News on Sunday.

“There are some important things from our past that need to continue to be part of our present and part of our future.”

When asked if she was expressing a personal view or what she thought Australians wanted to hear, Gillard said she would have said the same thing had she never entered politics, pitching herself as a social conservative.

“I had a pro-union pro-Labor upbringing in a quite conservative family in the sense of personal values,” Gillard said.

“If I was in a different walk of life, if I’d continued in the law and was a partner of a law firm now, I would express the same view.

“I think for our culture, for our heritage, the Marriage Act and marriage being between a man and a woman has a special status … I know that people might look at me and think that’s something that they wouldn’t necessarily expect me to say but that is what I believe.

“I’m on the record as saying things like I think it’s important that people understand their Bible stories. Not because I’m an advocate of religion — clearly I’m not — but once again, what comes from the Bible has formed such an important part of our culture.”

Only the day before crowds of around 400 gathered at the Sydney Town Hall before marching to Taylor Square and in Brisbane’s Queen Park.

In Sydney, speakers from New Mardi Gras, Australian Marriage Equality urged people to contact their MPs and lobby them directly, while Greens MLC Cate Faehrmann warned of the danger of a conservative-controlled Upper House after the NSW state election.
“The influence of people like Fred Nile and the Christian Democratic party may only get stronger after this election,” Faehrmann said.

“What we’re hearing is that not only will the Coalition probably win government but they may also win control of the Upper House with the support of the Christian Democratic Party and the Shooters and Fishers. The only way to stop that is to make sure that everyone you know votes progressive in the Upper House. That’s probably more important than what you do with your Lower House vote.”

Faehrmann and Sydney MP Clover Moore both pledged to introduce legislation to create marriage equality at a state level if the federal Government failed to act.
Tags: Australian Marriage Equality, featured, Greens MLC Cate Faehrmann, marriage equality, Prime Minister Julia Gillard, same-sex marriage

This post was written by: Andrew M Potts

Julia the Christian

Let me understand this. Here we have a prime minister who doesn’t believe in God telling us to read the Bible because it’s the basis of our tradition, society and culture, opposing marriage equality because it’s not part of that tradition (Sky TV interview last Sunday).

A prime minister who employs gay staff but doesn’t consider them her equals. A woman extolling the virtues of one man one woman marriage refusing to marry her long-time live-in lover.

When asked to explain on Sky TV, Gillard hauled out her Bible and pitched for the Christian vote. Cynical or what?

Describing herself as a traditionalist and a conservative, she praised the virtues of the ‘strong Welsh Labor working-class household’ in which she was brought up: politeness, thrift, fortitude, discipline conveniently omitting the narrow-minded prudishness and prejudice equally typical of that era.

Where the hell did all that come from? It came from Fred Nile’s Christian Democratic Party, the Australian Christian Lobby and the Australian Christian Values Institute, whose website features Peter and Jenny Stokes (the Salt Shakers), Bill Muehlenberg, and Warwick Marsh, among others.

“Australian values are Christian values. These are the values that made Australia great,” it says, “… reaffirm Australia’s commitment to Judeo-Christian values as the cornerstone of our nation’s prosperity for the common good.”

Compare that with Gillard’s more subtle evocation of Christian heritage: “what comes from the Bible forms an important part of our culture”, we have to pay respect to “the way our society is and the way we got here”, “important things from the past should continue into the present and the future”, “for our culture and heritage marriage has a special status,” and so on, and on.

I wonder what else she has been reading lately.

Could it be the latest report from the Australian Human Rights Commission, which says “hostility towards homosexuals …. remains widespread” and that there is “great wariness about rights legislation”? (The Age) If so, then how perfectly she dog-whistled for the prejudiced vote.

Imagine for a moment if she had spoken honestly. “It’s not me, reverend,” she pants, tugging her crimson forelock. “Honest, I get the Christian values thing. It’s the Greens who made me do it, with their euthanasia and gay marriage. Vote for me and I’ll save you from them. Don’t worry about the poofs and dykes — they don’t count.”
Maybe not, Julia, but we — and our families and friends and their families and friends — do vote. But not for you and your party while you continue this grovelling to the God squad.

Oh, and Tim? I’d order the top hat and tails now if I were you. She’s obviously decided there are votes in straight weddings.

This post was written by: Doug Pollard