The West has lost its freedom of speech

[luutzu]

Hi explod,

I did ask you this -


This is where this conversation has come from, and also about the hijab, and the Muslims asking that people understand how they feel, asking others to wear it.
As I said, I don't remember any other faith asking the same, be it buddhists etc, we all just moved along enjoying the country we live in.

VC, I already said, I treat all people the same, so I appreciate you not turning it around.

I don't need your PC rules to tell me how to be with people, we grew up with Christian principles, what this country was built on.
You keep forgetting that.

Yes, it does concern me, seeing special holidays like Christmas and Easter that are on our Christian calendar being compromised, because of PC, and people trying to change the fabric of our society.

As the title says, The West has lost its freedom of speech

We took our kids to the cheaper version of the Easter Show at Moore Park today and I saw plenty of Arabs and Indians and pacific islanders and Aussies I don't think most people care about Holy Days... for most of us it's just an excuse to take time off work and enjoy time with the family.

If I'm a Muslim or someone who doesn't practice Christianity... I'd love all the Christian holidays because it meant I get to actually not pray or worship or anything but just relax, go out to my traditional restaurants and they'd be open.

Anyway, with the chocolates and easter eggs and the xmas themes during these seasons all over the place, even at shopping centres and supermarkets in dominantly Muslim suburbs.. I just don't know where these claims about PC, dislike for Christianity or Christians must quiet down comes from.

---

Regarding the article, I thought it was a project two high schoolers came up with - hardly Muslims forcing "us" to to do anything.

It's a good idea, but 3 hours might not be enough... maybe 24 hours or a week... to let others know that just because you wear a hijab or a burqa does not mean you're a terrorist. Will also let people experience the kind of looks they get and maybe the verbal abuse Muslims sometimes get.

Walk a mile in someone else's shoes often make us better people.

 

[luutzu]

Actually, I don't find that terribly surprising. Whilst I'm Australian born, I know precious little about my father and grandmother's countries of birth.

Recently I was rather amused to observe the behaviour of a waitress during a visit to an oriental restaurant.

Patrons of oriental appearance were being greeted in a Chinese dialect, and those of Western appearance were greeted in English.

One "celestial" gentleman, upon receiving the Chinese greeting, replied in Australian accented English: "I'm sorry, but I don't speak Chinese."

That's the great thing about racism! It's non discriminatory! It can manifest in any race!

yea, it happens. Sometime it's not racism though, just stereotypes - something we all do to not think too much about everything and everyone we meet.

My wife's friend recently got it a bit worse than you though... she married a Caucasian and they meet up with a female Caucasian friend. She was holding their 6 months old etc. and the waitress turn to the friend, saying how handsome her kid was, how old is he etc. Not everyday you're mistaken for a maid.

 

[Value Collector]

You're not SAS are you?

No, but my unit was a special operations unit that worked very closely with the SAS, pretty much every SAS patrol in Afganistan had members of my unit attached, my unit is called the SOER (special operations engineer regiment) I am not there any more though.

 

[Value Collector]

Using New Zealanders as an example in this case is pretty thin as you are not burdened with a religious philosophy that trumps national loyalty.

And I also wonder how comfortable you would be serving alongside Muslims given the number of Coalition troops killed by renegades they were supposed to be training.

Pick any race you want, and you will find them in the Australian defence force.

Australian forces have trained and fought along side many muslims, in both Iraq and Afganistan, and I have had members of my unit who although we're pretty none religious, they were from islamic backgrounds and wounldnt drink alcohol.

 

[Value Collector]

Yes, it does concern me, seeing special holidays like Christmas and Easter that are on our Christian calendar being compromised, because of PC, and people trying to change the fabric of our society.

As the title says, The West has lost its freedom of speech

No one is stopping you celebrating your religious traditions in any way you want.

Can you give me an example of a single time some one has stopped you celebrating your "special holidays"?

 

[Tink]

What are they teaching in public schools, Ramadan, no Easter?
Correct me if I am wrong.

I have already said my part in this forum.

The PC brigade are destroying this fine country, in my view.

 

[Tisme]

If it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, it ain't Australian ....just saying

 

[Value Collector]

What are they teaching in public schools, Ramadan, no Easter?
Correct me if I am wrong.

I have already said my part in this forum.

The PC brigade are destroying this fine country, in my view.

Firstly, even if they did stop teaching anything about the religious holidays, how is that stopping your family celebrating them?

but, personally I feel if you want to include lessons on the Christian holidays, you have a responsibility to include lessons on a broad range of other religious traditions of other faiths.

I don't know what they are doing in schools at the moment, but I am guessing some schools teach Easter other Ramadan, I am against any single religion being taught as fact or being given special privilege.

I am fine with children being taught about the various different religious traditions as long as the cover a broad cross section of the faiths out there, and are not teaching them as fact,

 

[Value Collector]

If it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, it ain't Australian ....just saying

In my opinion, the hard working chinese guy running my local chinese resturant, is more Australian than the Bogans with the "Aussie pride" stickers on their Commodores, doing burn outs and throwing rubbish out the window.

If you take a look at our history, Australia has been built by generations of immigrants from all over the world.

 

[SirRumpole]

If you take a look at our history, Australia has been built by generations of immigrants from all over the world.

No one is arguing that, but times have changed from the diligent Italians and Greeks with their market gardens and milkbars, the Brits and the Chinese miners.

There is a growing feeling that the pull factors to this country for an increasing number of migrants are the social welfare benefits as well as the desire of some people on the left of politics to try and portray us as a "Kumbayah" society that is prepared to dilute our traditional roots with an ever increasing nanny state towards anyone who wants to come here regardless of what sort of contribution they make to the country.

The aforementioned hardworking migrants (including Vietnamese for luutzu), had far less of a social security net, but made up for it by working very hard and deservedly have a high reputation in the community. Sadly the same cannot be said for a segment of later arrivals who frequent Centrelink and seem to think that the rest of us owe them a living.

 

[Hodgie]

From a different perspective, my aunt's partner of 15 years identifies as having Muslim beliefs and has come here from Turkey a long time ago. He is however an Australian citizen and works with the QLD police force, contributing to our society while offering the community protection and security as part of his occupation.

On the note of Christian holidays, he celebrates Christmas like the rest of us in the family. He even dressed up as Santa one year to entertain the young ones. It's interesting to note that he does not force any of the other family members to take part in anything related to his religion while also willing to celebrate all the typical Christian holidays with the rest of us (although it is more about having the day off work rather than any religious aspect).

I would definitely consider my aunt's partner as an upstanding moral person as well as an Australian which we are lucky to have in our community. He just happens to hold religious beliefs that are non-Christian.

He is as disgusted by the actions of the likes of groups like ISIS as much as anyone else I know. As with most modern Christians, he is also able to separate the outdated and barbaric preaching in the religious texts he follows.

He does however have to put up with a lot of unjustified derogatory comments from other white Australians because of where he has come from and which religious views he holds.

I can completely understand how people like him can see that much of the western world really have no idea what they are talking about and treat people unfairly because of 1 aspect of a person's identity.

 

[Value Collector]

The aforementioned hardworking migrants (including Vietnamese for luutzu), had far less of a social security net, but made up for it by working very hard and deservedly have a high reputation in the community.

It didn't stop people at the time calling them wogs, crouts or gooks though, and there was plenty of racist propaganda against each new group that arrived, blaming them for the ills of society at the time, and making slippery slope arguments.

 

[Value Collector]

He even dressed up as Santa one year to entertain the young ones. It's interesting to note that he does not force any of the other family members to take part in anything related to his religion while also willing to celebrate all the typical Christian holidays with the rest of us (although it is more about having the day off work rather than any religious aspect).

He sounds like a "Top Aussie Bloke" to me.

About the holidays being "Christian", Modern Aussie Christmas celebrations are not really Christian anymore, out of all the various Christmas day celebrations at with my family, family friends, Inlaws, neighbors and all the Christmas parties I have attended, I honestly can not remember a single time when Jesus was mentioned.

Lots of talk of Santa, elves and reindeer and probably more talk of beer's wine and prawns.

I am an atheist, but I celebrate Christmas, because to me it's never been a Christian thing. It's just a great excuse to have a party and some time off at the end of the year, If the Christ story never existed, we would just latch onto another arbitrary calendar date to celebrate.

A lot of Churchs have even stopped doing Christmas mass

 

[Tisme]

I think many of the Chinese were kicked out of OZ when it became apparent the wealth was being sent to families in China....and... they plssed off the miners by sorting through the tailings?

Migration was generally based on trades and skills. To find out newbs are arriving and gaining welfare to fund fifth columnist movements and airfares to a conflict in a foreign land is not in our best interest, I feel.

It is true that hard working Armenians, Afghans, Yugoslavs, rolled up their sleeves in the post federation years, but I not sure the present lot aren't being funnelled into public service jobs and the dole queue?

I'm not sure I agree that ones ethnicity is good indicator of repeating the good of ones predecessors either. But I do know that an indolent, non industrial society will probably see our welfare society as manna from heaven. Our roots are European/British ethic; empire building and all that industry that goes with it, rather than pitching tents, building mud brick huts, slavishly reading a fairytale book and basically doing zip all day with idle hands and the Devil more than happy to use those hands.

 

[SirRumpole]

It didn't stop people at the time calling them wogs, crouts or gooks though, and there was plenty of racist propaganda against each new group that arrived, blaming them for the ills of society at the time, and making slippery slope arguments.

View attachment 62249

That's not even an Australian poster.

 

[luutzu]

That's not even an Australian poster.

Years ago I went to Oberon, some place way past the Blue Mountains, and while walking through the town centre I noticed two little girls just staring at me with that "what a strange looking fella" look. The same kind of look I had when I first saw hairy white people.

Anyway, I like driving through the countrysides... people give you a two finger wave. Here in the city...

 

[Value Collector]

That's not even an Australian poster.

Plenty of Australian versions, If you think we have a history of welcoming all those hard working groups research the white Australia policy or the lambing flat riots.

 

[SirRumpole]

Plenty of Australian versions, If you think we have a history of welcoming all those hard working groups research the white Australia policy or the lambing flat riots.

View attachment 62251

Ancient history. People can appreciate other ethnic groups who work hard, but if you point out some groups that are not as industrious, the old racism strawman is unpacked.

 

[Value Collector]

Ancient history. People can appreciate other ethnic groups who work hard, but if you point out some groups that are not as industrious, the old racism strawman is unpacked.

It's not Ancient history, its a continuing trend through out history, every new wave of migrants is met with resistance and often racism.

If they are hard working groups, they are charged with "Taking Aussie jobs" or if you can find unemployed among the group we label the whole group welfare scum, we look back fondly on the new arrivals in later years, many people are willing to admit the benefits to Australia the Greeks and Italian migrations had, But at the time they are met with racism.

 

[luutzu]

I think many of the Chinese were kicked out of OZ when it became apparent the wealth was being sent to families in China....and... they plssed off the miners by sorting through the tailings?

Migration was generally based on trades and skills. To find out newbs are arriving and gaining welfare to fund fifth columnist movements and airfares to a conflict in a foreign land is not in our best interest, I feel.

It is true that hard working Armenians, Afghans, Yugoslavs, rolled up their sleeves in the post federation years, but I not sure the present lot aren't being funnelled into public service jobs and the dole queue?

I'm not sure I agree that ones ethnicity is good indicator of repeating the good of ones predecessors either. But I do know that an indolent, non industrial society will probably see our welfare society as manna from heaven. Our roots are European/British ethic; empire building and all that industry that goes with it, rather than pitching tents, building mud brick huts, slavishly reading a fairytale book and basically doing zip all day with idle hands and the Devil more than happy to use those hands.

Social welfare is there for those Australians who need it, just most who do need it are often recent migrants and refugees, hence giving the impression that the new arrivals are here just to get on the welfare system, or welfare is only for them.

What you're saying about idle hands and such... I've heard from political scientists lecturing about how such ideas are propagated to demonise and then 'justifiably' cut such programmes. That and gov't taking on a bunch of debt... with high level of debt, a group of mainly ethnic or otherwise minority being seen as lazy, disloyal or just scamming the kindness of the hardworking masses, and everything goes.

Then steps in the big corporations and industrialists... they are obviously contributing more to society because one, they're rich so 'obviously' would never ever need gov't handouts (like those bailouts on Wall Street, or other bailout here in Australia - Holden etc.)... and being rich and never needing help, they in turn want to help rebuild (insert country) just the tax system are not 'competitive' - so tax cuts please; or that gov't enterprises are not efficient - so sell it off please...

So in cutting the measly social welfare pay that literally mean the difference between a poor family having enough food or not, the gov't save a few bucks. In cutting taxes on the rich and corporations, the gov't get to stay in power because the poor are too busy working a couple of jobs to really care for politics... and since there are more unskilled and desperate labour out there, corporations make more profits by exploiting that too.

The gov't also gain in other ways with a poor, hungry and desperate masses... there are fingers to point to others among them new arrivals, and in being too busy and too desperate to put food on the table they will have no time to question or protest or march down the streets against foreign wars and or pollution or industrial waste or cuts in social programmes for "those other migrants".

This is what has been happening in the US since the Vietnam War, and ramp up under Reagan. Capitalists do what they do best and exploit loopholes and people where they can; and gov't does likes it too because they not want any organised masses of idle hands marching on their capital demanding an end to war, or social equality and equal rights or environmental protections.


So you got a guy like Blankfein, CEO of Goldman Sachs, earning some $70million a year... whose bank and fellow bankers got bailed out by US taxpayers to the tune of $860 billions and whose gov't guarantee all debt and obligations to keep their firms afloat... you got a guy like that complaining that those on minimum wage are having it too good.

So a guy that earns some hundreds of thousand per hour, whose job and business would have gone bust without gov't welfare, telling us those earning $8 an hour or those on food stamp and welfare shouldn't be because it breeds dependence and is the root of social ills. And not too many people thought wtf.

Australia doesn't seem to be where the US is yet. But it will get here soon enough... a bit like netflix and broadband internet. You can see it in the repeal of the carbon tax and the mining tax... losing the gov't truck loads of revenues and now there's this dog and pony show about BHP and RIO dodging more tax through Singapore.

After the public is thoroughly convinced that gov't is also after the big boys, it'll be the turn of those welfare cheats, scholar wannabes and green environmentalists who dare put future generations survival ahead of profit. The big boys got money, politicians and good lawyers... the people got... got Murdoch's media so they'll be 'right.