It will be interesting to see how many people read this. I will not be one of them.

To my mind a fair and reasonable argument from someone who knows what they are talking about. Not all will agree, but it can only help to read what you are disagreeing about (which is in itself a widespread problem).

I'd go as far as to say the deliberate cruelty seen in government policy towards refugees and asylum seekers crawled out of the same pool of moral and intellectual dishonesty that gave us the Centrelink robo-debt fiasco.

Graeme Gibson

Graham Gibson...
Honest people have nothing to fear!
The refugee rorting had to be stopped. If you consider that cruel, I suggest your on the wrong page!

I presume that the sensitive author would condemn one of biggest acts of cruelty that persists to date:

FREE TIBET!

Water boarding and various other tactics are well and truly calculated. Lack of commentary of actual figures from govt ; should be a concern as to Manus or Naru. What are the truthful figures, of those in custody and arrival numbers if there were none it would be common knowledge, but that is very shadowy to say the least.
Numbers do not deplete from those detention centers so we are not being told anything.

The usual drivel from this fool. The "Refugees" are trying to play the Australian people as is the author. Give refugees residency and safety and the first thing they do is fly back "Home". The place they fled in fear of their lives. Just to marry or set stuff up but not enough to affect their Centrelink payments.It is so common no one even comments anymore.
We take more refugees than Saudi Arabia or Japan but to the odious Professor we are the bad guys.
Peace Prize - do not make me laugh. Just look who they have awarded to.
The defence rests.

The genuine Peace Movement is damaged by this farrago of abuse,( “politicians and bureaucrats seem to derive pleasure from appearing strong by playing with people's lives”)and ignorance (“with Iranian and Russian connivance, the Syrian government tortures, kills, burns bodies and, like the proverbial psychopath, the President denies the undeniable. In their bestiality alliance with President Assad, the al-Qaeda affiliates and the Isis support groups use every conceivable cruelty …).
And he doesn’t ask himself why if there is “ inadequate medical care of refugees on Nauru” they do not take the offer to return home.

Yuyutsu

Free Tibet ?
In Australia the Chinese are God!

So here we have another of these totally useless, worthless academics, happy to sit on their fattening ass, sucking their sustenance from the taxpayer teat. These types have never done a single productive thing in their entire miserable lives, but always have their hand out for more of what is produced by others.

Not content with that, they want to dictate how we spend anything left after they & the bureaucracy have sucked us dry.

What a pity we can't find another island somewhere to banish these ingrates to, where they would have to fend for themselves or starve. The same thing we should be doing with the gate crashers, masquerading as refugees.

People like this bloke make me want to puke.

when unelected public servants overturn the Minister's decision to deport paedophiles, rapist and thugs that have arrived as ' refugees' on boats how can you possibly win the arguement?

"Give refugees residency and safety and the first thing they do is fly back "Home". The place they fled in fear of their lives."

Hi JBower,
I agree..take the news story today re the 12yr old girl killed in Baghdad, the whole family back there, supposedly visiting a sick grandfather. They didn't say dying even, just sick.

The whole family flew back to the war torn country they supposedly fled from. Fair enough if say, the father flew back to visit the grandfather, but the whole family including the 12yr old daughter?

No. Just no. Wrong on every level.

Dear JBowyer,

«Give refugees residency and safety and the first thing they do is fly back "Home". The place they fled in fear of their lives. Just to marry or set stuff up but not enough to affect their Centrelink payments.»

Hold your horses...

You don't need to give anyone residency, safety or payments.
But do not lock them up either - that's cruelty!

If they take a boat and drown, let them drown, it's their own doing.
If they somehow manage the trip and get on shore, let them be - don't help them, don't stop them either.
If they cause trouble, harassing Australians and/or their property - shoot them, that's legitimate self-defence, but make their death as unpainful as possible.
If they want to go home - let them pay for their tickets back, or re-board their boats, that's none of your business.

In summary, treating them any worse than wildlife, is cruel, but treating them any better, is optional.

Whence this concept as if you need to accept and support them?
Oh, this stupid "refugee convention" which you have no intention to follow anyway - so be a man, take off your signature, don't pretend to follow it and don't torture others just to bluff that you are.

---

Dear Dan,

«In Australia the Chinese are God!»

In that case we need to free not only Tibet, but also Australia!

Garbage in garbage out that spuriously, fatuously tries to link refugees with stolen generations etc? And find myself in broad agreement with most of the other posters, save G3.
Alan B.

I suggest you are saying the right thing Alan B.

If I was a "Profesor Emeritus" like Stuart Rees, I would be telling my students this.

The reason why Australia will not bring sick or injured illegal immigrants from detention centres on Manus Island is because they will immediately claim refugee status upon reaching mainland Australia, even though they signed agreements stating that they would not do so.

The so called "stolen generations" were a figment of the imagination of a certain white activist and it was the biggest lie since Hitler's "Eternal Jew". The High Court of Australia has completely quashed the idea that the "stolen generations' ever existed and anybody can check that in seconds on Google.

Stuart's idea that "civilised" countries should not execute the worst kinds of dangerous criminals is simply his opinion. Let's have a referendum on this topic and end this once and for all. Like homosexual "marriage", Stuart does not want that because he knows that his side will lose. Democracy is a real impediment to the sort of socialist nirvana which Stuart dreams about.

I could not care less how much "Palestinian" land Israel "occupies." The Muslims ae the world's leading exponents of genocide and ethnic cleansing and if one of their former victims has turned the table on them, then good for them. If all Muslim "Palestinian" prisoners in Israeli jails starved themselves to death, I could not care less either. These people are Israel's and the free world's mortal enemies, and if they want to turn themselves into "good Muslims" then good for them

It appears to me that the reason Stuart Rees is incapable of writing a comprehensible article is that he cannot think straight.
A random sample of the rubbish he presents in the article bears this out: “ politicians and bureaucrats seem to derive pleasure from appearing strong by playing with people's lives. They might deny this, but for years they have been rejecting sympathy for the vulnerable even by trampling on them.”
It is English, but put together in a way that makes no sense.
I endorse the approach of ttbn. Refrain from reading anything by this author.

Graeme Gibson

I will suggest this should be stop and there should be no room for cruelty.

moonshine
How could this happen? maybe some one scared them away because the action they took does not really save them from danger.

Perhaps someone can help me:

* Australia has an annual quota for a refugee intake, I think it's currently 14,000 ? Compare that with New Zealand's six hundred;

* there are 68 million refugees in the world. Surely a sizeable portion of those have filled out all the right forms to be selected to come to Australia, then sat and waited, penniless in some ghastly desert camp. And waited. And waited. I talked to a lovely, bright and bubbly African woman who had spent eighteen years in a camp in Guinea waiting.

* My puzzlement is: if people come here illegally, if they jump the long, long queue, would they be counted in the annual allocation ? So, if we accepted those who have been able to afford to make the payments to officials and smugglers, would they displace some of those poor buggers (funny, I don't see any bleeding hearts thinking of them) and make them wait another year ? And wait ? And wait ?

* so would relatively wealthy 'refugees' have a way to get preference over those poor buggers with nothing, stuck in their desert camps ? Waiting ? And waiting ?

Those who try to come here illegally shouldn't be mistreated of course: they could be sent back to their departure points, asked politely to fill out all the right form and wait their proper turn. And wait. And wait. You know ? like those poor buggers with nothing, in desert camps ?

Joe

Joe this has been remarked on many times about these line jumpers. The resident soft left think we have to acceded to any blackmail and so they have to be let in.
Think of Iranians flying into muslim Malaysia because they will not refuse any muslim. They then go over to Indonesia and pay for a boat, or used to. Then on to Christmas Island and we "HAVE" to take them. They were safe in Iran but lied and said they were not. Had refuge in muslim Malaysia but who wants to live in that muslim hell hole. Then on to another muslim country and on to Atheist Australia and we are the bad guys?
Believe me if the current idiot politicians do not stop this nonsense then we will vote in someone who will.