The National Forum   Donate   Your Account   On Line Opinion   Forum   Blogs   Polling   About   
The Forum - On Line Opinion's article discussion area



Syndicate
RSS/XML


RSS 2.0

Main Articles General

Sign In      Register

The Forum > Article Comments > Coalition’s backdown on repeal of section 18c is shameful > Comments

Coalition’s backdown on repeal of section 18c is shameful : Comments

By James Allan, published 11/9/2014

Forget principle and ask yourself why a political party that has at most one seat at risk from the dislike of the

  1. Pages:
  2. 1
  3. Page 2
  4. 3
  5. All
Well OTB, it has already happened here.
The Bilal gang did the grooming technique on at least one girl that was
known to one of them when she got into their car.

Whether it is/has happened on such a scale I wouldn't know.
However the police/ DOCs should be active enquiring, but I would bet
quids it would be politically incorrect to make such enquiry.
Posted by Bazz, Thursday, 11 September 2014 10:04:40 PM
Find out more about this user Recommend this comment for deletion Return to top of page Return to Forum Main Page Copy comment URL to clipboard
Virginia Trioli wrote an interesting article
on this very subject in the magazine, "The
Weekly Review, August 13, 2014, page 3.
I'm going to quote the entire article for you
because I don't want to be accused of "cherry-
picking." :

"Turns out we don't have the right to be bigots
after all. The Federal Government has abandoned its
crusade to repel Section 18C of the Racial Discrimination
Act. Columnists who want to offend someone about their
race will now have to make sure they get their facts
straight, and there's no legislation to make sure
they do that."

"Section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act makes it
unlawful for someone to do an act that is reasonably
likely to "offend, insult, humiliate or intimidate"
someone because of their race or ethnicity."

"The question that those arguing for its repeal never
managed to answer was what did they want to be able to
say that they couldn't say now?"

"In other words - what problem would the repeal fix?"

"The worries of those who saw a greater problem with
unstitching the legislation were clear: if everyone had
the right to be a bigot, just imagine what would be said
and written when bigots declared open season. But the
advantage created by removing the sanctions was never
made clear."

"The rhetoric was always powerful - dangerous restrictions
on free speech, trampled liberties, et cetera - but the
solid examples were scarce."

cont'd ...
Posted by Foxy, Thursday, 11 September 2014 10:23:28 PM
Find out more about this user Recommend this comment for deletion Return to top of page Return to Forum Main Page Copy comment URL to clipboard
The offending was stating that someone could, because of partial
ethnicity decide which one gave them the best advantage.
That offended the complainant.
Posted by Bazz, Thursday, 11 September 2014 10:36:10 PM
Find out more about this user Recommend this comment for deletion Return to top of page Return to Forum Main Page Copy comment URL to clipboard
cont'd ...

"The morning after the decision to abandon the repeal
was announced, the man at the centre of the legislative
row, columnist Andrew Bolt, could still only come up
with two examples of "banned" speech for his comment
piece that day, and they were the columns that got him
into trouble in the first place - columns described by
Justice Bromberg in his 2011 finding against Bolt for
breaching the Racial Discrimination Act as containing
"errors of fact, distortions of the truth, and inflammatory
and provocative language."

"While Section 18C makes it an offense to offend, insult etc,
the bit straight after it, Section 18D, gives us all a
way out: this is the guarantee protecting freedom of speech."

"Let me just say that again, because the ideological
warriors in this fight have conveniently ignored this
crucial section."

"This section protects freedom of speech. Under our laws we
all have a defence for our sinsulting: if you are engaged
in artistic works, scientific debate and fair comment on
matter of public interest, you can vent to your heart's
content providing what you do is said or done reasonably
and in good faith."

"That's why Bolt couldn't rely on this protection for
his columns. The judge found that through his errors
and inflammatory language he had not acted in good faith.
It bears noting - for this truly is the straw-man at
the centre of this high-fallutin' row - that Bolt
probably could have got away with almost everything he wrote
in those strangely skin colour-obsessed columns if he had
just done the one thing a journalist is required to do -
get his facts straight."

cont'd ...
Posted by Foxy, Thursday, 11 September 2014 10:41:18 PM
Find out more about this user Recommend this comment for deletion Return to top of page Return to Forum Main Page Copy comment URL to clipboard
cont'd ...

"But let's return to the problem that this repeal was
supposed to solve: what can't you say right now because
of 18C? The argument, such as it is, seemed to be made
even weaker when Bolt had another go the next day at
arguing his corner. His lament was that once upon a
time he could have denouced someone and "in perfect
safety drawn links between his faith and his bigotry.
I could have wondered whether we were safe, importing
so many people from such a culture."

"Once he could have done this? Seems to me this columnist
just managed to say now what he said he couldn't."

"Situation normal: everyone go back to your homes."
Posted by Foxy, Thursday, 11 September 2014 10:46:47 PM
Find out more about this user Recommend this comment for deletion Return to top of page Return to Forum Main Page Copy comment URL to clipboard
'Rottenham' (Rotherham).

Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Exploitation in Rotherham (1997 – 2013)

"In just over a third of cases, children affected by sexual exploitation were previously known to services because of child protection and neglect. It is hard to describe the appalling nature of the abuse that child victims suffered. They were raped by multiple perpetrators, trafficked to other towns and cities in the north of England, abducted, beaten, and intimidated. There were examples of children who had been doused in petrol and threatened with being set alight, threatened with guns, made to witness brutally violent rapes and threatened they would be next if they told anyone. Girls as young as 11 were raped by large numbers of male perpetrators.
This abuse is not confined to the past but continues to this day.
..
Over the first twelve years covered by this Inquiry, the collective failures of political and officer leadership were blatant. From the beginning, there was growing evidence that child sexual exploitation was a serious problem in Rotherham. This came from those working in residential care and from youth workers who knew the young people well.
Within social care, the scale and seriousness of the problem was underplayed by senior managers. At an operational level, the Police gave no priority to CSE, regarding many child victims with contempt and failing to act on their abuse as a crime. Further stark evidence came in 2002, 2003 and 2006 with three reports known to the Police and the Council, which could not have been clearer in their description of the situation in Rotherham. The first of these reports was effectively suppressed because some senior officers disbelieved the data it contained. This had led to suggestions of cover- up. The other two reports set out the links between child sexual exploitation and drugs, guns and criminality in the Borough. These reports were ignored and no action was taken to deal with the issues that were identified in them."

http://www.rotherham.gov.uk/downloads/file/1407/independent_inquiry_cse_in_rotherham

tbc.
Posted by onthebeach, Friday, 12 September 2014 4:44:29 AM
Find out more about this user Recommend this comment for deletion Return to top of page Return to Forum Main Page Copy comment URL to clipboard
  1. Pages:
  2. 1
  3. Page 2
  4. 3
  5. All

About Us :: Search :: Discuss :: Feedback :: Legals :: Privacy