Immigration
Users browsing this topic:0 Registered, 0 Hidden and 0 Guests
Registered Users: None |
 |
| View previous topic :: View next topic |
| Author |
Message |
stui magpie 
Prepare for the worst, hope for the best.
Joined: 03 May 2005
Location: In flagrante delicto
|
| Post subject: |  |
|
The problem with using *ist and *ism labels is we get into these debates about how the label is defined instead of what the issues are.
If we take the "Final Solution" reference which has stirred up so much noise, out of the equation and consider it just a gaff of monumental proportions, the rest of his speech probably will appeal to a number of mainly older people.
Now, if that is so, the next steps should be to work out what's causing that and what to do about it. Simply labelling them ignorant racists and shouting them down doesn't change how they feel and why.
Edit, a second point toward David's final paragraph, I don't think that the discourse is moving further to the right at all. These views have always existed but for a while now the left has largely controlled the discourse and people were reluctant to air these views for risk of being berated and insulted. Now, more people are sick of that and are standing up and airing their views.
So we're probably starting to have a more honest discussion and as I said above, we need to have that without labels and insults.
_________________
Every dead body on Mt Everest was once a highly motivated person, so maybe just calm the **** down. |
|
|
|
 |
think positive 
Side By Side
Joined: 30 Jun 2005
Location: somewhere
|
| Post subject: | |
|
great post.
_________________
You cant fix stupid, turns out you cant quarantine it either! |
|
|
|
|
Pies4shaw 
pies4shaw
Joined: 08 Oct 2007
|
| Post subject: | |
|
| David wrote: | Fascism is not only a way of running government, but also an ideology. There are plenty of politicians out there who might not be full-blown fascists but who nonetheless embrace fascist ideas.
I’m a strong supporter of free speech, as you know, and believe that it is essential in its own right, but I’m a bit sceptical of the notion that it is much of a protective mechanism against fascism. Fascists will suppress speech, certainly, but to do so they need to get into power. How effective is free speech alone at actually stopping that? Could Hitler’s or Mussolini’s rise have been prevented by more freedom of speech? If not, what other tactics do we have access to?
In Anning’s speech, he repeatedly invokes Bjelke-Petersen’s Queensland as his model for how Australia should be. This was a state government that banned protest, allowed police significant power and little oversight, subverted the democratic pricess in order to retain power, beat up on minorities and of course supported the racist (by definition) national immigration policy that was in place when it first took power. So I think it’s fair to say that he is, at best, a fascist sympathiser. He may come across as just a conservative old farmer, but where do you think mainstream support for leaders like Mussolini actually came from? It wasn’t from brainwashed ideologues waving little red books; it was from conservatives with views that were only slightly to the right of mainstream paradigms of that time in history in places like Australia. They believed in strong borders, a strong nation, unfettered industry and the exclusion of undesirables. It’s not such an alien philosophy even now.
Anning may not be within the corridors of power himself, but some are justifiably worried that beliefs like his are becoming increasingly mainstream. It’s not him or the Katter Party that worries us; it’s what they are potentially paving the way for.
Could people like him ever take power? Perhaps. My impession is that, culturally, Australia has a strong authoritarian streak underneath its supposedly easygoing surface, combined with an apathetic tendency to accept the status quo without question. And look at what our government is already doing: your private communications are being monitored by government agencies; is that freedom? People are locked up indefinitely in detention centres: do they have freedom? A whistleblower is being prosecuted by our government for revealing the truth about illegal government actions in another country: is that freedom of speech? Civil liberties are slowly being wound back for the sake of “national security”: is that freedom?
It’s all very well to debate whether a far-right politician ticks the boxes to meet all the criteria of being a fascist, or argue that anti-Islamic “patriot” groups aren’t truly racist because Islam is a religion, etc. But how far right does mainstream discourse have to go before we accept that we have a problem, and would we even recognise the turning point when we get there? An analogy about boiling frogs comes to mind here. |
It's a form of deliberate myopia that serves as an apology for extreme views. That's why I have referred to it previously as "enabling" activity.
The strategy seems to be to take a particular fact in isolation and explain why that particular thing on its own doesn't (or might not) signify unacceptable extremism and to ignore the constellation of other factors that all point in the same direction.
At the same time, a secondary strategy of pretending that people who are moderate actual conservatives (like me) are beyond-the-pale "leftists" assists - that creates a vilifiable target.
Robert Manne wrote an interesting article last week in the wake of one of Bolt's particularly awful pieces. He identified, amongst other things, that this sort of thing could never have been said 20 years ago because everyone knew it was unacceptable.
Anyway, the issue about "Muslims" is - as I tried to identify a few days ago - just the latest convenient low-lying fruit for anti-immigration "crusaders". It is worth remembering, always, that before Hanson was shaming us all with her stunts in "Islamic" clothing, she was against "Asians". Presumably, so was this latest poor excuse for a politician, in his day. |
|
|
|
|
Mugwump
Joined: 28 Jul 2007
Location: Between London and Melbourne
|
| Post subject: | |
|
| stui magpie wrote: | The problem with using *ist and *ism labels is we get into these debates about how the label is defined instead of what the issues are.
If we take the "Final Solution" reference which has stirred up so much noise, out of the equation and consider it just a gaff of monumental proportions, the rest of his speech probably will appeal to a number of mainly older people.
Now, if that is so, the next steps should be to work out what's causing that and what to do about it. Simply labelling them ignorant racists and shouting them down doesn't change how they feel and why.
Edit, a second point toward David's final paragraph, I don't think that the discourse is moving further to the right at all. These views have always existed but for a while now the left has largely controlled the discourse and people were reluctant to air these views for risk of being berated and insulted. Now, more people are sick of that and are standing up and airing their views.
So we're probably starting to have a more honest discussion and as I said above, we need to have that without labels and insults. |
Yes, excellent post, though “labels” are really just names for things that do have a meaning derived from history. There is nothing wrong with calling someone who has a fascist ideology a fascist. It’s just silly to apply that word as a swear word merely because someone desires a selective immigration policy. For educated people to do this shows how debased our political thought has become.
The “final solution” phrase was clearly a gaffe, but a sentence stating that “the final solution to immigration is a plebiscite” really doesn’t carry the meaning the semiotic bone-pickers want it to. For Frydenberg to carry on about it being an insult to the Jewish children etc, as he did on radio, just shows how low we have sunk in our cynicism. We don’t care what people say any more : just about how we can twist what they say.
_________________
Two more flags before I die!
Last edited by Mugwump on Thu Aug 16, 2018 7:13 pm; edited 1 time in total |
|
|
|
|
Mugwump
Joined: 28 Jul 2007
Location: Between London and Melbourne
|
| Post subject: | |
|
| David wrote: | Fascism is not only a way of running government, but also an ideology. There are plenty of politicians out there who might not be full-blown fascists but who nonetheless embrace fascist ideas.
I’m a strong supporter of free speech, as you know, and believe that it is essential in its own right, but I’m a bit sceptical of the notion that it is much of a protective mechanism against fascism. Fascists will suppress speech, certainly, but to do so they need to get into power. How effective is free speech alone at actually stopping that? Could Hitler’s or Mussolini’s rise have been prevented by more freedom of speech? If not, what other tactics do we have access to?
In Anning’s speech, he repeatedly invokes Bjelke-Petersen’s Queensland as his model for how Australia should be. This was a state government that banned protest, allowed police significant power and little oversight, subverted the democratic pricess in order to retain power, beat up on minorities and of course supported the racist (by definition) national immigration policy that was in place when it first took power. So I think it’s fair to say that he is, at best, a fascist sympathiser. He may come across as just a conservative old farmer, but where do you think mainstream support for leaders like Mussolini actually came from? It wasn’t from brainwashed ideologues waving little red books; it was from conservatives with views that were only slightly to the right of mainstream paradigms of that time in history in places like Australia. They believed in strong borders, a strong nation, unfettered industry and the exclusion of undesirables. It’s not such an alien philosophy even now.
Anning may not be within the corridors of power himself, but some are justifiably worried that beliefs like his are becoming increasingly mainstream. It’s not him or the Katter Party that worries us; it’s what they are potentially paving the way for.
Could people like him ever take power? Perhaps. My impession is that, culturally, Australia has a strong authoritarian streak underneath its supposedly easygoing surface, combined with an apathetic tendency to accept the status quo without question. And look at what our government is already doing: your private communications are being monitored by government agencies; is that freedom? People are locked up indefinitely in detention centres: do they have freedom? A whistleblower is being prosecuted by our government for revealing the truth about illegal government actions in another country: is that freedom of speech? Civil liberties are slowly being wound back for the sake of “national security”: is that freedom?
It’s all very well to debate whether a far-right politician ticks the boxes to meet all the criteria of being a fascist, or argue that anti-Islamic “patriot” groups aren’t truly racist because Islam is a religion, etc. But how far right does mainstream discourse have to go before we accept that we have a problem, and would we even recognise the turning point when we get there? An analogy about boiling frogs comes to mind here. |
A good post, which makes some worthy points. In short :
1. Bjelke-Petersen’s Government was demonstrably a corrupt disgrace. That Anning endorses such a government is far more shocking than what he said about immigration. Selective immigration is a policy that one can agree or disagree with. Corruption is not.
2. Bjelke-Petersen-Peterson’s government was hardly fascist. It conducted free and fair elections. It had no army. No secret police. No internment without trial. It made no claim for the legal superiority of Queenlanders in Queensland. It developed no corporate state between unions, business and government. It was a corrupt right-wing authoritarian government operating within a constitutional framework. No history student would get a pass at first year seriously claiming that it was fascist.
3. It does not follow that because someone holds basically right wing views, and wants to protect their culture through selective immigration, they are a “fascist sympathizer”. This is like saying that a house cat has tiger sympathies. There is just enough family relationship to show that they are not remotely the same thing.
4. No fascist government that ever existed believed in “unfetttered industry”. Not Hitler, not Franco, not Mussolini, not Salazar.
5. It’s a secondary point, but people are not “locked up indefinitely in detention centres.” People who invited themselves to Australia are free to go wherever they please except Australia. There is a lot to hate about the policy being pursued, but it’s best to describe it truly.
6. Hitler did rise through free speech, just as he rose through democratic elections. Few would argue that we should curtail the latter, as a result. You ask what tactics we have. The answer is that we have the apparatus of Australian liberty : constitutional monarchy, habeas corpus, free speech, the separation of powers. And two-hundred-odd years of those habits. The views Mr Anning expressed were official policy not too long ago. We did not slide into fascism then ; still, we did not have the conditions I described in the last paragraph of my post above, I suppose.
7. Eco’s checklist doesn’t require that all boxes be ticked. But you need to tick more than perhaps two of the fourteen. If you use “thin end of the wedge” thinking to call Anning a fascist, then you must expect that people will call you, with your avowal of a powerful state dedicated to economic equality, a Communist. I don’t think that is much of a recipe for a grown up conversation.
_________________
Two more flags before I die! |
|
|
|
|
Mugwump
Joined: 28 Jul 2007
Location: Between London and Melbourne
|
| Post subject: | |
|
| Pies4shaw wrote: |
That's why I have referred to it previously as "enabling" activity.
The strategy seems to be to take a particular fact in isolation and explain why that particular thing on its own doesn't (or might not) signify unacceptable extremism and to ignore the constellation of other factors that all point in the same direction. |
A cat and a tiger have numerous points of correspondence, as do a Social Democrat and a member of the Politburo. But they are not, of course, remotely the same thing.
As for extremism, well, it’s a relative concept. If you wrongly define yourself as a conservative, above, then people might reasonably question your judgement about what extremism means as well. To a complete libertarian, social democracy would be extreme. I think the term can only incontestably be used about people who advocate criminal action.
I should add that, as a self-described “conservative”, you have some striking views. A sample:
1. Your reaction to the fact that the obviously renegade (to put it as politely as possible) John Setka had blackmail charges dropped : “Ho ho ho”
2. Your comment that someone was “a conservative who should have been drowned at birth”
3. Your stalwart defence of mass immigration
4. Your consistently anti-American posting.
5. Your scorn for religious belief
6. Your expressed desire to pay more taxation.
7. Your association of fairly common conservative views, widely held across Australia, with fascism.
You wrote above about the need (rightly) to look at the totality of a position. Reminding us how well-off you are and posting the odd literate legal comment doesn’t make you conservative, weighed against the above, no matter what hall of mirrors you may choose.
I am concerned about the working class in the wake of crime, drugs and the wage-depressing effects of mass immigration. I think there is a place for decent unions. I support a welfare state. I suppose that makes me a moderate socialist and you extreme, using your strange inversions.
_________________
Two more flags before I die!
Last edited by Mugwump on Sat Aug 18, 2018 12:44 am; edited 1 time in total |
|
|
|
|
pietillidie
Joined: 07 Jan 2005
|
| Post subject: | |
|
The vigilant focus on the ills of immigration at the expense of its many and weighty socioeconomic upsides reminds me a lot of the way Evangelical Christians such as Seventh-day Adventists see signs of the end in every other bit of world news that crosses their path. It's almost becoming a way of life for some, even as the collision of cultures, and the need to master culltural engagement, intensifies.
I personally can't see immigration slowing down; the physics is so strong it's very likely that societies which do not master the process now will pay heavily later on for what is a stubborn refusal to adapt.
_________________
In the end the rain comes down, washes clean the streets of a blue sky town.
Help Nick's: http://www.magpies.net/nick/bb/fundraising.htm |
|
|
|
|
Mugwump
Joined: 28 Jul 2007
Location: Between London and Melbourne
|
| Post subject: | |
|
| pietillidie wrote: | The vigilant focus on the ills of immigration at the expense of its many and weighty socioeconomic upsides reminds me a lot of the way Evangelical Christians such as Seventh-day Adventists see signs of the end in every other bit of world news that crosses their path. It's almost becoming a way of life for some, even as the collision of cultures, and the need to master culltural engagement, intensifies.
I personally can't see immigration slowing down; the physics is so strong it's very likely that societies which do not master the process now will pay heavily later on for what is a stubborn refusal to adapt. |
Look at Sweden. One of the most admired and gentle societies on the planet twenty years ago is now struggling with violence,, gangs, a rising far-right. The benefits, if they exist at all, are very hard to discern. In social affairs, it’s difficult to get a control group to prove anything. The GdR vs West Germany was one. Sweden is roughly another. In any other sphere, you would consider the evidence utterly compelling. You’re so pre-committed to this ideology that you’re immune to obvious evidence.
_________________
Two more flags before I die! |
|
|
|
|
David
I dare you to try
Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Location: Andromeda
|
| Post subject: | |
|
| pietillidie wrote: | | I personally can't see immigration slowing down; the physics is so strong it's very likely that societies which do not master the process now will pay heavily later on for what is a stubborn refusal to adapt. |
This, 100%. The immigration isolationists are in as much of a losing battle as those who want to resurrect coal-powered energy, The challenge is how to get that integration and cultural change right, not how to prevent it.
_________________
All watched over by machines of loving grace |
|
|
|
|
Wokko 
Come and take it.
Joined: 04 Oct 2005
|
| Post subject: | |
|
| David wrote: | | pietillidie wrote: | | I personally can't see immigration slowing down; the physics is so strong it's very likely that societies which do not master the process now will pay heavily later on for what is a stubborn refusal to adapt. |
This, 100%. The immigration isolationists are in as much of a losing battle as those who want to resurrect coal-powered energy, The challenge is how to get that integration and cultural change right, not how to prevent it. |
Yet Hungary and Poland have managed to control their immigration levels quite successfully. Japan has a tiny amount of immigration. Many other such examples. |
|
|
|
|
Mugwump
Joined: 28 Jul 2007
Location: Between London and Melbourne
|
| Post subject: | |
|
^ when the evidence is practically impossible to deny, fall back on the “well, there is nothing to do be done, can’t be changed, it’s the ‘physics’, you see”.
Interestingly, those who make this argument would be speechless with indignation if it were made about, say, economic inequality or corporate or high-wealth taxation - both far harder problems to solve than border control.
So the question is : why ? Why this blind desire to obliterate the precious uniqueness of nations and their fascinating historic cultures, to make everywhere a pluralist blancmange, like an airport hall with architecture and more poor people ?
What can be the real motive for such a terrible policy ? If it were being done to a forest ecosystem there would be outrage, but because it is being done to a social ecosystem, it’s just “physics” and can’t be helped.
_________________
Two more flags before I die! |
|
|
|
|
ronrat
Joined: 22 May 2006
Location: Thailand
|
| Post subject: | |
|
[
Yet Hungary and Poland have managed to control their immigration levels quite successfully. Japan has a tiny amount of immigration. Many other such examples.[/quote]
๋Japan is in deep trouble socially. They have a looming boom in elderly people needing care and services and no workforce capable of covering it. the kids have left the farms and they can't grow enough food. Farms and villages are being abandoned. Despite there own views they would be better off allowing the excess of refugees languishing in places like Malaysia and Pakistan to migrate with some conditions. serious crime, militant religious behavior etc gets the entire family deported. And they must stay in the rural areas for say 10 years and they must attend language classes. Booming noises out of mosques etc should be banned. Priority given to family groups and low cost governemnt loans provided to repair and upgrade existing abandoned homes . say 200 Rohingans in a village and eventually one family will set up a shop to cater for their traditional foods etc and some can be employed to look after the elderly in their own rural homes whilst the kids are in Tokyo earning big bucks can pay for it. The rice farms will have labour again.
_________________
Annoying opposition supporters since 1967. |
|
|
|
|
Wokko
Come and take it.
Joined: 04 Oct 2005
|
| Post subject: | |
|
| ronrat wrote: |
๋Japan is in deep trouble socially. They have a looming boom in elderly people needing care and services and no workforce capable of covering it. the kids have left the farms and they can't grow enough food. Farms and villages are being abandoned. Despite there own views they would be better off allowing the excess of refugees languishing in places like Malaysia and Pakistan to migrate with some conditions. serious crime, militant religious behavior etc gets the entire family deported. And they must stay in the rural areas for say 10 years and they must attend language classes. Booming noises out of mosques etc should be banned. Priority given to family groups and low cost governemnt loans provided to repair and upgrade existing abandoned homes . say 200 Rohingans in a village and eventually one family will set up a shop to cater for their traditional foods etc and some can be employed to look after the elderly in their own rural homes whilst the kids are in Tokyo earning big bucks can pay for it. The rice farms will have labour again. |
They don't need immigration, just allow foreign workers to come in on visas then politely show them the door later. |
|
|
|
|
Mugwump
Joined: 28 Jul 2007
Location: Between London and Melbourne
|
| Post subject: | |
|
It’s a few years since I last went to Japan, but it didn’t look like it was in deep trouble to me. Its aging population is no doubt a problem, but the powerful Japanese tradition of stoicism, duty and sacrifice will presumably manage it.
In any event, there are aspects of your policy set that make sense to me, Ronrat. I hate the idea of deporting whole families for the misdemeanors of one, as collective punishment goes against any principle of justice. But many social issues can be navigated successfully if there is a united will on how to manage it.
Just by way of analogy, Australia, like the Uk, erected tower blocks for social housing at the end of the 1960s. They soon became a byword for violence, drugs, graffiti and piss-stinking stairwells. Singapore did the same, and none of those issues arose because they were not tolerated - the overall society retained and enforced standards of decency and expected social conduct. Japan has this, and it will manage its problems in that light.
An immigration policy of modest scale in an orderly society is perfectly responsible. Managed as we do, however, it is not.
_________________
Two more flags before I die!
Last edited by Mugwump on Sat Aug 18, 2018 1:07 am; edited 3 times in total |
|
|
|
|
David
I dare you to try
Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Location: Andromeda
|
| Post subject: | |
|
| Mugwump wrote: | ^ when the evidence is practically impossible to deny, fall back on the “well, there is nothing to do be done, can’t be changed, it’s the ‘physics’, you see”.
Interestingly, those who make this argument would be speechless with indignation if it were made about, say, economic inequality or corporate or high-wealth taxation - both far harder problems to solve than border control.
So the question is : why ? Why this blind desire to obliterate the precious uniqueness of nations and their fascinating historic cultures, to make everywhere a pluralist blancmange, like an airport hall with architecture and more poor people ?
What can be the real motive for such a terrible policy ? If it were being done to a forest ecosystem there would be outrage, but because it is being done to a social ecosystem, it’s just “physics” and can’t be helped. |
I think you’ve missed my point. It’s not that we can’t take an isolationist or racist immigration policy and legislate accordingly. The argument is that, in an ever more integrated world, the countries that do so will ultimately be left behind economically and socially, and be much less equipped in the long term to cope peacefully with mass (uncontrollable) people movements that may be caused by catastrophic climate change, etc. Under that understanding, a policy of multiculturalism is like a kind of insurance, basically.
_________________
All watched over by machines of loving grace |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot vote in polls in this forum
You cannot attach files in this forum
You cannot download files in this forum
|
|
The Rules
FAQ
Usergroups
Calendar
Search
Log in
Register
