Apologies, readers, the link I included to Philip Jensen is a bad one, here is the correct link:

http://www.abc.net.au/rn/talks/8.30/relrpt/stories/s804949.htm

Jennifer.

excellent article of plain truth. Australian politicians have drifted far from endorcing the human rights of everyone, be they Australians or refugees. If human rights clash with the constution or Australian law then amend the laws to suit the situation for political gain or save embarrassment. Human rights are only mentioned when we try to apply pressure and influence other countries but never refer to when we look in our own back yard

What does this academic theorist want Australia to do ? Send our Navy over there & wait for the assylum seekers then bring them here ? I suggest to this academic that if she is so keen to prevent the many assylum seekers the why doesn't she organise all her academic theorist hangers-on to go to these countries & counsel the war lords & fanatics to stop fighting a nonsensical cause so there won't be any assylum seekers.
Jennifer Wilson should put forward realistic solutions not scrape old scabs. Of course those children were overboard, they were in the water weren't they ? Obviously thrown in there by John Howard himself. Twit !

"In reality, as a signatory to the UN Refugee Convention Australia has agreed to accept asylum seekers no matter what their method of arrival in the country, regardless of their country of origin, and whether they are sans papiers, or not."

That seems to be the catchcry of all the bleeding heart types who finger wag the rest of us and lecture us about Australia's duties .. the problem is, no one in the community feels that way, nor did they sanction the signing of the UN covenant.

That's your disconnect .. I see the same thing in every article of this type, the chest thumping and rhetoric that we have an obligation to the world because various lobby groups convinced our politicians to sign up. What a surprise that the rest of us don't feel the same as the tiny minority who did this to us .. and you're amazed, jeez, get out more.

The people of Australia remain horrified and in shock that their country has been obligated to this organization, who constantly lecture us on our shortcomings, and offer us little in return.

"The international Covenant is supported by our domestic law", what domestic law is this? State, Federal .. if it is Law, then why is that never referred to, and only the UN commitment is constantly rubbed in our faces .. do you get that?

We're sick of it, we didn't sign up, so the bleeding heart lobby groups who think this is important have a bloody nerve obligating the rest of us WITHOUT our permission!

BTW - I'm happy to take refugees who go through the process and want to come to Australia to start a new life .. not the open ended uncontrolled rush for the open door that is the IEV route.

The wrong question is asked the Jennifer. The question should be why should someone who pays a people smuggler get preference in this country above the numerous waiting some in even harder situations than where the boat people come from. At least the overstays by plane had to go through Quarantine and had not thrown away passports.

Jenny with air arrivals we have the paperwork. We know who they are, usually what they are, & very often, air arrivals just want to work. They don't expect to be housed fed & be medicated by the Oz tax payer.

The boat lot come with papers intentionally destroyed. We know they are probably lying about what & who they are, & about the "danger" they face. They expect everything on a platter, at our expense.

This is a sideways invasion. & it's time we started treating it as such. I wonder how long it will be before we see a private militia start to repel these people.

I'm sorry to point it out again, and no offense intended, but these arguments are a waste of breath.

As long as we legally must accept all asylum seekers for refugee assessment, the arguments about numbers, method of arrival, etc, have no substance.

All politicians have done for ten years is to behave like a dog chasing its tail - frantically trying to find a way round the law and inevitably failing, because there isn't one.

No politician will stand up and admit this - that there is actually nothing they can do about stopping and assessing boat arrivals, without breaking the law.

"Stop the boats" has as much real substance as the tooth fairy story.

Scott Morrison's latest call to restrict the numbers of boat arrivals granted refugee status is also rubbish, and no doubt he knows that. He can't do it, it's against the law.

My solution is that we have the real debate, the debate about whether or not we want to change our international commitments to asylum seekers, and our corresponding domestic law. When we've made that decision we can talk about numbers, who gets assessed, how they must arrive, etc.

Until then, it's all p*ss and wind, it's not a debate, it's propaganda used to win votes, and provoke fear and hatred.

It's causing horrible divisions in communities, and for what?

If we decide to stick with the commitments we've got, then the politicians lose the opportunity to manipulate voters with imagined threats to which they then offer imagined solutions.

It just boils down to how much you want politicians to emotionally exploit you for their own ends.

I do dearly hate it when people try to pretend the issue is about something else.

I can assure you, if our latest boat arrivals were entirely, say, Vietnamese, nobody would worry about it.

But judging by the substantial coverage of shrieking furious protesters over the free-speech publication of Danish cartoons, endorsement for theocracies to overthrow their host societies which they regard with hostility, and widely-publicised hate crime against outside communities ALONE coming from Islamic fundamentalists entering Western countries, you can keep pretending this is nothing but the latest stage of old-fashioned xenophobia, or a hysteria over terrorist bombers (not the issue) all you like- but quite frankly, don't be surprised when the issue remains the same.

And that goes for plucking anal semantics about plane arrivals (ignoring that hardly anybody actually says "boat people" except in the media), smuggling in itself, etc.

The entire concern is about Islamic fundamentalists, and nothing else. I can assure you, if we had a test demanding potential immigrants had to endorse the notion of Free speech, even to cartoons of the prophet mohammad to gain entry (thus ensuring they were seculars or moderates), the Muslims that DID come in would not be a problem in the eyes of anyone.

Having said that, we SHOULD repeal our signature to the UN and adjust domestic laws properly.

Signed, an atheist.

It's about perceptions..

One perception - boatpeople, of Islamic background, do not like us and have no intention of "fitting in", are happy to draw on all the available services, but look down on us as infidels, marry their cousins or people from "back home" - it's a convenience to be here only.

Another perception - if they are prepared to pay a lot of money to come by this route, then they have something to hide .. this applies to all boatpeople.

Finally, we worry that we have no control, unlike the Immigration gate, where we can refuse them entry or at least know who supposedly is entering. If the boatpeople could avoid detection coming in, I'm sure we would never know.

We clearly cannot control the entry of boat people, and the ALP have increased the anxiety since they relaxed the rules and have created a pull like nothing before.

If boatpeople came in their thousands, would that be OK for the people who say, "it's only a few what does it matter"? What if they come in 10s of thousands? Is that OK

What's the line where those people who support taking everyone who comes here by boat, say "oh hang on"? Is it 100,000, a million, 10 million .. these are not ridiculous numbers if there is some disaster in Indonesia for instance .. (stop them? we don't even have that many bullets in Australia)

If we suddenly have 100s of thousands coming, or millions .. who is paying for this, I didn't agree to have my lifestyle diluted by having to pay for never ending streams of uninvited immigrants.

that's why people do not like this, and further, we do not like having the UN obligation thrown up constantly in case you missed it earlier), it's just another invitation for people to abandon their homes to come here.

We should decide who comes, when and how many .. not lobby groups sneaking around the halls of parliament house with bags of ideology for sale

I could be wrong of course .. but doubt it

All those complaining about Asylum seeker policies should consider this.

After 1945, the Chifley government found itself in the Cold War against Soviet Union. De-nazification was stopped in Germany and fascists still dominated the police and military in Italy. Chifley locked Australia into the western security web and surrendered national sovereignty to the intelligence system in Washington. The Australian Labor government was knowingly admitting Nazi war criminals, combatants and collaborators as refugees.

In poured the Nazis, protected and used by ASIO to control and monitor the growing migrant groups. Together with the Croatian Ustasha, Hungarian Arrow Cross, Romanian Iron Guard, the SS controlled Slovenian militia. Groups derived from former members of these were organised with the tacit support of the Menzies and successive Liberal governments.

Lyenko Urbanchich the man who invented ethnic branch stacking in Australia. He was also the last, and most powerful, of the central and eastern European Nazi collaborators and war criminals that infiltrated the Liberal Party from the 1950s.

The peak of Urbanchich’s success was the formation of the Liberal Ethnic Council. As council president, he automatically had a seat on the state executive. The “Uglies” faction of the Liberal Party was established by Urbanchich 40 years ago.

The Uglies, control up to 30 per cent of the Liberal Party State Council votes and are the power base of Tony Abbot, Bronwyn Bishop and of John Howard and others.

Urbanchich remained unrepentant about his pro-Nazi past. He would, however, have died happy in the knowledge that his long campaign to control the NSW Liberal Party and insinuate his extremist views into its policy agenda has succeeded beyond his wildest dreams.

These are the people that are winning over the younger generations; into the short sighted bigoted
camp who fear asylum seekers and allow themselves to be manipulated by what passes itself off as our political leadership.
We condemn the Germans for looking away as the Nazis manipulatede the. But here it is happening to us twits.
Wake up you fools, before it's too late.

So, according to you John, because a former Nazi joined the Liberal Party, we are not allowed to implement criteria to restrict entry in Australia as a result of this?

Thought so.

I agree with you entirely Amicus, Thursday, 24 February 2011 12:43:09 PM

Briar Rose's thought processes run amok sometimes she does not account for swings at the ballot box and no Politician can afford to not to sniff the wind .

How many people from Oz are entering other Nations illegally ?
If there is any are they receiving 2.4x the Oz social security payment ?

I am quiet familiar with Islamic People , their fine in my experience , but none of them are fundamentalists ie; "The Toxic Ones" , perhaps Briar Rose should apply her talents to Detox the Islamic Freaks that are the root cause of all her problems , John Howard found a way to Protect his People from them, what can you show Briar Rose, what have you achieved in protecting our people from Fundamentalism ?

I wouldn't really bother Garum-
Some people have absolutely convinced themselves that opposition to Islamic fundamentalism can only come from the conservative-christian-right.

Anything to the contrary will not register on their minds and they will simply try to reject it with a convenient excuse so their can continue believing what they do.

For example, the concept that some people are moderates or secularists who are concerned with all sources of fundamenalism (and not just the ones on "the right wing") is just too hard a concept for some to understand- because that requires independent rational thought, while the other requires being told what being "left wing" or "right wing" is supposed to mean, and following it like a doctrine because thinking for themselves is too hard.

http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=11665#199335

Dear John, And the Closet Communist GAYLP has been intentionally bringing in large numbers of CARS, Communist, Anarchist, Radical, Socialists.

Ever since Comrade Hawke was elected in "1984" our immigration department has been giving asylum to terrorists from Northern Ireland, good Catholic Labour voters. Then the focus shifted to South America & again large numbers of Sandinista Communists were imported from Nicaragua, El Salvador & all over South America.

Yugoslavia, you name it, anywhere these idiots can find a good Communist the welcome mat has been out.

Need i remind you that Pauline Hanson got 49% of 1st preference votes as a dis-endorsed Liberal party candidate, in one of the safest blue collar electorates in the entire GAYLP history.

But let's really "bell the cat". I move in a wide variety of social circles, meet people from both sides of politics & 90% of them want the "White Australia policy" back.

Don't believe me, ask some of those white, educated, Christian, Greeks or Greek Cypriots in Melbourne, who came from a modern, western, capitalist, democratic, 1st world nation, how they feel about Turks &/or large numbers of Muslims coming from anywhere?

BTW, Multiculturalism was invented by CARS, Communist, Anarchist, Radical, Socialists for the specific purpose of destabilising, weakening, strong, healthy, stable, cohesive, Mono-cultural societies like Australia. Check out the proof, for yourself.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8630135369495797236#

We were growing to quickly, for the USSR, becoming progressively stronger, more powerful every year between 1945 & 1975. The last thing they wanted was for the US to have, as close an ally as Australia, becoming a nation of 80 to 100 million people & a permanent member of the UN security council or a wealthy, powerful, G7 nation.

Briar Rose,

You are no doubt right about the legalities of the situation, but this is hardly "end of story". Laws can be changed if they become counterproductive.

To see the problems with self-selected arrivals, you should take a look at Europe. There were only a small number of asylum seekers there in the 1970s, but numbers snowballed. The process is explained in Christopher Caldwell's "Reflections on the Revolution in Europe". People who are going to be starting with nothing in a strange country know that they are likely to need a support network, so prefer to go to places where there is already a community of their fellow countrymen. The first arrivals may be genuine refugees and pretty desperate, but the ethnic community that they form then acts as a magnet for other asylum seekers, who are not necessarily refugees, especially the friends and relatives of those who are settled already (chain migration). The UN High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) has admitted that by the early 1990s, the vast majority of asylum seekers in developed countries were economic migrants.

http://www.aph.gov.au/library/Pubs/cib/1999-2000/2000cib13.htm

Britain got half a million asylum claims between 1997 and 2004, not counting dependants. Only about 20% of them were found to be genuine refugees, including after appeal, with another 14% given exceptional humanitarian leave to stay. Of those whose asylum claims were completely rejected, about 75,000 were deported and 239,000 failed, but were not removed. The costs of dealing with all these people were enormous, more than 2 billion pounds in 2002 alone.

http://www.migrationwatchuk.org/briefingPaper/document/10

Cont'd

Cont'd

So why are failed asylum seekers allowed to stay? And why would it be a bigger problem for boat arrivals than plane arrivals?

Hasbeen has explained some of the issues. Airlines and shipping lines can be held financially responsible if they bring people in without valid papers. A person with valid papers can, of course, claim asylum, but he/she can be quickly returned to sender if the claim is rejected. Countries cannot refuse to honour their own travel documents.

Very high proportions of boat arrivals destroy their travel documents, so it is difficult to prove where they came from. Countries may also refuse to accept back involuntary deportees, as Iran has done and Afghanistan has threatened to do.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/libertycentral/2009/aug/18/failed-asylum-seeker-iran-detention

Higher acceptance rates for boat arrivals are misleading. The burden of proof for acceptance of a claim is very low, because it is difficult to check stories, and no official wants to take the chance of rejecting someone who is sent back and then killed.

Amicus, you say “no one in the community feels” the way that Jennifer Does. Well she obviously does. So do I. Are we not “in the community”? The truth is that there are a variety of views on this issue, and your opinion is not universally held. And even if it was, this wouldn’t make it right.

You say boatpeople have “no intention of fitting in” and that being here is a “convenience only”. You offer no evidence for this other than saying it’s a “perception”. It may be the perception of some, but only bigots would take such “perceptions” to be true without testing the evidence. Surely the costs and risks that asylum seekers bear in the hope of coming here are evidence that it is more than a mere “convenience”

Illegials are legal to the extent that they have been found by our navy - otherwise they may well remain illegial, but what they definitely are is queue jumpers.

If Australia accepts a boatload of these refugees, particularly refugees that, as another poster points out, may well have destroyed their papers and made up uncheckable stories, that does not mean we get an additional number of refugees.

No, that means a load of genuine refugees in another camp will not then fit inside the set quota for refugees for the year - a quota set by Parliament. Immigration won't exceed the quota. Perhaps the author could explain why we should accept those devious, comparatively wealthy refugees arriving by boat (its takes money to get that far), and reject the truely needy still in camps.

Curmudgeon, it doesn't matter what my personal views are , or yours, or anybody else's.

Australian law requires that anybody who requests asylum here, no matter how they've arrived, is allowed to stay here while their refugee status is assessed.

If they're found to be refugees, they cannot be sent back to the country they've fled, and they are eligible for resettlement here.

I know politicians have spent the last ten years brainwashing the electorate into thinking otherwise, but the law is the law, and that is what the law says.

briar rose, where does it say that?

Hay Rosey, remember the "LAW" law tax cuts? Didn't happen did they? Laws do change, often quite quickly. I reckon you will find almost as many genuine Ozzies are as anti the UN as they are anti boat people.

I think you'll find that at any future election anyone who doesn't guarantee to stop the boats will be history.

Of course our Julie was not going to have a carbon dioxide tax in this term, & was going to stop the boats. Just possibly enough people will remember all the lies, & vote where people can be trusted in future

Sorry love, but we have had enough of people like you robbing us & our kids of our birthright, & heritage

Hasbeen,

Julia's position is already pre-ordained.

If the numbers voting Liberal and Labor remain the same at the next election as the last then Julia's history.

Do you really think Windsor and Oakshoot will be re-elected in traditional conservative electorates?

Do you really think Windsor and Oakshoot will be re-elected in traditional conservative electorates?
Keith,
There are plenty of non-thinkers unable to look ahead to vote for these two blackmailers again.

http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=11665#199364

Poor dear briar rose, i am with rpg. where does it say that? Furthermore almost all Loony Left, academics, journalists, politicians & bureaucrooks have been telling deliberate, premeditated, lies about almost everything, for almost half a century now.

there are ONLY 2 occasions of honesty i can remember. Paul Keating's warnings that "we were about to become a banana republic" & "the recession we had to have".

Would you like to see video of 1 former Loony Left, academic admitting it was all lies & a second, still Loony Left academic admitting that it was all deception, repression, for the cause?

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8630135369495797236#

Almost a century of deliberate, premeditated, Spinganda.

All over Britain & Europe former politicians are coming out of retirement & falling over each other, to admit they were all wrong about multiculturalism & mass immigration. Both sides of politics.

wake up to yourself, the number of people in favour of this ridiculous rubbish amount to less that 1% of the population.

Talk about the tail wagging the dog. No wonder you fools are about to be voted out of office forever.

Like the Politically, Correct, Thought, Police say in the video, "you would have to be mentally ill to vote for the Red/green, getup, GAYLP, Socialist Alliance".

rhian .. if you don't feel that way, then you're not part of the community I was talking about .. clearly the author is of a different community as she does not understand what is it about waterborne asylum seekers that make them despised .. the general community disagrees with you and the author and despises these people .. that's the perception the author has and does not understand why .. hence the article.

Politicians understand, which is why they pay attention to the community's feelings in this, they don't pander to the people who want to open the doors to everyone to come on down, they pander to the community who does not want these people .. but feels restrained by the noisy minority who carp about UN conventions.

Your second point you have answered yourself. I said clearly, this is the perception in the community .. in response to the author's question .. why are they despised. What I said was "One perception - boatpeople, of Islamic background, do not like us and have no intention of "fitting in" .. the key word is perception, it may be an incorrect conclusion, but that does not make the perception vanish.

Don't cherry pick .. I can see you're irritated by a home truth, sometimes you have to have it in plain print to understand the rest of Australia does not agree with you or the author.

I hope you understand better now what the rest of Australians, that the politicians clearly respond too, think.

Rhian- willingness to catch a boat and risk dangers could just as strongly imply the huge increase in living standards we offer (as opposed to all of the countries they passed through to actually get here).
For somebody in Afghanistan to even REACH the boats that take them here would require passing through Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Myanmar, Thailand, Malaysia and finally Indonesia.

Evidence of non-integration would be the events leading up to the Cronulla riots, the calls for Sharia system to dominate the UK, and of course the angry protests of the Danish Mohamad cartoons calling for beheadings, the murder of Theo Van Gough for blasphemy- there are definitely signs to suggest many people DO only come for our material conveniences while holding the host population in utter contempt.

Briar Rose - you completely missed the point of what I was saying .. the law demands that they be treated in a certain way, so they are.. that issue is settled and done with. The point I was making is that they are queue jumpers - they are gaming the system and pushing aside far more deserving causes.

Activists who support them are turning their backs on those more deserving cases in favour of the ones who push in.

This is not fair, as I'm sure you'll agree, so the law should be changed so that anybody who arrives by boat should be sent back, as I'm sure you'll agree. The issue is not the acceptance of refugees, that's already set out in the system and remains. We still ge tthe same number. It is the acceptance of the genuinely deserving, poor over the queue jumpers.

Amicus
You’re right, I’m not part of the community of racists who base their opinions on unsubstantiated, self-reinforcing prejudice. I am, however, no less part of the Australian community than you are.

King Hazza
How does the murder of Theo Van Gough demonstrate that boat people arriving here hold Australia in utter contempt? And is your concern only for Moslems – what about other boat people?

rhian .. ah, I see, you have no substance so resort to name calling, as an admission of defeat. btw, islam is not a race

you're cherry picking again .. read hazzas post and you'll see what he is saying, it is completely valid

Curmudgeon, I didn't miss your point - that would be an impossibility - I just don't agree with you, or share your "queue jumper" premise.

As well, your argument is irrelevant, given our legal obligation to accept for assessment anyone who asks for it. You'll have to change that law for your argument to have substance in reality.

So there's really nothing much more we can say to each other - we will have to agree to differ.

Formersnag and rpg - don't you think that if it was legal to do so, politicians would send boat arrivals back? We've agreed to accept all asylum seekers from any country for refugee assessment, and our domestic laws reflect that UN agreement.

Doesn't matter how much you complain about it, that's the reality - if you don't like it lobby your federal MPs to change it.

It's not my job to educate you about these matters and I don't have the time- they're common knowledge - try Google.

http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=11665#199457

Rhian, poor dear Lefty, King Hazza's point was that these problems are universal "multiculturalism", "Mass immigration" has not & is not working, anywhere in the entire world.

It worked fine in the USSR before 1989 because it was a totalitarian regime whose KGB, Military & Police could control all of the racial unrest it causes. Ditto for the former Yugoslavia. Ditto for China right now because it still is a totalitarian, 1 party, dictatorship.

North Korea does not even have this problem because it is almost entirely Korean apart from a couple of American soldiers who defected during the war & a few Japanese who were kidnapped.

Try reading all the other comments like i did & you might understand more about the views of 99-5% of the population.

On the subject of Muslims. Do you think some devout Muslim men might be "radicalised" by Fe"Man"Nazism, or seeing our "liberal" "tolerant" "decadent" society after they get here.

How do you think a devout Muslim male might react to losing his house, children in our Anti Family Law Courts? having his pay docked by the CSA? having a DVO/AVO slapped on him for shouting at his wife?

Does anybody from the RED/green, getup, GAYLP, Socialist Alliance ever think through the possible outcomes of their silly ideas? Or is everything they do a "plan for failure".

And no, nobody other than their friends & relatives from the earlier boats want these people here.

And yes you are a racist, because you hate white people.

Amicus

The term “racism” is commonly used to apply to sweeping and negative generalisations about a group of people based on their ethnicity, religion, culture or nationality. Your argument that Islam is not a “race” does not excuse you from the accusation of racism, especially as your attacks are directed at the culture of boatpeople as well as their beliefs.

You said, “it’s about perceptions. boatpeople, of Islamic background, do not like us and have no intention of ‘fitting in’, are happy to draw on all the available services, but look down on us as infidels, marry their cousins or people from "back home" - it's a convenience to be here only. Another perception - if they are prepared to pay a lot of money to come by this route, then they have something to hide. This applies to all boatpeople.”

The evidence you offer to substantiate these “perceptions” is the authority of others in your “community” who share your views. Hence I feel quite justified in saying that your views are based on unsubstantiated, self-reinforcing prejudice.

Some of the world’s most successful countries are based on migration. The USA would not be to world’s greatest superpower without waves of migration in the 19th and 20th centuries. Australia, Canada and New Zealand are migrant cultures, and richer for it.

Formersnag,

I’ve been called many things on these forums, but never a “lefty”. A most unlikely label to add to the collection.

rhian .. I don't need to offer any evidence at all, it's the usual empty response to an opinion .. "prove it!" .. it's an opinion, get over it

"The term “racism” is commonly used to apply to sweeping and negative generalisations about a group of people based on their ethnicity, religion, culture or nationality"

So calling a bunch of Australians you don't like, a "community of racists", as is their cultural bent and behavior is in fact racist .. so in your own words and definition you are a racist. Dear me some of you tangle yourselves up in your prejudices and anger with your fellow Australians.

briar, I asked where is that because I didn't think we had law covering that at all, and you called attention to it not me and now dodge it, if it was law and you could find it, I'm sure you would have put it up and crowed over it.

We behave the way we do towards refugees because of UN conventions and following that the policy of DIMI, not Australian law, is my understanding, which is why many people are questioning why we subscribe to UN conventions.

Why do we? Is it just feelgood stuff, or so we can replenish or grow our population?

rpg
calling a bunch of people who hate others on the basis of their race "racist" is no more racist than causing a bunch of people who steal others' property "thieves". If the label is appropriate to every member of the group, it's not a hostile generalisation but a statement of fact.

Briar rose - no, its not a matter of agreeing to disagree. You never responded to my queue jumping point.. you simply said that the law at the moment says we must treat them a certain way. Saying what happens now is not a counter argument. How do I know what your stance is, as you've never stated it?

If you disagree with the queue jumping point then why do you disagree? Why shouldn't the law be amended so that queue jumpers are sent back? I'm curious as activists never explain this point. They act as if those coming in by boat was all there was to the immigration program when, in fact, boat people make no difference of any kind to the overall numbers.

Rhian, I have explicitly stated my only concern is of people with mindsets incompatible with a secular moderate western country such as ours (which is primarily, fundamentalist Muslims).
As such, I neither care under whether they arrive by boat or plane, and I have little problem with boat arrivals who were moderate and secular, and that aside- have some willingness to integrate.
(And that very much includes Muslims who are SECULAR)
And no, I'm not just adding that to be politically correct- the secularism is important to me).

In fact, I don't think anyone is actually singling out the boats except the politicians and the media- I would gander that most voters in support of border policy were willing to keep Islamic fundamentalists out, and the pollies and media know it.

Whether they tar the brush on all Muslims is based on their lack of exposure to non-fundamentalists to inform them otherwise. But quite frankly, for those that are fundamentalists (to the point where another cartoon printout would cause an uproar) are not good citizens and should not be dumped next to some poor schmuck in Australia- to have to tiptoe around in case he offends them by his everyday business (of course, arrivals who hold others in contempt are unlikely to show consideration back).
REGARDLESS of their reasons for coming.

But my previous post stood to demonstrate how little value potential migrants (ESPECIALLY fundamentalists) have for the society they move to beyond material gain, security and luxury.
In other words, Amicus' point that you were replying to is actually quite a truthful occurrence.

King Hazza

Fair enough – I disagree with you, but acknowledge you are not generalising about all Muslims or all boat people in the same way Amicus appears to be.

I do agree that extreme Islamic fundamentalism is not compatible with Western liberal democracy (as indeed is true of other extreme fundamentalisms, including Christian, Marxist, nationalist etc).

I really don’t see that this is an issue in Australia in the same way it has become in some European countries. I also think that people coming here by boat are usually trying to escape extremism, not import it

Bring back Temporary protection visas. These meet the requirements of the treaty, and prevent abuse of the system.

Off shore processing in Nauru will also stop the waste of billions of dollars in legal fees by preventing their access to our courts.

It is appropriate that Jennifer -- who has shown herself to be very particular about the use of words—cites the Tampa affair, since it well illustrates how words can mis-colour perceptions.

Here’s the core Tampa facts:
On August 26, the Tampa traveling from the Australian port of Fremantle to Singapore…. intercepted a stricken Indonesian vessel and took aboard 433 people.

The pick-up occurred within the Indonesian rescue zone. And Indonesia had agreed to accept the rescued.

The Tampa’s captain, set course for the port of Merak on the Indonesian island of Java,
but [ from Wikipedia]
“About half an hour after the Tampa had set sail toward Indonesia, a delegation of five asylum seekers visited the bridge to demand passage to Australian territory, specifically Christmas Island, or any western country. The group was quite aggressive and agitated and Rinnan agreed to alter course for Christmas Island. When interviewed by UK newspaper The Observer, Rinnan explained: "A delegation of five men came up to the bridge. They behaved aggressively and told us to go to Australia. They said they had nothing to lose."
And [ from A Harvard University publication]
.” Their demand was “either take us to Christmas Island or go to any Western country.” With his crew of Thirteen vastly outnumbered; the captain turned the ship about, and headed for Christmas Island.

But here’s is the sanitised version which Jennifer links to :
“On 26 August 2001, in response to a Mayday signal from a ship in international waters, the Australian Government sent a plea to nearby vessels to conduct a search and rescue mission. The Tampa, a Norwegian cargo ship, responded to the call.After a four hour journey, the Tampa discovered the Palapa; a 35 metre Indonesian fishing boat with 438 asylum seekers on board. The Palapa had been heading to Christmas Island and the passengers were planning to claim refugee status in Australia, but they had encountered a storm and the boat was falling apart.

The asylum seekers asked to be taken to Christmas Island and the master of the ship, Arne Rinnan, took them as far as he could before he was forbidden to enter Australian waters.Canberra did not want any more asylum seekers in Australia and they held to several arguments: to protect the nation's sovereignty; that our detention centres were full; that these people might not be genuine refugees and after 11 September, that there could be terrorists among them.The asylum seekers were kept on the hot deck of the Tampa with up to 15 people unconscious at one time, not enough toilets, on hunger strike, with skin diseases, diarrhoea, three pregnant women, one broken leg, several suffering from hypothermia and 46 children.
Rinnan waited outside the territorial waters with the health situation on board deteriorating for three days until he decided that he had to get to Christmas Island.”

Note:
1) The confrontation of the bridge is now edited to : “ The asylum seekers ASKED to be taken to Christmas Island” .
2) The very Grimmian : “ but they had encountered a storm and the boat was falling apart” and “The master of the ship” and “ forbidden to enter” .
3)The incongruity that the asylum seekers had embarked on the journey on a much smaller vessel with fewer facilities but when they boarded the much larger Tampa, overcrowding suddenly becomes a matter of life, death and human rights.

The word “Grim” which Jennifer uses in her heading is indeed appropriate -- but Grimm with two Ms

At the conclusion of the Grimm saga we find those who paid a small fortune for illegal passage ,and intimated the captain and crew of their rescue ship come out smelling of roses—and get to live happily ever after.

For those think such fairy tales sagas can only happen once . I suggest the saga of the Oceanic Viking -- same plot, and even some of the same lines “Christmas Island, or any western country”, but different cast & crew.

Oh, Shadow Minister, I was wondering where you were.

Of course you are quite right - although the last lot of asylum seekers sent to Nauru were found to be refugees and resettled in Australia.

Briar Rose,

As shown before, the pacific solution worked, the present system isn't.

http://www.aph.gov.au/library/pubs/bn/sp/BoatArrivals.gif

Pacific solution introduced 2001, removed 2008.

Rhian
"I also think that people coming here by boat are usually trying to escape extremism, not import it"
Largely true Rhian, though they may just as easily be escaping war, poverty, or persecution for BEING a fundamentalist, or simply for being in the wrong clan or specific fundamentalist sect.

Which is why there must be a system to determine which of the two our arrivals are, let in those who are moderate if nothing negative can be found against them- and the non-moderates must simply be deported back to their country of origin.

Yes, Shadow Minister, I read it in another place, but we reached an impasse there as we will here, because we don't have any agreement on what critieria make a policy "work."

Briar Rose,

I am not arguing about what criteria makes a policy successful or why the pacific solution worked, I am simply saying that the figures unequivocally indicate that it did work.

Given that there were no other push/pull factors that coincided, any claim to the contrary is pure fantasy.

Shadow Minister
I am not arguing about the success or otherwise of Pacific solution in this article so you're off topic.
Jennifer.

I read the story about conditions aboard Tampa and thought that it was yet another example of how facts were kept from people back then, as with the Iraq war, conditions in detention centres and the belated recognition that 98 percent of boat people were dinkum refugees rather than blow ins, as Ruddock had suggested.
Personally, I think a good way to stop refugee flows would be to get big powers out of third world countries where they engineer coups to put military thugs in as dictators to protect their own selfish business interests against the needs of the many, when they are not bombing the daylights out of the third world masses themselves.

Briar Rose,

Given that you concede that the pacific solution worked and complied with the letter of the law, why should it not be re applied to stop people dying on the boats?

The greens and other bleeding hearts are happy with the 5% or so of boat people that go to Davy Jones's locker, as long as the survivors get a cushy welcome.

King Hazza
One of the most significant differences between western liberal democracy and other political systems is that it tolerates its enemies to a far greater extent. This is based in confidence that its superiority is so self-evident that its opponents will not succeed in overcoming it. That is why free speech protects even those with anti-democratic leanings, and why Australians voted against banning the Communist Party. With the arguable exception of Nazi Germany, I can’t think of any liberal democratic society that has chosen to abandon democracy.

All people here must obey the law of the land, and if they stay within those bounds, fundamentalists pose no real threat to our society. So I’m not especially concerned if the odd Sheik Hilali gets here, whether by boat or plane. He’ll never be anything but a marginalised fool.

He'll be a marginalized fool with a few dozen marginalized acolytes happy to act on his words.
Furthermore, marginalized fools have no trouble lobbying councils and politicians to help force their will on others if they pose a swinging vote, or simply have the money or means to threaten or blackmail (eg the Brethren, or the Church in general).

And I am also concerned about the poor neighbors that will have to endure these bastards and tip-toe around all their theological and superstitious prejudices.
Personally, their rights to peace, security and liberty trump the pricks who would take it away.

When it comes to what our society does- tolerating conduct by citizens, and holding similar criteria to potential immigrants are two different things.
To drag out the house analogy again, would be the difference between having a trespasser arrested, or calling the cops to arrest someone you invited inside because their manners were bad and you changed your mind.

@ Rhian

But even “marginalized fools” can inflict much damage:
1) http://tinyurl.com/4rdzoka

2) “Court that the seven men considered violent jihad an integral part of their religious obligations, often referring to themselves as mujahidin and talked about destroying buildings and killing infidels.”
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/inept-fanatic-benbrika-jailed/story-e6frf7kx-1111118740860

3) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_depth/uk/2005/london_explosions/default.stm

but of course if the damages are to others, it is easy to dismiss it as insignificant and posing “ no real threat to our society".

This is certainly a post where some people are showing their attitude and in many cases their ignorance. Most of the countries in the world are suffering a recession or depression, almost entirely through the mismangement or corruption of the despots who manage to get into the position of management or government, and even Australia and the US are among that group. By the difference of the treatment given to millionaires and to the workers, it is easily seen where the preference lies. The reciprocal imports from our mining exports, destroys our own manufacturing industries, and except for the acceptance that a guaranteed two or three days a week work is accepted as not being unemployed - although they are really unemployed the other two or three days, allows the acceptance of only 5.4% unemployment to stand. Many countries have much worse conditions, even the US and UK. We need a return to the 66.6% top tax, with the first $30,000 tax free, Our country would surge ahead economicly then. We have to kick out our gang of politicians and get free.

Shadow Minister, I don't recall "conceding" the Pacific solution "worked" anywhere.

I have no issue with you or anybody else arguing it as an alternative to withdrawing from the Convention. It's clearly on the opposition's table.

I wonder if you heard the interview with the man responsible for immigration in Malta on Radio National on Saturday morning? They're preparing themselves for thousands of Libyan refugees. His attitude was astounding, compared to what we are used to hearing.

No mention of observing only the letter of the law, just of the humanitarian crisis, of the responsibility to assist. They're bracing for more asylum seekers over the next few weeks than we get in ten years.

We are more than a little precious in this country in our hysteria about boat arrivals.

We are more than a little precious in this country in our hysteria about boat arrivals.
briar rose,
there is no hysteria only boat arrivals which should be helped not to have to leave their countries in the first place.

MMM! is there a difference between the Libyan refugees in Malta and the refugees here?

In Malta, people are genuinely fleeing the fighting, as Malta is the closest stop where the government has not just suffered a revolution.

Many are ex pats trying to get home to their countries of origin, and those of Libyan origin are not likely to seek permanent residence.

The refugees in Australia have passed through several peaceful and friendly countries, but would prefer to settle here, as the economically most comfortable.

The standard instruction to boat people has been stated that they are
to throw their documentation over board when the boat leaves Indonesia.
The purpose is said to be that Australia then cannot prove their
nationality and so cannot deport them.

The destruction of passports etc is almost certainly an illegal act as
does arriving in a country by other than regulated transport.
Christmas Island may not have been a "Port of Entry" and it is illegal
to enter a country at other than a designated "Port of Entry".

It is these actions that make them illegal.

That almost all illegal entrants eventually are settled in Australia
probably illustrates the difficulty that the government has in deporting them.
Their countries don't want them back.
I wonder why ?

The destruction of travel and identity documentation occurred blatantly during the rescue of asylum seekers by the Tampa in August 2001. The first mate of the Tampa, Christian Malhaus, testified in a Western Australian court during a people smuggling case that during the rescue he witnessed asylum seekers throw their documentation overboard before boarding the Tampa. The purpose of these actions was obviously to make the establishment of the identities of the asylum seekers, the disproval of their stories of persecution, and their removal to their countries of origin extremely difficult if not impossible.

A boat carrying asylum seekers with documentation was intercepted in July 2001. The boat had departed from Cambodia for Australia with 241 Afghans and Pakistanis on board, who were believed to have paid between $US5,000 and $US10,000 per person for their journey. Note that the average per capita income of Afghanistan is $800 per year or around $2 per day.

The boat was intercepted and most were found carrying Pakistani or Afghan passports, many Afghan documents indicating long term residency of Pakistan. The asylum seekers could have applied to the UNHCR for asylum in Cambodia which is a signatory to the relevant UN conventions. Only after interception did many of the group apply for asylum.

Only 14 of 241 (6%) were accepted by the UNHCR as refugees, and the remainder were returned to their countries of origin. However, if this group of asylum seekers would have destroyed their documents en route and then reached Australia, perhaps most would have been granted protection in Australia due to the difficulty in establishing their identities and disproving their unverifiable stories of persecution.