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 > Silencing the lambs: Asylum seekers are a metaphor for our times > Comments

Silencing the lambs: Asylum seekers are a metaphor for our times : Comments

By Isobel Blackthorn, published 24/6/2015

Not weak, vulnerable, bleaters, but remarkable lambs with the spirit and savvy to get out of whatever hellhole they've escaped from.

  1. Pages:
  2. 1
  3. 2
  4. 3
  5. All
Isobel, you have written a truly moving opinion piece which needs to become part of national, parliamentary and public policy debates in our great country Australia and internationally.

All to often the good citizens of Australia are too busy extinguishing bushfires and have too little time to become actively involved in scrutinising policies on asylum seekers, human rights or foreign policies that discriminate and delegitimise sovereign states like the Republic of Macedonia. We must not wait to be led. We must lead debates and policies for achieving better social, economic, democratic and ethical outcomes.
Posted by Macedonian advocacy, Wednesday, 24 June 2015 9:46:50 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
maybe Isobel you should use some of your compassion to meditate on the millions of displaced people who are waiting in refugee camps and have no money to pay people smugglers. If a tiny bit of logic enters your brain you will see those in the camps are really the 'innocent lambs'. I suspect it does not fit your politics as it doesn't the UN.
Posted by runner, Wednesday, 24 June 2015 10:37:51 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
I identify the moral and intellectual fakery of Isobel’s article as lying in the fact that she expects other people to be forced to pay against their will the costs of the values she pretends to hold but is not willing to pay for voluntarily.

“We must not wait to be led. We must lead. “

Good. Here’s your chance. I have already asked you and everyone criticising Australia’s asylum-seeker policy to undertake the costs themselves, and received only shrieks of silence in reply.

My humanitarianism has even drafted the Deed and Declaration of Trust that you can use to prove that your protestations of moral superiority are not fake.

Here it is. Open a trust account, and deposit as much into it as you believe should be spent on social justice for asylum-seekers. And circulate the deed to everyone who agrees with you, with instructions how to deposit into the trust account.

Then print and sign the deed, and then post the signed original in PDF back into this thread so anyone in Australia can sue you on it if they want.

“DEED AND DECLARATION OF TRUST

I, the undersigned, hereby solemnly and sincerely declare that I hold the whole of my property, both real and personal, ON TRUST to pay for all the costs of dealing with asylum-seekers to Australia with the compassion, and to the standards, I proclaim as good and morally necessary.

This includes all costs of:
• Ensuring their safety at sea and safely landing in Australian territory
• Health and identity checks
• Accommodation, food, health, mental health, sport, recreation, training during processing
• The costs of determination of refugee status, including all reviews administrative and judicial
• The costs of administration, including all premises, staff, salaries, tax, superannuation, workers compensation, holiday leave, flex leave, long service leave, maternity leave, study leave
• The costs of resettlement including income support, housing, and training
• Full indemnity for any crimes, including full costs of legal, court, admininstrative costs, and impact on victims..."

(cont.)
Posted by Jardine K. Jardine, Wednesday, 24 June 2015 11:36:23 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
(cont.)

“I declare I am appalled by, and condemn the moral depravity of current policy on asylum-seekers.

On that basis, I make this solemn declaration as legally binding with the intention that any person in Australia should have and does hereby have a legal action against me in law and equity for judgment as to the whole of my property in repayment of any and all of the above costs, in satisfaction of the values of humanity I have publicly declared without so far having to, or ever intending to, put my money where my mouth is.

SIGNED, SEALED AND DELIVERED

Isobel Blackthorn
Every member and supporter of the Labor party
Every member and supporter of the Greens
Every member and supporter of the Refugee Council of Australia
Every member and supporter of the Jesuit Refugee Service
Every member and supporter of the Refugee Advice and Casework service
Every member and supporter of the Asylum-Seekers Centre"
Posted by Jardine K. Jardine, Wednesday, 24 June 2015 11:40:28 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
Most of the bleating seems to be coming from seemingly paid activists, looking at their rapidly diminishing bank balances?

Rather than genuine asylum seekers, who to a person, are thankful for safe sanctuary!

Yes it's not perfect, but then we could say the same about our own orphanages, or about those forced to sleep rough, and sometimes for virtual decades.

And we have over a hundred thousand of the latter right here, and a far better place for our "forced" largess, than on uninvited economic migrants.

Perhaps if we could just have some BALANCED comparisons between our treatment of intending economic migrants; and those meted out in ASYLUM seeker camps in southern Thailand!?

Those bleating about how we treat ENTIRELY UNINVITED GUESTS, would have absolutely nothing to say!?

I didn't agree with how he went about it, but I entirely agree with what former P.M Howard said! "We shall decide who comes here and the manner of their arrival"!
Rhrosty.
Posted by Rhrosty, Wednesday, 24 June 2015 12:13:10 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
Another 'activist'. Woudn't have thought that there would have been much action in "rural New South Wales" where she lives. Everyone is an activist these days. Activism means ' a policy of taking direct and often militant action to achieve an end, esp a political or social one'.

Nothing about whimsy and naive nonsense which flies in the face of common sense, majority opinion, and the rule of law which protects our democratic way of life.

Leave activism out of Australia where it is irrelevant. Life doesn't get any better than it is here.
Posted by ttbn, Wednesday, 24 June 2015 2:21:43 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
This article makes me wonder what she's smoking at 4:00AM

Very trippy idea Isobel.
Posted by ConservativeHippie, Wednesday, 24 June 2015 2:35:21 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
Another fine White supremacist article from Isobel, "we" must lead eh? Is that "we" the people who invented the concept of human rights, albeit in an age when "we" were 2/3 of the world's population. Now that "we're" only 9% and falling that whole minority/majority thing is turned on it's head, as should be the concept of universal human rights.
Posted by Jay Of Melbourne, Wednesday, 24 June 2015 2:55:54 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
Does the author realise where the problem starts?

It starts with the obligations of the refugee convention, which demands that those who sign it, not only provide a safe-haven for arriving refugees, but also supply them with more than a reasonable person is willing to afford. On top of this, the convention forcibly defines who is a refugee, overriding common sense and making the process of sorting expensive in itself.

Once Australia withdraws from this stupid convention, which no government is willing to follow in truth and spirit anyway, the cruelty should stop because government will no longer feel that they must turn refugees away in order to protect Australians from the unacceptable costs that are required by that convention alone.
Posted by Yuyutsu, Wednesday, 24 June 2015 9:01:32 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
Come off the raw prawn love, if you think we are silly enough to fall for this garbage you are the fool.

We4 know none of these people are held against their will, they are just not permitted to enter Australia.

We the long suffering taxpayer will pay to fly them home any time they like, at our expense. They stay where they are, hoping clowns will bleat loudly enough to force us to take them in, & keep them for life, in the luxury we would like to achieve for ourselves.

Why don't you look around a little. You can find all types of more deserving people than these gate crashers, you could try to help. But please pay for your charity from your own pocket. I have other priorities, as do most taxpayers.
Posted by Hasbeen, Wednesday, 24 June 2015 10:08:34 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
Whether you like them or not, why are the people in question called "asylum seekers"?

Have they actually ever asked for asylum?

Why would they do so anyway, given that the Australian government firmly declared that they won't have it come what may?

What we have instead are seafarers, victims of piracy, snatched from their boats on the high seas without asking for anything, then arrested indefinitely in cruel and secret conditions.
Posted by Yuyutsu, Thursday, 25 June 2015 6:01:14 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
Isobel, I'm trying to defend you in an argument with an acquaintance who's arguing that you're a stinking hypocrite, and I'm telling him that you're not and I can prove it.

So could you please hurry up and post the signed original deed and declaration undertaking to pay for asylum-seekers to the standard that you say other people should be forced to pay for?

All the members of the ALP and Greens will sign, so you don't need to worry about losing all your property. I think. But even if that did happen, it would be worth it, wouldn't it? Wouldn't it?

Could you hurry up please?

Either post it or admit that you're a phony.
Posted by Jardine K. Jardine, Sunday, 28 June 2015 8:49:20 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
Great post, JKJ.

Stop it Conservative Hippie, your killing me! Hahaha!

Is it just me? Or has anybody else noticed a shift to the Right from our friend, Yuyutsu?

Yuyutsu from memory was always taking the humanitarian role, but now is sticking it to the humanitarians. Well done, Yuyutsu. You have turned away from the Dark Side.
Posted by LEGO, Tuesday, 30 June 2015 4:49:45 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
Dear LEGO,

<<Yuyutsu from memory was always taking the humanitarian role>>

I base my views on spiritual principles - at times they coincide with humanitarian values, at other times they do not.
Posted by Yuyutsu, Tuesday, 30 June 2015 8:35:24 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. 2
  4. 3
  5. All

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