Sorry mate.

Now that Australia has done ANZAC Day 100 the issue is off the politician's bland speech to-do list.

Now its politicians' mock concern sound-bight Day for 2 dead drug barons.

Pete

I agree with McIntyre about the sanitised image a lot of Australians have of WW1, that war, and this goes for any in history, is just utter brutal hell on earth. I mean, sure today, we have 'rules of engagement' but that is just dumbing down and humanising conflict in the first place.
If war is not shown in all its total ugliness and destruction, and that includes any battle within the realms of WW1. it will, and has become a relatively easy option to solve international disagreements, including in today's world. This 'humanising effect of war' started with 1864 Geneva convention.

War is War, period. It should mean exactly that.

The only orders soldiers should follow are that from their higher military command to achieve military objectives placed on the military by Politicians. How those objectives are achieved should be an open book. Its the end result that matters. This may sound over the top and harsh but the way I see it, war should be ugly, utterly violent & downright brutal. THAT is the only way to steer a course towards long lasting peace. Too much humanising of war (rules of engagement etc.) will only lead to the temptation in today's world that it is 'another way' to solve conflict.

I can't stress enough to emphasise the fact that sheer military conflict should be totally brutal and violent. No mercy. It is the only way to deter war in the first place.

If war is hellish and downright terrifying enough it will force other options to solving conflict such as the use of the term 'compromise'. A rare word in today's world. Because compromise is the only way to have ever lasting peace.

Despite the blathering of these anti-Anzac, anti-anything Australian malcontents, the Anzac crowds are steadily increasing.

Most Australians have never heard of these whingers and whiners.

They will be back next year, along with anti- Christmas misanthropes, and every year after that until enough people are bored with their misery and hatred, and refuse to respond to them.

I think Dilan is trying to muddy the waters here. This is a professional and industrial issue, not a free speech issue. There is a world of difference between the things that one should be prevented from saying by law, and the things one can legitimately be sacked for saying.

I completely support McIntyre’s right to tweet things about the ANZACs, and those commemorating ANZAC day, that many find offensive. And I completely support SBS’s decision to sack him for doing so.

Twitter is not a private conversation, and McIntye is not an anonymous citizen – he is a reporter for a national and publicly funded broadcaster. His comments reflect poorly on that organisation and on his judgement and impartiality as a journalist.

Freedom doesn’t mean the right to do things without restraint. If you accept a public position, you accept the restraints that go with it.

As a satirist he perhaps overstates the case, but I think P.J. O'Rourke sums up the basic point quite well:

“There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences.”

McIntyre can exercise high rights, but shouldn’t whine about the consequences.

War is failure. The failure to come to a peaceful/civilized settlement.
War is mass murder. Old men and women far from the battlefield send young people to kill and maim other young people.
War is brutal and brutalising to soldiers and civilians. Why so many veterans with PTSD? Why so many veterans committing suicide? Why so many civilians killed? >100,000 civilians have died in Iraq.

War is never about ideals such as freedom and democracy - it is about gaining territory and access to strategic resources like oil, gas, farming land, shipping channels, and in the future, water.

Far from advancing our freedoms and liberties, we have lost vital legal protections and freedoms since the War on Terror began. Some people are now below the law and are killed without due process and can be held without charge in prisons like Guantanamo for a decade or more. As a former NSA head said "we kill people based on metadata" Is this what we are fighting for?

Ordinary people don't want war. We need to be pushed into it. It has happened so many times, it is like clockwork -
Vietnam - Gulf of Tonkin - never happened.
1st Gulf war Operation Desert Storm - babies tossed out of humidicribs - never happened.
2nd Gulf war - WMD did not exist. Reports that Iraq could attack Britain in 45 mins - false.
Afghanistan - to avenge 9/11 attacks - however most of the attackers were Saudis (our supposed allies). To defeat the Taliban - which has links with Pakistan military (another ally).
To defeat Al Qaeda which was funded by CIA - as seen in this clip of Hillary Clinton. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dqn0bm4E9yw

Millions marched against the 2nd Gulf War - we tried to stop it. We were not fooled by the lies. But we were unable to stop it - our government signed us up for an illegal pre-emptive war of aggression without parliamentary approval. We didn't get a say.

The ANZACs wanted us to remember them so we would never again follow our allies blindly into war. Lest we forget.

The sanitised Anzac version of WWI also hides the real truth of how the Australian population felt about the war.

During what was left of 1914 and for part of 1915, about 300,000 (mostly urban Protestant) young men, fired up on King and Country and the 'fact' that girls love a man in uniform and various other misguided forms of hero-whipped tomfoolery stormed the enlistment offices.

Those who didn't - boys on farms and Catholics - were rounded up with elaborately funded recruitment drives firing them up on King and Country and the 'fact' that girls love a man in uniform and other misguided forms of hero-whipped tomfoolery.

Yet despite all this, by the end of 1915, the enlistments flowed to a trickle and then all but stopped. In desperation, the government passed the draconian War Precautions Act, which censored and criminalised just about everything anyone could ever possibly say that could even mildly criticise the war. Even possessing sheet music for songs like 'I didn't raise my son to be a soldier' carried a prison term.

Despite all this, there were (up to) 100,000-strong anti-war rallies held in Melbourne and Sydney - the existence of which are all but buried by Australia's official Anzac narrative. Many anti-war activists were jailed, tortured and/or deported.

And despite all this, two conscription referendums in 1916 and 1917 were defeated by the general population, the second by a higher majority - making Australia the only British colony (indeed, only allied nation) that refused to allow conscription. It was also one of the only allied nations that refused to allow the execution of its deserters.

Every year, this proud 'other Anzac' history remains hidden and forgotten, except in the research notes of a trickle of academic writers, rarely ever climbing out of the footnotes of our official, mawkishly sentimental WWI narrative - of blokey courage, mateship, Anzac biscuits and 'becoming a nation'.