Post by Willow on Jul 26, 2013 18:01:21 GMT 9.5
Right on Clementine - we Aussies should hang our heads in shame - cant even vote to preven tthis nasty, miserly approach as both side ramp up the rhetoric
By Clementine Ford
Posted 7 hours 7 minutes ago
PHOTO: It is an enormous privilege to be able to ignore the suffering of people whose lives have been ravaged by war and oppression. (Michael Neist, file photo: User Submitted)
It was John Howard who cultivated Australia's cruelty towards asylum seekers, and it is he our current leaders are shamelessly trying to emulate, writes Clementine Ford.
Last Friday, I bought a kettle. It's one of those newfangled contraptions whose sleek design, multiple settings and eye-boggling price tag all cleverly combine to hide the fact that its primary function is to boil water. It sits in the corner of my kitchen, purring at me.
"I have a setting for 'Oolong'," it whispers. "I boast 'quiet boil technology'."
It is an entirely ostentatious appliance, but because I have the good fortune of living in a country where ostentatious appliances are the norm, I strolled into my local department store and bought it on sale nonetheless.
That same Friday, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd stood before a press gathering and announced Australia's new policy on asylum seekers. For those trapped in a Royal Baby tornado, I'll summarise it for you: Australia, a country that clings desperately to the mythology of the 'fair go' and mateship, a country with one of the largest capitalist economies in the world, a country with a system of socialised healthcare and free education, will no longer provide refuge to asylum seekers who arrive by boat.
Instead, these vulnerable people will be sent to Papua New Guinea for processing and assessment. Should they be found to be 'genuine' refugees, they will be resettled in PNG, a country in which over two thirds of women experience violence, where gang rapes are not uncommon, where women continue to be burnt as witches, and where 37 per cent of its citizens are living below the poverty line.
Almost a week later, Opposition leader Tony Abbott has countered Rudd's PNG farce with the ominously titled Operation Sovereign Borders. Mimicking the Howard government's heavy handed approach to Aboriginal communities in the NT, Abbott's plan involves "a multi-agency taskforce led by a three-star military commander to deal with asylum seekers who come to Australia by boat".
It's difficult not to view Rudd's refugee policy as an attempt to court the bigoted voting blocs cultivated under John Howard's prime ministership. Nor does one need an advanced degree in Racist Politics 101 to recognise Abbott's response is a way of reassuring those same demographics that the Coalition is better equipped to 'deal with' the dangerous scourge of desperate people apparently besieging our borders.
It was under Howard that the selfishness currently on display in Australia was truly cultivated and nurtured, and it's to that festering wound that both major parties are rushing to represent.
During his 11-year reign, Howard was fond of invoking the idea of 'mateship' as a way of bonding white, patriarchal Australia. He famously tried (and failed) to have acknowledgement of it included in a preamble to the Constitution in the 1999 referendum. When a combined effort from rescue workers freed two trapped miners in Beaconsfield in 2006, Howard described their liberation as 'a colossal achievement of Australian mateship'.
Yet despite this apparent fascination with the dinky di Aussie values of a fair go for all, only five years earlier Howard had presided over the introduction of the Pacific Solution, "a series of policies which excised islands around Australia from the migration zone, turned boats back to Indonesia and processed asylum seekers in offshore detention centres on Manus Island and Nauru".
The Pacific Solution is often cited as a successful example of the Government showing tough leadership on tougher issues. Yet its legacy is far more sinister than that, and a direct contradiction of the mateship that its instigator apparently holds so dear.
Senthorun Raj, a Churchill Fellow conducting research into asylum seeker policy, told me, "The Pacific Solution was designed to deter asylum seekers on boats coming to Australia. While initially couched in humanitarian terms, the political debate soon descended into one focused on 'border protection' and turning the pressing human rights needs of refugees into a matter of orderly migration."
Howard's rallying of the xenophobic troops was effective and swift. And in the years since, the cultural narrative has shifted its focus away from the so-called generosity that defines the Australian spirit into one of miserly hoarding.
We live in a land of abundant resources and more than enough opportunities for all, yet so many of us behave as if we've done something to deserve this good fortune and as such have a right to dictate who gets to benefit from it.
We jealously guard invisible borders from the invading hordes we imagine are lining up to steal our bounty and justify such meanness by throwing around terms like 'queue jumpers', 'illegals' and 'economic migrants'.
We pretend that in a reverse scenario WE would show deference to authority and follow the bureaucratic protocol of 'lining up', even though it may take years and compound the danger presented to our families - because in our heart of hearts we don't believe such a situation will ever arise.
It is an enormous privilege to be able to ignore the suffering of people whose lives have been ravaged by war and oppression. It is an obscenity to accuse those same people of greed because we don't want to share.
And in the end, what was the result of Howard's Pacific Solution? According to Raj, "The policy did not 'stop the boats', people continued to seek asylum, and over a billion dollars was expended on a punitive detention program that just served to punish those who sought protection from persecution in Australia."
Much more money was wasted on similar mandatory detention programs, both on and offshore, even though the much more humane option of quicker processing and assimilation into the community has also been shown to be significantly cheaper.
And yet despite these facts, a Middle Australia curiously obsessed with the misleading rhetoric on its borders continues to applaud the punitive, barbaric handling of refugees, glad to have a Government that takes pride in declaring itself "tough on asylum seekers".
Take a moment to let that nauseating phrase roll around in your mouth. As former prime minister Malcolm Fraser wrote recently, "During my time in government, the Immigration Department proposed mandatory detention centres several times. We regarded the proposal as barbarous, and we rejected it. It's part of a policy of deterrence, trying to be nasty to people hoping that will stop them wanting to come. But what neither the government nor the opposition have understood is that no democratic Australia could ever impose penalties or hardships on refugees which could match the terror from which most of them flee."
This is the path Rudd and Abbott want to continue down - appeasing the ignorance of a population that has, in its refusal to show empathy for those fleeing oppressive regimes or war torn nations, ironically managed to paint itself as at risk from a destructive force. And for what? So we can protect the Australian way of life?
Resettling asylum seekers who come by boat to Australia won't result in people having to give up their houses, jobs and flat screen TVs in order to accommodate them. Being born in a country like Australia is a fortuitous accident, not a reward for work well done. Being asked to share your privilege isn't the same as being forced to give it up.
We live in a country where you can stroll into a department store and buy a kettle with five different boiling functions on it just so that you don't have to run the risk of burning your green tea leaves - I think we can manage extending a hand to some of the world's most vulnerable without threatening our core values.
Clementine Ford is a freelance writer, broadcaster and public speaker based in Melbourne. Follow her on Twitter @clementine_ford. View her full profile here.
By Clementine Ford
Posted 7 hours 7 minutes ago
PHOTO: It is an enormous privilege to be able to ignore the suffering of people whose lives have been ravaged by war and oppression. (Michael Neist, file photo: User Submitted)
It was John Howard who cultivated Australia's cruelty towards asylum seekers, and it is he our current leaders are shamelessly trying to emulate, writes Clementine Ford.
Last Friday, I bought a kettle. It's one of those newfangled contraptions whose sleek design, multiple settings and eye-boggling price tag all cleverly combine to hide the fact that its primary function is to boil water. It sits in the corner of my kitchen, purring at me.
"I have a setting for 'Oolong'," it whispers. "I boast 'quiet boil technology'."
It is an entirely ostentatious appliance, but because I have the good fortune of living in a country where ostentatious appliances are the norm, I strolled into my local department store and bought it on sale nonetheless.
That same Friday, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd stood before a press gathering and announced Australia's new policy on asylum seekers. For those trapped in a Royal Baby tornado, I'll summarise it for you: Australia, a country that clings desperately to the mythology of the 'fair go' and mateship, a country with one of the largest capitalist economies in the world, a country with a system of socialised healthcare and free education, will no longer provide refuge to asylum seekers who arrive by boat.
Instead, these vulnerable people will be sent to Papua New Guinea for processing and assessment. Should they be found to be 'genuine' refugees, they will be resettled in PNG, a country in which over two thirds of women experience violence, where gang rapes are not uncommon, where women continue to be burnt as witches, and where 37 per cent of its citizens are living below the poverty line.
Almost a week later, Opposition leader Tony Abbott has countered Rudd's PNG farce with the ominously titled Operation Sovereign Borders. Mimicking the Howard government's heavy handed approach to Aboriginal communities in the NT, Abbott's plan involves "a multi-agency taskforce led by a three-star military commander to deal with asylum seekers who come to Australia by boat".
It's difficult not to view Rudd's refugee policy as an attempt to court the bigoted voting blocs cultivated under John Howard's prime ministership. Nor does one need an advanced degree in Racist Politics 101 to recognise Abbott's response is a way of reassuring those same demographics that the Coalition is better equipped to 'deal with' the dangerous scourge of desperate people apparently besieging our borders.
It was under Howard that the selfishness currently on display in Australia was truly cultivated and nurtured, and it's to that festering wound that both major parties are rushing to represent.
During his 11-year reign, Howard was fond of invoking the idea of 'mateship' as a way of bonding white, patriarchal Australia. He famously tried (and failed) to have acknowledgement of it included in a preamble to the Constitution in the 1999 referendum. When a combined effort from rescue workers freed two trapped miners in Beaconsfield in 2006, Howard described their liberation as 'a colossal achievement of Australian mateship'.
Yet despite this apparent fascination with the dinky di Aussie values of a fair go for all, only five years earlier Howard had presided over the introduction of the Pacific Solution, "a series of policies which excised islands around Australia from the migration zone, turned boats back to Indonesia and processed asylum seekers in offshore detention centres on Manus Island and Nauru".
The Pacific Solution is often cited as a successful example of the Government showing tough leadership on tougher issues. Yet its legacy is far more sinister than that, and a direct contradiction of the mateship that its instigator apparently holds so dear.
Senthorun Raj, a Churchill Fellow conducting research into asylum seeker policy, told me, "The Pacific Solution was designed to deter asylum seekers on boats coming to Australia. While initially couched in humanitarian terms, the political debate soon descended into one focused on 'border protection' and turning the pressing human rights needs of refugees into a matter of orderly migration."
Howard's rallying of the xenophobic troops was effective and swift. And in the years since, the cultural narrative has shifted its focus away from the so-called generosity that defines the Australian spirit into one of miserly hoarding.
We live in a land of abundant resources and more than enough opportunities for all, yet so many of us behave as if we've done something to deserve this good fortune and as such have a right to dictate who gets to benefit from it.
We jealously guard invisible borders from the invading hordes we imagine are lining up to steal our bounty and justify such meanness by throwing around terms like 'queue jumpers', 'illegals' and 'economic migrants'.
We pretend that in a reverse scenario WE would show deference to authority and follow the bureaucratic protocol of 'lining up', even though it may take years and compound the danger presented to our families - because in our heart of hearts we don't believe such a situation will ever arise.
It is an enormous privilege to be able to ignore the suffering of people whose lives have been ravaged by war and oppression. It is an obscenity to accuse those same people of greed because we don't want to share.
And in the end, what was the result of Howard's Pacific Solution? According to Raj, "The policy did not 'stop the boats', people continued to seek asylum, and over a billion dollars was expended on a punitive detention program that just served to punish those who sought protection from persecution in Australia."
Much more money was wasted on similar mandatory detention programs, both on and offshore, even though the much more humane option of quicker processing and assimilation into the community has also been shown to be significantly cheaper.
And yet despite these facts, a Middle Australia curiously obsessed with the misleading rhetoric on its borders continues to applaud the punitive, barbaric handling of refugees, glad to have a Government that takes pride in declaring itself "tough on asylum seekers".
Take a moment to let that nauseating phrase roll around in your mouth. As former prime minister Malcolm Fraser wrote recently, "During my time in government, the Immigration Department proposed mandatory detention centres several times. We regarded the proposal as barbarous, and we rejected it. It's part of a policy of deterrence, trying to be nasty to people hoping that will stop them wanting to come. But what neither the government nor the opposition have understood is that no democratic Australia could ever impose penalties or hardships on refugees which could match the terror from which most of them flee."
This is the path Rudd and Abbott want to continue down - appeasing the ignorance of a population that has, in its refusal to show empathy for those fleeing oppressive regimes or war torn nations, ironically managed to paint itself as at risk from a destructive force. And for what? So we can protect the Australian way of life?
Resettling asylum seekers who come by boat to Australia won't result in people having to give up their houses, jobs and flat screen TVs in order to accommodate them. Being born in a country like Australia is a fortuitous accident, not a reward for work well done. Being asked to share your privilege isn't the same as being forced to give it up.
We live in a country where you can stroll into a department store and buy a kettle with five different boiling functions on it just so that you don't have to run the risk of burning your green tea leaves - I think we can manage extending a hand to some of the world's most vulnerable without threatening our core values.
Clementine Ford is a freelance writer, broadcaster and public speaker based in Melbourne. Follow her on Twitter @clementine_ford. View her full profile here.