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The Forum > Article Comments > Criminals, Easter and Australian values > Comments

Criminals, Easter and Australian values : Comments

By Warwick Marsh, published 13/4/2017

Believe it or not, Easter celebrates a man who died a criminal's death and became the foundation for what are commonly called 'Australian Values'.

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" (Although disputed) at the time of Federation, Irish Gaelic was the Australia's second language."

I'll dispute that, although I'd agree that Irish was the second language in the time of Macquarrie and for some years after.

Few second generation Irish from 1850 onwards learnt the language as their parents saw no point in teaching them.
Posted by Is Mise, Tuesday, 18 April 2017 8:59:49 AM
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Hi Killarney,

Sir Robert Peel brought about a substantial reform of those execution laws in the 1820s, so that execution was only to be used in cases of murder, rape and treason.

Apart from those who were transported for stealing a handkerchief or a slice of bread for their starving families, there were some more accomplished thieves: one of my gr-gr-grandfathers was nicked for pinching a hundred sheep, up in the Scottish borderlands. Another pinched bolt of expensive cloth but was arrested trying to sell it up the street. Ah, that explains the feeble-mindedness. She was given the option of execution or transportation: she complained that she got sea-sick, so didn't want to be transported. The judge ordered that anyway, for which I am grateful.

As for "enduring the lash", etc., I suspect that few of my ancestors were ever actually lashed: the sheep-thief above went to work straight away employing his expertise for Mrs McArthur, and another was soon pardoned after helping to build one of the early roads around Warragamba (they named a bay there after him; now flooded).

Yes, the enclosure acts, etc.: I worked back on Ancestry.com a few generations, and noticed that my ancestors came from smaller and more remote areas the further back I went - then it struck me (I really am a slow learner) that, in real time, going forwards, they came from VERY remote hamlets (not even villages) in border country, then on to larger settlements, then larger still, and so on: in other words, they were sucked out of remote farming areas into the Industrial Revolution but, given their innate criminality, turned to crime instead. Hence their transportation. Hence me. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

But I always wanted to find an ancestor who came from beautiful Kerry, from Killarney: no such luck :(

Cheers,

Joe
Posted by Loudmouth, Tuesday, 18 April 2017 9:29:30 AM
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Dear Killarney,

I think that your last comment is a bit selective:

Those who repeatedly make the life of others miserable should be sent away on a one-way trip to Mars and beyond. In 18th century England, being left without your horse could mean that you needed to make your way back home on foot in the snow. If you ever had to walk several kilometres in deep snow that comes inside your boots, then you would appreciate the removal of such perpetrators from society. The same applies today for the heartless spammers and producers of computer viruses, malware and ransomware, or are those poverty-crimes?

The people who invented Easter were men, not women, and men generally do not consider a nearly-naked man on a cross as a sexual object. Easter symbolises the willing to sacrifice oneself, life and comforts, out of love for others, whereas the pagan customs which you consider to be spiritual and represent rebirth and renewal, encouraged care-free but irresponsible carnal pleasure, resulting in babies.

Everything felt wonderful in spring, but winter-come, those babies had to be fed and when there was not enough to go around, they resorted to poverty-crimes, then the gentry had to introduce laws that restrict and regiment our lives, laws from which we suffer till today.

Genuine paganism can be great and spiritual, at times even austere, but it should not be misused to create cycles of wantonness followed by suppression, broken by renewed wantonness, crushed by further suppression, etc.
Posted by Yuyutsu, Tuesday, 18 April 2017 10:29:09 AM
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Joe, Is Mise, Yuyutsu

I thought I had put up an earlier comment in reply, but on checking back here, it's missing. Perhaps I pressed the wrong button.

I had said in that comment that there were several interesting points raised that I'd like to address but I have major work deadlines this week and don't have time to get into an exchange.

Just one point to clear up, Yuyutsu. I wasn’t using ‘-porn’ in the sense of sexual pornography. I meant it as it’s sometimes used nowadays to describe repetitively over-gratuitous or sensationalised imagery or metaphors
Posted by Killarney, Thursday, 20 April 2017 1:29:07 AM
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