Dear Graham,

In English common law, incitement and harassment are illegal.

Your group and you wish to have protection for your harassment of women who are going to an abortion facility. Harassment is an offense even if you call it free speech. You have many avenues to express your opposition to abortion. Your article that I am commenting on is one of the ways. Free speech is not absolute. If your expression becomes harassment then your expression is a criminal offense under common law. What you want is not free speech but the right to harass women.

We live in an oligarchy run by bankers. Joe Hockey's wife is an ex-banker. Malcolm Turnbull is the ex-CEO of Goldman Sachs Australia. Maggie Abbott, Tony's wife,used to work for a Rothschild Merchant Bank.

When John Howard was in power he signed away the last control over our RBA our Govt had. All monetary policy in regards to interest rates, is now out of our Govt control. APRA the banking regulatory authority is answerable to the Bank of International Settlements, the Rothschild head of all Central Banks ie private ownership answerable to no Govt.

If you think this is a democracy, then don't wait around for total corporate control. In their circles they refer to us as," The useless eaters."

Thanks Arjay, we need a bit of a diversion every now and then.

So, to paraphrase Mr Preston's question: what would the police do if a young man marched through a shopping centre carrying an ISIS flag ?

Ask him to go home.

And look how that turned out.

Joe

How did ISIS get so well armed and financed. Many suggest Israel and the USA created ISIS so they could go back in and secure Iraqi oil.

The USA seem to think they can win a nuclear war with Russia and China. Totally MAD.

Arjay, I admire your perseverance!

We have to deal with some very stubborn customers on OLO, the kind of people who'll swear black is white or white is black depending on which day of the week it is, people who are easily swayed by Western propaganda.

Looking at Tony addressing the U.N., I greatly fear for my country. We are being sucked into a gigantic black hole, one created by the imperial U.S., a nation which has alienated most of the world's nations.

The world is being filled with fear while the U.S. moves ever closer to its goal of world domination.

The U.S. is no better than Isil. It uses horror weapons to achieve its ends and thinks nothing about the kids born with hideous birth defects because of its use of depleted uranium and landmines and phosphorous munitions.

The world is a madhouse of greed and killing and sadly, the forces of good and peace are in disarray!

Don't lose heart, my friend!

Violent ferals are allowed to protest and prevent free speach although usually are to gutless to protest against those who sell girls as slaves, multilate them and make them cover their face. Instead they don't want anyone to see pictures of the babies that are about to be multilated because their 'rights' triump over this barbaric act. THey actually have a lot in common with the butchers so its no wonder they are so selective about who they choose stop allowing speak in public.

"It was just over a year ago that Obama officials were insisting that bombing and attacking Assad was a moral and strategic imperative. Instead, Obama is now bombing Assad’s enemies while politely informing his regime of its targets in advance. It seems irrelevant on whom the U.S. wages war; what matters is that it be at war, always and forever."

This excerpt came from an article written by Glenn Greewald and it appeared on ICH today.

Not everyone swallows U.S. propaganda. There are some thinkers in the world still though, sadly, few in number!

I agree with the right to life as a first principle, and if the mother's life is at genuine risk!
Then the mother's much more important life is the one we need to spare.
Moreover, a woman can't be made to carry to full term, when the conception was not accompanied by her informed consent! As would be the case in rape, date rape and incest!
And then there is the issue of tissue rejection in the womb and subsequent toxemia, which can and does kill both mother and baby!
Then there are the cases of contraception failure, and a schoolgirls entire life ruined, by an entirely unplanned pregnancy!
Yes they should refrain, but that particular horse has already bolted.
These poor women in particular, don't need to then be also harassed by a absolutist nut job, claiming a right to free speech.
Patently, the right to privacy trumps the right of so called free speech.
If I were running any of the clinics, I would take out an AVO order against you, and advise all my clientele, to do exactly the same!
If you were a mind reader and had xray vision, you might be able to make a case for trying to prevent a very small percentage of women from using, what is for them, an essential service!
Perhaps you should go away, earn a medical degree, and then come on back, with your witless opinions.
Which no doubt do much more harm than good, when applied by a patent control freak!
These women also have rights; one of which is to allow their conscience to be their guide, not witless fools, parading up and down outside a private medical facility!
Perhaps you could make out a case for a referendum, and have it decided by that.
And given the majority of voters are also women, guess what chances of success that might have!?
In the final analysis, if it were men who had to carry the babies, and then pass something the size of a indoor bowls ball, we just wouldn't be having this conversation.
Rhrosty.

It's not ISIS I fear, but my government ! The following words, from 'UNION AMONG THE COLONIES ' written in 1854 by John West resound more loudly today, than they did when West wrote them, & I quote :

" Badly as power has been used by the mere servants of the the Crown, it has been infinitely less oppressive than would be the slavish violence of mere servants of the people. Under the existing system of government, royalty preserves so large a share in our assemblies, & a control so perfect over the collection & distribution of revenue, that faction at present cannot wield its authority, or unsheath its sword.

Those who are dazzled by the idea of unrestricted and responsible government in little colonies have seen only one side of the medal. They have not yet seen family compacts in their full bloom; they have not yet beheld an Attorney General, armed with the power of the majority, hunting its enemies into the meshes of the law; they have not yet witnessed nepotism with greedy hand & jealous eye, seizing the public as a spoil. All this they would assuredly behold in a small community in which no voice should be heard to speak beyond its own borders.

American history is full of examples to warn & admonish us; for notwithstanding the public & private virtue concentrated there, its annals are full of both turbulence & oppression. Those in who were not in the ascendant were prostrate." Unquote.

Who now 'represents' us, we the Australian Citizens? And who exactly is George Brandis being controlled by ?

One should not be arrested for standing in the street and lying.

Yet the "Universal Declaration of Human Rights" is full of lies. To begin with, take this stupid idea of "the right to life":

My life is God-given. It was never a result of some parliamentarians and bureaucrats, nor even the United-Nations, declaring, "Let's grant Yuyutsu a life, along with a title (birth-certificate) to acknowledge that from now on this life, conferred by us, is to be protected".

What God has given, is wrong to take away, but that has nothing to do with my non-existent "right" - instead, it has everything to do with respecting and loving God.

It is so sad to see religious people cling to secular authority: they have lost their way!

"Abortion is not an act that requires unique protection. People in good conscience should be allowed to peacefully express their views about it in all public places (what does "universal" mean?), just as they should be allowed to do so about any other matter. The Tasmanian law must be repealed."

Indeed!

The Tasmanian abortion law is extremely discriminatory. It grants no rights whatsoever to the most innocent of victims, the unborn.

It decriminalises the killing of unborn babies, yet criminalises opposition to such killing -- hardly the hallmark of a civilised society

Of course one can mount a good conscience argument, for not stilling a already beating human heart.
But that's not what we are talking about here, is it?
Unless on irrefutable life and death medical grounds!
And therefore, almost as sensible as parading the streets, protesting against wart removal, another equally relevant, living human tissue removal issue!
If any of the (ignorant leading the blind) detractors were genuine, they would be out there, and with action and their own money, beavering away, at the mortality rate of women giving birth, in less developed countries!
A mortality rate, which far and away kills millions more fully developed babies, and their mothers, than all the abortion clinics the length and breadth of this country.
Reality and relevance!
Rhrosty.

While we are on the topic of abortion, this is an issue bigger than just being for or against it. I understand where the OP is coming from, every life is precious, but the problem is, the women that walks into an abortion clinic does not want the baby. Making abortion illegal can have negative consequences for that child. For instance, that 4year old kid in SA, don't tell me that child would have suffered more if the mother had an abortion.

On the free speech issue, should we also picket funerals of diggers to protest against the war ala Westboro Baptist or the Mardi Gras against gays? No, common decency suggest that isn't the time and place. Most of the women going to the clinics already have a lot to think about, they don't need people waving placards trying to shame them too.

Yuyutsu says my life is God given sorry Yuyutsu my life is the result of a sperm and egg meeting and so is yours, it has nothing to do with a fictitious God, do not tell me he was the one who made me an expert swimmer and drowned the rest trying desparatily to get to the prize, perhaps all those billions of other sperm were the creation of the fictitious devil and never stood a chance, how ridiculous is religion.

Dear Ojnab,

I have read this view of yours before and while I do not agree, for the purpose of this particular topic, suffice that we agree, as indeed we seem to, that you do not owe your life to the state and its government and that the good reason(s) for others to avoid killing you do not include some United-Nation's decree which proclaims that you have a "right" to live.

On a side issue, your seem to be quite outspoken when it comes to male identity and not minding the PC brigade you declare without hesitation that you are a sperm - your mother's ovum being what then? just food I presume...

Hi Arjay,

Nice to see you have a friend on OLO: the coming together of the dumb-dumb Left and the isolationist extreme-Right is produ ing some strange friendships, isn't it ?

You write,

"How did ISIS get so well armed and financed. Many suggest Israel and the USA created ISIS so they could go back in and secure Iraqi oil."

How ? Well, overrunning all the military bases around Mosul, and the air force base at Raqqa, might have helped. Raiding the Mosul banks of half a billion might have given them a boost, too.

But keep pushing the one about Israel setting up training bases for ISIS in the Negev: that might give the Israelis, ISIS and me all a good laugh.

And wouldn't it be easier, and cheaper, to simply buy the oil ?

Terrorists-as-puppets: an interesting concept.

And how come nobody ever blames the Swedes ? Clever b@stards, never leave the tiniest bit of evidence behind, to cover their tracks. They may be training ISIS fighters in the mountains for winter fighting, and who would even suspect them ? Devilishly cunning. No wonder nobody can connect the dots.

Just trying to help, Arjay :)

Joe

"Every Human Being Has the right to life

Is that statement correct?

Nature the greatest power on this planet doesn't think so.

Nature spontaneously aborts babies, it is called miscarriage.

Nature would kill a huge percentage of children in the first few
years of life without immunisation.

100years ago the life expectancy even in Western countries was
about 50-60years. That's if you managed to survive until 30years
or even 20years.
Without Pencillin a small scratch could kill you very quickly even today.

A right to life? Another man made delusion presented as fact.

Aray,
< How did Isis get so well armed and financed>

Friends in high Sunni Places, including quite large donations from
supporters in Western countries. Plus every town and business and
bank they conquer, the money goes straight into the pockets
of the revolutionaries-(Isis). ISIS is controlling the oil supplies
in Iraq now, the profits from that are probably flowing right
into their pockets also. I'd say they are as rich as King Midas
about now, well almost. That's the whole point of the fight to
control land and wealth, all that talk about religion is bulldust,
as it always is.
Also, if they had taken control of the main dam and water supply, before America stopped them from taking the dam,
imagine how they could have raised taxes from towns and people for
their water supply.
Big money can buy good weapons from lots of places in the world.

This is a major Sunni insurgence.
The Sunnis don't want to live under rule by the Shi-ites Tribes, who have the numbers in government, they want their own
state or country. It's that simple. If they have to use violent,
angry, men to seize back their country then who better to do it.
A bunch of pussycats.

I doubt that the Sunnis like some of
the more lunatic violence of Isis, but they do like the control of
a Sunni state or country being handed back to them by ISIS. At the
moment they fear persecution at the hands of Shi-ite militia
more than they do Isis. And down the track they can always deal
with those who are the biggest nutters in ISIS, after they have the country back in Sunni hands.

People who take land, country and resources, prosper and become
rich, that is what war is all about.

CHERFUL,

I strongly object to your calling ISIS 'revolutionaries' - they are reactionaries, fascists, terrorists, thugs, yes but in no way are they as you call them.

I'm still Left enough to believe that that term has some integrity and value, even if it hasn't been properly used for many years.

But I mostly support the gist of what you say: I do think, however, that they are using religion to push a religious cause - world domination. It's amazing what the promise of seventy two white-breasted virgins can conjure up in the male mind.

Or was that seventy two white-breasted raisins ?

Joe

Yuyutsu, your life was not given to you by a spook, it was given to you, and your parents and maybe grandparents, by millions of heroes who put their lives on the line to crush the Krauts and the Japs whose hell-bent mission was to take your lives and mine along with the rights proclaimed in the Declaration which is written in the heroes' blood.

Contrary to the Zionist propaganda ISIS promote themselves as a social justice movement, their stated mission is to liberate Iraq and the Levant from the (ex) Maliki and Assad governments.The stories of mass rapes and sexual slavery will be shown to be bogus, as they always are, remember the "Viagra Rape Squads" of Libya in 2011 and the fake "Rape Camps" of the Bosnian wars?

It's no wonder idealistic young people raised in the West and given a Liberal education are attracted to the Jihad, the ISIS message of defending the weak against the tyrants is music to their ears.
Every one of the Britons and Australians fighting for ISIS has no doubt been raised as a "Special Snowflake" in state schools, told that every idea he has is valid, that every opinion he hears is worthy of consideration and, as we say had his tyres pumped up too much by helicopter parents and Liberal teachers.

I think ISIS is just another false flag event like 911. http://ae911truth.org/

When we look at our own life it is due to circumstances from the very beginning, somewhere along the way to our life we have managed to escape or been lucky to survive diseases, wars, deaths by someone young, deaths ,marriage, multiple marriages, abortions, etc, when I look at my own life, people who are not even related to me but by circumstances in their life by young deaths and second marriages I would not be here without that particular death at the time, it is an amazing road, it has nothing to do with a God, just luck along the way, and the same process of someone living in the future will just be by the same, purely luck to live, or an early death, where the future of that person and continuing line will stop forever and some one new hopefully will start another living line, the same as myself

Dear Julian,

Parents, grandparents and heroes, as well as the food, the earth, the water and the air - all are God - there's nothing but God, so what's spooky about using the above expressions of God as the means to create the body through which I live?

Now claiming that at least part of the reason why it's wrong to kill a person is the United-Nations' declaration of human rights, implies that before the advent of the United-Nations, it was more OK to take a life than today. Is that so?

What's next? When faced with moral questions such as whether killing and eating a kangaroo is acceptable - are you scanning the volumes of U.N. statements to check whether kangaroos (or unborn foetuses for that matter) have a right to live?

If you consider the United-Nations as the highest authority, do you also take their advice that "everyone is equal" when looking for a romantic partner?

Dear Ojnab,

<<When we look at our own life it is due to circumstances from the very beginning>>

Yes, if we look with our physical eyes through the filter of our human mind, then this is what we perceive, this is how it looks at the surface. However, beyond appearances, everything including those events which seem so random, is the same, is God.

Even science tells that physical objects are not what they seem to be, that in fact there are only atoms there, then protons, neutrons and electrons, then quarks and other sub-atomic particles, then even those, according to Einstein's general relativity theory, are truly nothing but energy. What's the wonder then when I take it one or two steps further, saying that even that which seems to be energy and that which seems to be space and that which seems to be time, all indeed are nothing but God!

We don't have freedom of speech as long as telling the truth is an offense & can cost you your job.

The right to free speech is not impeded by the requirement for religious fundamentalists to protest at least 150m from termination clinics, however, their ability to harass people trying to exercise their rights to choice is.

[OT: but he started it]

Are you still on about that, Arjay?

>>I think ISIS is just another false flag event like 911. http://ae911truth.org/<<

When will you learn?

One of the more fascinating recent contributions to your 9/11 fiction, is from an Australian fiction writer called Dee McLachlan. She has taken the trouble to post a film of a collapsing building that has been demolished using explosives.

"This is what a building collapse looks like. Even though the pillars of the building have been skillfully severed by explosives – everything of weight is going downwards."

She contrasts this with a film of one of the WTC buildings going down. The two examples have absolutely nothing in common - that is, the profile of the collapse in each case is very markedly different.

Amazingly, her conclusion is: "This building has been BLOWN UP – with sophisticated explosives."

Any sane person would think, given her claims that both buildings were blown up with skilfully-placed explosives, the patterns should be identical? Or at least, vaguely similar in some way?

The lack of any logic has never been an impediment to the conspiracy brigade though, has it Arjay. As with your lastest suggestion that ISIS is somehow a CIA conspiracy.

Still crazy, after all these years.

Pericles Dr Paul Craig Roberts ( ex -assistant secretary to the US Treasury) says ISIS is a creation of Washington. He has far more credibility than yourself.

http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2014/09/25/will-russia-china-hold-fire-war-alternative-paul-craig-roberts/

Arjay an excellent article, it is interesting that we never ever get articles written by this very learned man in our daily papers, but then that is not what they want us to read, they lie and keep the real truth under wraps and from its readers.

Pericles,

I worked for a time in the sixties in a mental hospital, at Ballarat. Since then, such institutions have been wound down or closed altogether and the inmates are now allowed to wander the streets and live in the 'community', as long as they take their medication.

To our mutual regret and aggravation, some have been able to master the Internet, but it seems, not their medication timetable.

Best wishes,

Joe

For some people, Arjay, I'm sure he does.

>>Dr Paul Craig Roberts ( ex -assistant secretary to the US Treasury) says ISIS is a creation of Washington. He has far more credibility than yourself.<<

But fortunately, there is still a large majority who know an egotistical, anti-semitic, white-supremacist, self-promoting flake when they see one.

I notice that you have no comment to make on the contradiction inherent in fiction writer Dee McLachlan's observations on the 9/11 "explosions". But I guess that would mean using your own brain, wouldn't it Arjay, instead of your usual process of simply cut'n'pasting some other conspiracy nut-job's online ravings.

david f, you said: "In English common law, incitement and harassment are illegal"
Graham wasn't charged with incitement and harassment, the police evidently had no grounds, therefore you have no grounds for that accusation. He was himself the victim of severe harassment.
Graham's case is watertight, based with pure logic on a universally-accepted charter of human rights which does not include a right to kill. You have no answer, so you invent a fictitious crime. Is that the best you can manage?

Dear Peter D,

I didn't write that Graham was charged with incitement and harassment. I maintained that what he called free speech was the right to harass women going to an abortion clinic. The limits set for him to approach the clinic was to protect women from harassment. Graham would like the freedom to harass already stressed women. He doesn't like the laws that protect women from harassment and claims his free speech is restricted. However, he has apparently obeyed those laws even though he doesn't like them.

david f, I never claimed that you wrote "that Graham was charged with incitement and harassment" - I stated the exact opposite, namely that it is you alone who have made that unjust accusation. Are you incapable of understanding the written word?
It is you alone who made the charge of harassment and incitement, and you alone who must own those words. My point, clearly understandable to any person of reasonable intelligence, was that, since police DID NOT lay any such charges, your accusation was therefore groundless.
If you are going to enter this debate, the first requirement is that you take responsibility for your own written words, don't try verballing me. That's not honest.

Well said and well done, Graham! A point well made.

Clear and penetrating.

Some laws were made to be broken.

Dear Peter D,

The accusation I made was that GP wants the freedom to harass women who go to an abortion clinic. I stand by that accusation.

'The accusation I made was that GP wants the freedom to harass women who go to an abortion clinic'

not nearly as vile as those who promote, profit and encourage the killing of the unborn David G.

David f,
You keep accusing Graham of harassment. I don't see why. Seems to me his protest was entirely silent and peaceful.

I can see how it would have been bad for business ($$$) on that day at the abortion clinic.

It's really quite hilarious, david f. You say it is wrong to criticise a person who goes to an abortion clinic for a purpose with which you disagree, and to do so amounts to harassment. Isn't that exactly what you are doing? Look in the mirror.
The bottom line here is that Graham has taken an immensely courageous and principled stand in upholding the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, in particular in relation to the Declaration on the Rights of the Child, and he has logically chosen to do so at a location where those declared rights are most openly and flagrantly violated, and he has done so in the face of extreme harassment and abuse, to which he never responds in kind. It is quite simply a lie to state that he is guilty of harassment.
If you want the Universal Declaration of Human Rights torn up, just say so, and have the courage to make your stand in a public place, as Graham has done. If you accept Australia's obligation to uphold those declared human rights, then you have no case against Graham.

Runner have you forgotten male circumcision, but of course to you that would be ok, it is still mutilation, freely done in the USA

A fetus is not a child so the rights of the child do not apply. Those who oppose a woman's right to have an abortion disregard the interests of women. They would return us back to a bloody past with back yard abortions which often resulted in a woman's death or inability to have children at a later date. Let us lessen the need for abortion by having all girls and boys taught methods of birth control so there are few accidental pregnancies. There will still be a few cases where a woman's circumstances will change during pregnancy so she will want an abortion. In those cases a medically safe procedure should be available.

I have noticed that those who would deny women the right to abortion are mainly men according to the names of the posters. Those women who are opposed to other women having the right to abortion need not get one themselves. The opposition to abortion apparently comes mainly from religious people. As is often the case with religious people they want to force others to conform to their beliefs. We may yet outlaw legal abortion and go back to the coat hanger and the backyard butcher. I for one hope those days are gone. Graham Preston and others would bring those bloody days back.

The law that keeps GP and others from harassing women who are going to get an abortion is a good law. If Graham can't make abortion illegal he would still like to be able to harass women. That is his 'courageous' stand.

Foetuses have a right to live, but they don’t have a right to live at the expense of someone else’s body. No-one does.

No-one here would think that that law should force a woman to donate a kidney to their child if they were the only ones who could provide it; so why does a foetus have special rights that no-one who has been born is afforded?

This is the contradiction in the anti-abortionist’s logic, and it’s the reason why Graham Preston’s article falls flat on its face and may be dismissed as nonsense.

All this talk of "rights" make me sick:

"human rights", "woman's right", "rights of the child", "right to live" (including of foetuses), "right to abortion", "right to free speech", "right to privacy"... and down the bottom of this page, "All rights reserved."

I claim that my life is God-given.
Others say that their life is their own.
Others again say that their life is from nature.

Actually, those three statements do not contradict each other.

But one thing is clear and obvious: Life is NOT from the state. Life is NOT state-given.

A 'right' is kind of a favour bestowed by a stronger entity, presumably by their mercy and grace and for which we are supposed to be thankful and indebted.
A 'right' can therefore be also taken away at any time just as it was bestowed.

No, we don't owe our life to the state or its government!
No, we don't owe them anything. We are not indebted to them in any way.
No, we don't need their token 'right' to confirm our life and freedom.

It is wrong to take away our freedom.
It is wrong to take away our life.

- but this has nothing to do with "rights".